Anniversarized!

Maaa-widge.  Maaa-widge is what bwings us togevah today.

If you haven't seen "The Princess Bride," then that first sentence won't make a lick of sense to you, but I'm okay with that.

Can you believe it's been 11 years since that blissful, rainy, wedding day in May when Stephen and I got married?  Psh-yeah!  I guess the saying holds true, "Time flies when you're having fun!"

 And speaking of fun, I thought that it would be fun to do a little "then-and-now" blog post commemorating our anniversary.  So, here it goes, folks.  Enjoy.

Then (May 2003):

Our wedding day.

And now:

Anniversarizing selfie at a restaurant in Park City

What differences do you notice between then and now?


I didn't see any either.


Moving on to the next "then-and-now" pictures.  Here we see Steve back in 2003 in what appears to be him posing with dramatic hand gestures on a mountainside.

Steve hiking Mount Timpanogos

 Compared to now, you will see that he is still posing with dramatic hand gestures on a mountainside. 

Steve striking a "biathlon" pose at the Olympic Park facility in Park City.

Moving on.

Back then, the camera obviously malfunctioned and superimposed an unfortunate facial expression on me whilst I was sitting next to a shockingly attractive man:

Our wedding reception

And now, we see that technology hasn't improved fast enough and the camera is still malfunctioning and superimposing an unfortunate facial expression on me whilst I stand next to the same shockingly attractive man:

At the Olympic training facility

Moving right along,

Back then... the happy couple in front of a temple spire surrounded by gorgeous flowers:

Our wedding day in front of the Mount Timpanogos Temple

 Now... same sweet couple, but with an Olympic spire jutting out from the female's head:

Eh.  Bad shot.  Bright sun in our faces, background of boring, spire of strangeness...

Okay, that was fun.  My, my, the years are progressively and exponentially speeding up!

For our 11-year anniversary, my mom took our children for the weekend to go play with aunts, uncles, and cousins on the Wasatch Front while Steve and I spent 2 nights in Park City.

We stayed at the Peaks Resort and had a nice time, complete with complementary sparkling cider, and $10 off our meals at the onsite restaurant, but we probably won't stay there again.
 

The rooms were clean and comfortable, the beds were soft, the hotel staff was nice, but the plumbing needs work.  The first night, we stayed in a basic ADA room with queen bed, but sadly the shower had hardly any water pressure and it was cold.  Plus, that room was right across from the pool and was definitely not sound proof, so we could hear all the traffic of every person that went in and out of that pool.  At least the pool was sound proofed, so we didn't hear all that hubbub.

The next night we were in the King Suite with the jacuzzi tub, which is a really nice room,

but I warn you, do not turn on the jets in the tub!  First off, the tub is old and has lots of surface cracks, but it's using the jets that will really trouble you. 
When we turned them on, a horrendous sewer-y sulfur-y smell permiated the place.  Yeah, we're not going there again.

The on-site restaurant we looked forward to for our breakfast, and they served us good food.

Steve got the breakfast buffet special

I got a version of Eggs Benedict with sauteed spinach and tomato served with roasted red pepper hollandaise on the side.  The poached eggs were cooked perfectly.

But, sadly, when we went to use our food vouchers, the restaurant was flustered that we were using it and made us feel bad because "it's a good deal for the hotel, but a bad deal for the restaurant because they actually lose money on all the voucher users."  Sad, sad, sad.

Speaking of restaurants, there were many eating options in Park City, especially compared to where we live.  So, the first night, Steve didn't eat all day to save up his appetite, and we went all out and ate at the Red Rock Brewery, which turned out some expensive and delicious food.  We ordered the sweet potato canneloni and wild mushroom polenta to share.

Menu at Red Rock Brewery

The food was super-yummers and cheesy-rich, but it also came in "fancy, fine-dining" portions, so Steve was still hungry afterwards.  When we finished at the restaurant, we literally drove around the corner, where Steve ordered a burger and fries at Five Guys.

Funny us.

The next day for lunch we ate at a deli on Main Street that had decent prices and decent food.

And for dinner, I picked up some ethnic-y food from Whole Foods Market and ate it at Taco Bell where Steve ordered his favorite Doritos tacos and beefy 5-layer burrito.

Thai Chicken Spring rolls with peanut sauce, a few greek olives and stuffed grape leaves, and spinach salad with red onion, feta, pecans, and cranberries.

mmm... tacos!

We went to the Olympic Park and looked around at their facilities and small museum.  We were going to go on a tour there, but the tour filled up with only one seat remaining.  We opted to just walk around.

We also watched a movie at the theater- The new spiderman movie, which was not very good in my opinion.  I don't remember why, I just remember having to walk out because it was too disturbing for me.  We went to another theater and watched "Heaven is For Real."  It was okay.  Steve loves movies, but it is really hard to please me, especially with all the gunk that they throw in them these days.  'Nuff said.

We perused some shops on Main Street.

Cool, HUGE Amethyst

But we mostly spent our time at the Park City Museum learning about the mining and the skiing history behind the now resort town.  I really loved the museum and I learned a lot.

The World's first underground ski lift, a failed venture, but holds a fascinating history.

A mining bike that would ride the tracks in the mine.

Can you find the snowboarder we made for Lily and Amara?  Their names are on the snowboard.

We've heard tell that Steve had an ancestor that settled Park City during the mining time and that nearby "Snyderville" is named after him.  We think "George Snyder" might be the guy.  He has his own feature at the museum.

 

All in all, we had a wonderful anniversary celebration.  On Sunday we visited the Family Search center on Main Street in Park City, and got a tour, watched a nice video about families, then we went to a single's ward, which was fun, before we drove home.  Consider us officially "Anniversarized!"