The perfect trip.....the temple and Ikea

The day started out with a trip to the Seattle temple with my good friend Rhonda and her daughter Nora. We attended the sealing of a special family in our ward. It was so beautiful to witness this marriage and sealing of chidren to parents. I remember not too long ago when our family was sealed for time and eternity in the same temple, thank goodness without all the hammering, but what is interesting is that I noticed it before the friends entered the room, but not during the ceremony. Work was being done on the steeple (see photo). We took advantage of the lovely sun and had Shari Whyte's lovely neice take this photo of the three of us.
Nora. She is just such a special girl. I am so thankful that Mae is only 5 months younger so that they can grow up being close friends. I sure love this Nora girl. Woohoo....we arrive. It is hot and it seems that Ikea has added extra parking since our last visit. That means more people and more languages to overhear inside! :)
We spent about 3 hours in Ikea. It is so overwhelming. There are so many people and so much to look at. You could seriously spend all day there and not see everything. We came to Ikea with grand ambitions. Rhonda even came with a full sheet of paper of measurements for all sorts of things. After 3 hours.....this is what the back of her van looked like. Mind you, half is mine.
Not much, I know. I think we both ended up with 1 or 2 things from our original list. I did find some great things. Here's what I ended up with after 3 hours!
-lazy susan for kitchen table
-spice rack
-maple step stool
-mortar and pestle
-12 glass cups
-6 plates
-2 sets of silverware
-stuffed animal for Mae
-cups for Mae
-kitchen rug
-dish towels
Oh well, it was tons of fun. Definitely more fun than trying to figure out how to get back to the ferry. Rhonda and I are both spacecadets after sensory overload. We also learned that I talk loud (I am deaf in one ear) and she has acute hearing. You'd think we would have figured it out in the 6 years we have been friends. Anyhow, it was a great trip and it was so nice to reconnect with my close friend. I don't know when I will go to Ikea again. I think I might just stick to the catalog and online ordering next time. Ciao!

Ps- Watched "My Blueberry Nights" with Jude Law, Natalie Portman and Rachel Weisz recently and I just have to say that it was AWFUL! I think they were trying to do the "Four rooms" type film and it just didn't work out very well. Awful awful awful! I lasted about 45 minutes and turned it off.