Provo, UT

The main display (which I am told is changed periodically) featured incredible lions, wolves, and cougars in action!

If you’ve ever thought about joining a book club, I highly recommend it. I’m a member of two, and I love them both. Book clubs are a fantastic way to find out about good books and have a chance to discuss them with people you like. When a group of people all read the same thing and get together, you inevitably get a lot of different opinions, and it’s really interesting to see things from other people’s perspective for a while.

A dark house sits on an Orem street. It is not like many houses you are sure to meet. No light shines from the windows. There is no answer at the door–and in the yard some very scary monsters are waiting for some gore!

It’s a bewitching time to visit Gardner Village! Every October the witches come out to play as pumpkins, corn stalks, and harvest decorations transform this charming little shopping village with the Halloween spirit. The shops and eateries are crammed with tourists, but the crowds don’t diminish the quaintness…instead you’ll wonder why you’ve waited so [...]

One of Mike’s and my favorite things to do is go to bookstores, namely Borders or Barnes and Noble, to hang out. Sometimes we’ll just walk around and look at books we want, check out the magazines and music, etc. Sometimes we’ll each grab a book or two to look through, and then we find [...]

Inspired by an earlier pirate adventure, my children and I wandered around Woodland Hills looking for treasure. My aunt, a botanist, lead the hunt for brightly colored leaves. I don’t recall in my thirty-four years of life ever running across a salmon colored leaf, but we found a tree full of them.

It may not be fly fishing in a sleepy southern town, but Nielsen’s Grove Park is a beautiful get-to-in-a-flash alternative that my family and I frequent when we want to relax, cast out a line and stretch out on weed-free green grass.

What would you expect to see at a Bean Museum? Kidney beans, lima beans, jumping beans, surprisingly, are nowhere to be seen at the Bean Museum in Provo. What can be found are palm-sized butterflies, a live reptile show, and the stuffed remains of fantastic animals I thought only existed in Narnia. The Monte L. Bean Life Science Museum is home to close to three million preserved animal and insect specimens. Word of warning: if you have a strong aversion to taxidermy this may not be the place for you.

Pop quiz! Name the first museum ever built in the state of Utah for the visual arts. Not sure? Try this: What Utah art museum houses over two thousand original works of art in its permanent collection, 1,500 of which were created by Utah artists? Still unsure? Okay, last one: This museum, built in 1907, also houses one of the largest modern Russian art collections anywhere outside of Russia itself.

Is it just me, or was anyone else surprised by last night’s snowfall? Snow on October 12th?! Three days ago my daughter was dancing barefoot in the grass! Hmmm….Well, we decided to make the most of it and have some faux-winter fun!