We started off the day after Christmas going out to breakfast at Kneaders for all you can eat french toast. It was so yummy!
Our plan was to leave @ 1 in the afternoon, drive to Meridian and stay the night. We would have time to check into a motel, relax, and go out to dinner with our friends Kim and Angela Redding. Then we would get a nice start off in the morning and drive home in mostly daylight.
Well... that was a nice thought...
Goodbye Miss Hazel! We're going to miss you! Cute girl was sleeping when we left.
It was beautiful and sunny when we left.
We got to about Layton Utah, which is only an hour or so away from where we were staying when several check engine lights went on. Of course, it kind of freaked us out! We got off the nearest exit and called Melissa and Chaz. They found a Ford dealership for us to go to. We took the car in and 2 hours later, they had run all the codes and couldn't find anything wrong. That was good and bad! The mechanic told us that we could wait until tomorrow if we wanted to have it checked out more, but he couldn't guarantee that he could find anything wrong and if he did it may take a few days to fix and who knows how much $$$. He told us we could drive it around town and if it acted up again we could bring it right in. We decided to travel on and see what happens. We said lots of prayers and headed onto Boise.
When we were passing Ogden (another half hour or so) all the check engine lights came on again. We glided into a rest area near Brigham City wondering what to do. We decided to see if there was a dealership near by and trade it in. After Brigham City there is pretty much nothing and we didn't want to be stuck in the middle of nowhere in the cold and dark!
The first dealership we went to was closed. (It was the day after Christmas). We called another one and it was open until 7. It was 5 when we pulled into the parking lot. The dealership overlooked the Brigham City temple. (picture from when we went to visit it before in the summer time). It is Keagan's favorite temple. Melissa called it the polly pocket temple.
Well, it took a few hours, but we walked out with an almost new 2016 Dodge Caravan. It is definitely not what we planned or wanted.. but we do love the mini van! It is nice having a reliable car and one that we really like.
It was about 10 degrees out! BRRRRRR! We took off about 9:30 starving and not knowing any of the vans buttons and gadgets! That night we drove to Twin Falls Idaho and spent the night. We got there @ 11 that night and crashed!
We drove by the beautiful Twin Falls Temple. It is one of the smaller temples. I love to see the temple! I love how beautiful each temple is and I love the peace I feel when I see it and walk on the grounds.
Before we left Twin Falls, we were checking the weather and were really worried. It showed snow most of the way to Pendleton and through the Blue Mountain range. We were scared to drive through that! Ray called our good friends that live in Meridian and we decided to stay with the Reddings in Meridian. It was a good thing we got to do this because just a few miles down the road there was a huge sign above the freeway saying the I84 was closed from Ontario Oregon to Pendleton.
So, even if we tried to brave it, we couldn't of gone on.
We got to the Reddings around noon. Both of their older girls, Kelli and Lauren were home for the Holidays and it was so fun visiting and catching up with them, too. We love the Redding family!!!
Kim drove us to the construction site of the new Meridian Idaho temple. It is beautiful! Kim told us that they just barely completed the outside. Now they are working on the inside. The complete date is estimated for September 2017.
Thank you Reddings for letting us stay with you! We really enjoyed our visit!
We got up the next morning and left @9:30. The roads weren't bad, but not good either. I drove. I white knuckled it the whole time I drove. Luckily, the traffic was going slow.
We cheered when we drove down into Pendleton! The temperature rose to a balmy 45 degrees! And there was sunshine and no snow! It was green! And there was moisture in the air!
After that, the drive was beautiful! I love that area of the windmills on one side and the water on the other side. It was so sunny, too! We saw Mt. Hood peaking out.
After we passed The Dalles, our google maps gave us a warning that there was a traffic slow down in the Portland area. (Big surprise!) So, it rerouted us to the Bridge of the Gods and to the cascade highway. It was beautiful! We ended up in Vancouver and missed all that traffic. I think we may do this route next time!
We got home about 6:30. We were so happy to be home and be home at a reasonable hour! We walked into the house and were hit with a nasty smell!! We couldn't figure it out. It was so fun getting home to several Christmas cards in the mail. We were sitting down reading them when Keagan opened up the fridge. Found the smell! UGH! Our fridge and freezer died. We think it died pretty early from our trip. The freezer side was de-thawed and warm. There was lots of mold on the cheese. GROSS!! Luckily we have another fridge, so we got that old one cleaned out and food thrown out. (Luckily our garbage can was empty and garbage day was the next morning...)
This is the way I felt about our journey home...
We decided to think of all our many blessings!
- We got to go to Utah and see Hazel, Melissa, and Chaz!
- The car didn't die in a dead area where there was no people!
- We were able to get a car that we really like and that will be dependable for a long time!
- We made it safely there and back!
- We got to visit with our good friends!
- We have good friends!
- We got to see some beautiful temples.
- We made it safely home!
- We had another refrigerator.
- Most of our expensive food was in the outside fridge and freezer
I'm sure there are many other blessings that we can't think of at the moment, but we are very grateful for all that we have and refuse to let any of this get us down... for very long. I was sad for a little bit, but I'm looking at the bright side of things!
