On the outside, I try to project an image of having it all together. But underneath that, I'm kind of a disaster. Hence... the name of the site: GlossyVeneer. These past few days have been very busy and much of the time has been spent traveling. I don’t particularly care for sitting in a vehicle for that long, but this was time well spent because of the destinations.
On Thursday morning Kevin and I got in separate vehicles at my parent’s house, he in our Subaru to head back to home so he could work and me in the back of my parent’s Nissan to head to Northern Utah.
In Northern Utah we stayed at my paternal grandfather’s house. My grandmother passed away a couple years ago and it was very odd to stay at the house, I don’t think my grandpa has thrown away anything of my grandmother’s. Her makeup was still in the drawers, her magazines still stacked around the house. It was a little sad.
But part of this stop meant that I got to meet Loralee! She picked me up and we spent a couple hours chatting at a cute little coffee shop in the area. Talking to her is a lot like talking to her blog, she’s got a big, bold personality and a great energy. I wish I lived closer to her so we could hang more. We talked about some of our fears and excitement about attending BlogHer too, but I think it will be a really good time. I can’t wait to meet so many people at the conference.
On Friday morning at drove out to the farm lands in Northern Utah to see where my dad’s sister and her husband are building their retirement home. It’s huge, about 10,000 square feet or something on 5 acres. When I retire, I am not going to get more house and more land to maintain (and I definitely will not be getting some cattle like they intend to either!). It was a brief tour because we had to get on the freeway to head back to the Salt Lake City area to see my maternal grandparents.
My grandmother has been going through radiation for her second bout with breast cancer. Because of this new reminder of how fragile human life can be, she really wanted to get everybody together for photos and a meal/party. The photo taken was excruciating, she wanted a big group picture and photos of individual families. I was bummed that my husband couldn’t be there as it would have been nice to get a new photo of the two of us. My grandma had all sorts of weird rules about who could be in certain photos at certain times regarding step-kids and in-laws. I think everybody kind of chalked it up to a silly old person’s mind as opposed to anything vindictive though, which was good.
After all that fun, my parent’s and I got back in the car to drive to their home in southern Utah. We said goodbye to my brother and his family since they were planning on driving home to Denver directly from SLC the next morning. It was hard to say goodbye to them, I wish I lived closer to my brother.
On Saturday morning we got back in the car so my parents and I could meet Kevin at a halfway point and I could head back home. I’m very glad to be back at home in my own bed. But also a little disheartened to come home to find all of the Christmas mess that still needs to be cleaned up. I’m glad my husband enjoyed his time alone to play Halo 3 on the XBox, but couldn’t he have thrown away the wrapping paper disaster? 
We’ve gotta go use some gift cards now to purchase new sheets for our bed.
