April has brought us some spring showers, and the lawn is nice and green; but we have had a couple of mornings waking up to a snow-covered landscape. Today is sunny and should be in the low 60s for a high.
With the warmer weather, I enjoyed going with Beth and daughters to the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point on April 6th.
The gardens cover approximately 55 acres and include 15 different theme gardens, including a Monet pond, Rocky Mountain landscapes, and a rose garden growing 60 different varieties (not in bloom on this visit). There are more than 280,000 tulips in over a hundred unique varieties. The display of tulips is redesigned with flowers imported directly from Holland each year.
Beth with Megan, Rebecca, and Amanda
Rebecca
Beth and Rebecca feeding the goldfish.
The official start date for the Tulip Festival
began on the next day, and so we were not
there at the peak of the blooming.
Still, we enjoyed the day and the many colorful flowers
that greeted us, like these unique ones.
There were other flowers blooming
in addition to the tulips,
and we liked these big
Ranunculus blooms.
It was a pleasant walk along the many paths.
Amanda and Megan
in the tunnel covered with ivy vines.
Rebecca in the "Secret Garden,"
which is featured as a replica of the garden described in
Frances Hodgson Burnett's book, The Secret Garden,
as well as being a fun Disney movie I enjoyed seeing years ago.
More color added on one of the paths with
hanging umbrellas, both opened and closed.
Some of the hundreds of varieties of tulips grown in these gardens
along with other colorful flowers.
Another section is a sculpture garden —
the Light of the World Garden at Thanksgiving Point —
based on the life of Jesus Christ.
This area includes a total of 15 scenes and 35 statues, with 14 scenes
from the New Testament and one LDS Church-inspired scene depicting
Joseph Smith’s First Vision.
Here are a few of the 15 sculptures enjoyed along our walk:
"Woman at the Well"
"Who Touched Me"
(Rebecca, Megan, and Amanda looking, not touching!)
"Mary and Martha"
"Tomb of Lazarus"
"Crucifixion"
(Amanda, Rebecca, Narene, and Megan)
Joseph Smith and "The First Vision"
One of the waterfalls seen
toward the end of our walk.
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Also on April 6th, Sam and I went with Hal and Christy Smith to enjoy
Noteworthy, BYU’s female a cappella ensemble.
Their concert combined harmony, vocal percussion, and some humor.
Christy, Hal, Sam, and Narene
waiting for the Noteworthy concert to begin.
Noteworthy concert
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On April 8th, I went with Beth, Amanda, Megan, and Rebecca
to BYU's Ballroom Dance production of "Swing 'n' Sway,"
which we really enjoyed.
Here are a few photos from this event.
A cute number entitled "A Memory"
featured an "older" couple reminiscing about their life
as they look through a photo album,
with dancers spotlighted first as young high schoolers,
then as college students wearing their letter sweaters,
and finally as the girl welcoming home her sweetheart from the army.
The performance featured many colorful costumes and a variety of music
from swing, waltzes, jive, samba, rumba, quickstep, cha-cha, paso doble, foxtrot,
and their award-winning competition ballroom medley
and their competition Latin medley.
All were very professionally done.
Bringing out all the dancers for the finale.
I really enjoyed all of the numbers they performed.
This summer, the BYU Ballroom Dance Company will be traveling to South America for a three-week performance tour to Chile and Argentina. They will be doing performances in Chile to benefit COANIQUEM, a charity that helps provide medical attention
and support to children who are victims of fire.
In Argentina, dancers will participate in an area-wide broadcast to the entire
South America South area of the LDS church.
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Our next blog entry should have some interesting photos when we return from our trip to China. It will be the first time I will be able to include pictures from Haley's bridal shower held in our home at 10:00 a.m. on April 15th with our leaving for the airport about 2:00 p.m. the same day. We return May 8th. Marla, Curtis, and Maren are coming for the shower and Easter weekend, so we look forward to our visit with them before we leave. When we planned this trip to China months ago, we did not know the trip would conflict with the visit from the Smiths nor did we realize we would be missing Easter. Because of passing the International Dateline that day, we go from a Saturday to a Monday, (with a couple of hours in the middle of the night technically being Sunday)!
