Third Anniversary!

On the date of our anniversary Dennis was taking finals - I think he had two or three that day! So we really didn't do much celebrating. But, the week after we had a little celebration. This past year I was one of three very lucky teachers who got to be part of CITES Associates. Basically its a partnership between Provo School District and BYU, and 5 times a year we go on retreats. We read books and discuss them, and talk a lot about school stuff. The meetings are really great and I come away so excited about being a teacher - they are very inspiring! But, the best part is we get to eat for free and stay in nice hotels! The last of the meetings was in Park City in May. Dennis gets to come with me so we decided to go up a night early. Wednesday afternoon we drove up and checked into our room at the Westgate Resort at the Canyons Ski Resort.

The school district makes the reservations, and I have had two different types of rooms when have stayed here, but we totally lucked out and got the one bedroom luxury villa! We could have lived there! It was the same size as our last apartment. Here are some pictures :)

After we checked in we went to Main Street to get some dinner. But since May is between ski season and summer, not much was open. In fact, we only saw two or three restaurants that were open. So we played it safe and went to one that we have gone to before and loved.

We got the BBQ chicken pizzza - so good. And the leftovers stored nicely in our fridge. That night we had our choice of three pools to swim in at our hotel, so we chose the closest one. It was indoor, but had lawn chairs set up and the ceiling was painted like the sky so you almost felt like you were outside. There was nice music playing and two saunas and a hot tub. It was nice!

The next two days I had meetings from 8-3, but Thursday we went to a really nice dinner with everyone from my meetings. It may have been the best steak I have ever eaten! Its pricey here, but I highly recommend this restaurant:

It was so good! The resort had tennis courts and a basketball court, as well as a lot of other things to do, but unfortunately we didn't have time to do those things. Friday when my meetings were over we loaded up the car and headed down to St. Goerge. My good friend McKenzie and her parents were doing the St. George Ironman on Saturday, so we went down to cheer for them. It was really awesome to watch, although I don't think I could ever do something that challenging. McKenzie and her parents are incredible though, and all of them finished probably the most difficult race in Ironman history! Here are a couple of pictures.

This is right before the 2.4 mile swim. Girls have pink swim caps and guys have green.

 Right after the race started, a huge windstorm came. Dennis and I went for a little jog and soon realized they were swimming in five foot swells, and rescue boats were going around like crazy taking people out of the water. We were really worried about McKenzie because she had previously injured her shoulder and was already worried about the swim. I can't remember how many people got pulled from the swim - I want to say 300 -  but Dennis and I started wondering how many people were even going to make it. But McKenzie and her parents all made it before the cut off time! The 112 mile bike was next, we just caught the tail end of that, and it's way to hard to take a picture when they're riding that fast. Everyone was saying the 20 mile an hour winds and 40 mile an hour gusts made it a very difficult ride, probably the hardest part of this ironman. Then finally was the 26.2 mile run.

Or walk :) McKenzie is in the yellow. I would have hated running in this course because you have to do it three times, and its just up and down streets next to eachother in a neighborhood. And when I say up and down I mean you run down the hill, then turn around and run right back up it, then cross over to the next street and do it again. BUT - we got to see the runners a lot!

It is pretty incredible to watch an Ironman. It is probably the most grueling physically challenging event people compete in, and this one was the hardest of all. Even the pros were about 30 minutes slower than normal. But wow, when each person crosses the finish line, it is an incredible feeling of accompishment. Good job Lynette, Cory, and McKenzie!