A Trip to General Conference

We had the wonderful opportunity to attend General Conference this year. We had never gone as a family so we thought we better do it this year. With Spencer graduating and leaving for college we wanted to make sure we did this with him still home.

We flew up on Friday afternoon and took a shuttle to our hotel, which was the City Creek Marriott, right across the street from Temple Square. It was so convenient to be that close. We were able to walk everywhere we needed to go. We arrived and checked into our hotel. We then set out to see the new much hyped City Creek Shopping Mall the church had just finished building to enhance the whole Temple Square experience. It is a beautiful mall with many shops and restaurants. We walked over to the Joseph Smith Building and went and ate at the The Garden restaurant up on the very top floor. It has the most beautiful view of the temple. At night with the temple all lite up it is just a breath taking view.

The next day was Saturday. We did not have tickets to the morning session but Spencer & Ike decided they were going to try and get in at the standby line. They both left very early. The kids and I went and watched it in the tabernacle. Ike & Spencer unfortunately did not make it in to the conference center so they watched it in the tabernacle too. We did have tickets to the afternoon session so we headed over and had a wonderful experience. It was so neat to be able to sustain President Monson and all the General Authorities in person. The MTC choir sang during this session. It was so awesome to see all of them sing together. Including in the group was David Archuletta who was in the MTC on his way to a mission in Chile.

That night Ike & the boys had tickets to the Priesthood session so Taylor and I went and had a fun evening. We went to Ladies night at Deseret Book Store. There were a lot of activities going on there. We then went up to The Garden restaurant again and had a wonderful dinner.  It was so nice to spend time with just Taylor. She just seems to get more beautiful everyday. How I got so lucky to have her for my daughter I will never know. Love this girl!

On Sunday we again did not have tickets to the morning session but that did not stop Spencer and I from trying once again to get in through the standby line. Sunday morning was freezing. There was even snow forecasted for the day which it did end up snowing later that day. We had to stand outside for 2 hours before they brought us into the tabernacle to wait out the rest of the time. Unfortunately we did not make it into the conference center this time either. No one did. So once again we all watched the morning session in the tabernacle. After the morning session was over we all headed back to the hotel quickly because we had to checkout and store our luggage at the front desk. We did have tickets to the final session of conference. It was a wonderful way to end our weekend in Salt Lake City. After the final session ended we hurried back to our hotel to eat dinner and then we were off to the airport for our flight home to Phoenix. What a wonderful weekend we had at conference. The gospel affords us so many opportunities and conference is definitely one of those experiences you must do if you ever get the chance. I am so grateful we could go as a family to see General Conference live. By the way as Spencer always says, "The Church is True!"