What a great 4th of July weekend it was! It's probably one of my favorite holidays, just because I love learning about and remembering the history of the American Revolution.
This year, I got to reunite with an old friend and spend the weekend together. Ashley Whitesides came down from Syracuse, UT to go to Stadium of Fire with me. I haven't seen her in about 5 years! It was great to get together. It's amazing how much we've both changed, but at the same time are very much the same as we were back then.
She came into town on Friday night, and we watched Shrek with another girl and guy in the ward. It's been so long since I've seen that movie! Very funny :)
Then we stayed up pretty late just talking and reminiscing about the past. Good times.
Ashley was sleeping in the extra bed in our apartment. We slept in pretty late. :) After breakfast and showers we went out to her car and found this waiting for us:
Darn the Provo parking authorities!
Waiting for the parking guy to come take off the boot
Oh well, I took care of the fine, picked up a parking pass for her, and then we were finally on our way.
Our first stop was the Freedom Festival downtown. There were lots of booths selling cool stuff and we walked around for a couple hours. We both got some hair flower clips that we love. Here's a picture of mine:
I love the yellow :)
Cotton candy!
The Boy Scouts' Native American villiage
Inside the teepee
Plus, we got a picture with THE coolest guy ever!
He had tons of bells on his ankles for dancing. It was sweet.
And of course we had to get our picture taken in front of the huge American flag hanging on the Mexican restaurant downtown.
We were now pretty hungry, so we headed to J Dawg's for some big hot dogs with special sauce.
Delish!
Sadly, we didn't take any pictures there.
After that, we visited the bookstore and walked around campus a bit, making a short stop in the art museum.
And then we hit up the Creamery on Ninth for some famous ice cream.
Ashley got the Cookies & Cream
I had a Raspberry Refresher
(raspberry sherbet, vanilla soft-serve, Sprite, and limeade-- oh baby!)
We took a drive up to the base of the Y Trail to get a look at the valley. Pretty sweet view.
After that we headed to the Provo Temple, and had to make due with pictures outside the gate since they were closed.
Squinty!
We even stopped at the MTC to take pictures by the sign out front. We didn't know where to park, so we started pulling in and got stopped by the "MTC police"!! hahaha
I pulled off an innocent voice and asked where we could park to take pictures.
Tons of elders were out playing on the fields for P-day.
Ashley was like, "I've never seen so many missionaries before!" hehe
We had to hurry and snap pictures fast because there was a district waiting to take theirs, too. Awkward...
Greatest. picture. ever.
Too bad my eyes were closed. Sad day.
Thumbs up!
Then we went to go pick up dinner to eat at my apt. By this time we were fighting the Stadium of Fire traffic. We ended up driving in circles around Provo (trying to find a restaurant that was open) until we finally decided on Cafe Rio.
hehehe.. we got brave and asked someone to take our picture while we were standing in line.
I think just about every person in Provo was eating there. The line was out the door.
Look at the kid in the lower right hand corner-- hahaha!
By the way, I haven't been a fan of Cafe Rio until now. I got the pork burrito and it was delicious! The funny thing was that I ate half of it, set it down, looked at it for a while, and then realized that I think I'd gotten someone else's order. Whoops! Hahaha.
We ate out by the pool at Glenwood. This guy named Arturo ("you gotta roll the R!") came and talked to us for a bit. He found out I was from Orlando and immediately got excited and started asking me about universities in Florida that he could attend. He wants to do tourism studies. Nice guy, and funny that we happened to meet.
After eating, we got ready for Stadium of Fire, then walked over to the stadium. So many people were out an about. It was crazy!
Our seats were in the very top row of the end zone. Not so great seats to see the performances, but great seats for the fireworks!
Carrie Underwood came out for just a minute at the beginnign to sing the National Anthem.
They had dancers do an awesome opening performance. One of Ashley's cousins was a dancer, so that was pretty cool! They were awesome!
Jenny Oaks Baker (Elder Oaks' daughter and a famous violinist) played a very fun song with a small group of other violinists. I was blown away by how fast she played! She was totally rocking out!
There was a tribute to the Boy Scouts, celebrating the 100th anniversary of Scouting this year, complete with the world's oldest Eagle Scout at 96 years old (!) who opened the ceremony. They created the world's largest Eagles' Nest to honor 200 new Eagle Scouts. They had every person in the stadium who was an Eagle stand up, then the new Eagles got their badges. Pretty sweet.
The Osmonds 2nd Generation (totally boy-band sounding, but they still good) sang right after that. They are all Eagle Scouts, and they sang "Fly Like and Eagle" and "I Believe I Can Fly." Cheesey, but fun. :)
After some other presentations, the 5 Browns did a performance. They played a medley of Star Wars songs. I was in hea-ven! It was so cool. They are really awesome.
Finally, Carrie Underwood took the stage to perform.
Boy, was she great! I see now why she is Entertainer of the Year. I was surprised by how spiritual she was, too! She sang three of her sad songs (I cried, a lot), and at the end of one of them she added a few lines from "How Great Thou Art." It was breathtaking. She's just amazing. (Plus, she sang my favorite jam-out, girl-power song, "Before He Cheats." hehe)
After she was done, the fireworks started up. They did like 3 segments of fireworks with breaks in between for patriotic video presentations and stuff. The fireworks were great. I saw a few new kinds that I liked, like the "fireflies" (as I called them), and the huge orange globes. Sweet!
On our way home we stumbled upon a street dance party going on right outside the stadium and we stayed to dance for an hour or so. It was a lot of fun, and very spontaneous. :) We were pretty tired after that...lol.
Ashley spent the night again and went to church with me. We have church at 9, and I didn't wake up until like 8:41. That was a little stressful. Sarah, my roommate, didn't wake up until I knocked on her door 5 minutes after I got up. I totally freaked out and started rushing around looking for a ride to church (I had to conduct the music in sacrament meeting), until Ashley reminded me that she had a car. Dur. lol. So we made it on time, and I managed to look fairly put-together.
After church, Ashley stayed for a couple hours. We ate our Cafe Rio leftovers-- still delicious-- and cookie dough, and watched Pride &Prejudice (the Keira Knightly version). Ashley had to leave before the movie was over so she could make it home in time for a family celebration. It was so good getting to see her. I'm so glad we did this!
What a great 4th of July weekend! Happy Birthday America!
2 comments:
I love Carrie Underwood too, that's so cool you got to see her perform!Glad you had so much fun Alexa!!! <3 Alicia
You're sure on top of everything! Putting the pictures up on facebook & updating the blog :)
Which might i add was very cute & loved this entry. I'm SO very glad that i was able to go down & see you. Didn't take too long so i'll have to do it more frequently. Love you girly!
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