These three beauties got to participate in the Cultural Celebration on Saturday preceding the dedication of the new Provo City Center Temple today!  The theme of the production was "Beauty from the Ashes."  So the show talked about how the pioneers built the tabernacle in the 1800s and how much the community loved it and how it was used for stake conferences, graduations, speakers, and musical performances and then five years ago it burned down almost entirely except for the outer brick walls.  Then the community was devastated, but the prophet revealed God's hand by announcing it would be restored as a temple and, of course, this is what God does with our lives everyday.  It's really an amazingly beautiful symbol.  In between all the story of the tabernacle, the youth from separate stakes performed dances to the theme of each story.  Our kids represented all the youth who left from this area to fight for their country in different wars.  It was beautiful and our youth did a great job!  You can watch their dance at this link here!

Or, you can watch the whole production complete with videos on facebook.  Sarah shared the facebook link.  I will try to share it to my timeline, as well.

So, that was the highlight of the week, and since we had three youth participating, we got six tickets!  So, we got to bring the whole family!

We were sitting up pretty high!

This was our stake in action.

So that was the big event of the week!  Sarah, Megan, and Mariah spent all day Saturday at the Marriot Center.

None of the kids had school on Friday, though, so that was nice timing and gave them a Saturday-like day.  Sarah's friend, Hunter, wanted to go hike the Y, so Sarah invited Cali and Chey and their friend, Elizabella, and Benjamin managed to finagle an invite as well.  They had a great time though I'm told they took many breaks!

Beth stayed home from the hike because she was playing with friends.  On Saturday she had one of those glorious days when all the little girls in the neighborhood come to play.  Then they can properly bathe, dress, and style all the Barbies in the house.  What a party!

Megan and Mariah had track practices again during the week and also had their first meet!  (Of which they were absolutely terrified, I guess because it was their first of the season!)  Mariah ran the 800 and the mile.  Megan ran the mile and ran in the 4x400.  They both did great and are feeling less terrified of their next meet.  (I hope.  Sincerely.  They really have been working hard.  Their "recovery runs" are 4-6 miles.  They are in incredible shape.)

We mustn't forget that St. Patrick's Day was this week!  All the elementary schoolers at my house dutifully dressed in green!

It was an incredibly lucky day because Cali and Cheyenne got to hold a boa constrictor at school . . . and they are still alive!

It was also lucky because Bethany ordered a St. Patrick's day book from the school book order that came with a matching green necklace . . . and it came before St. Patrick's Day!  (psst--she likes the necklace more than the book!)

This  week I took the opportunity to "Konmari" some drawers in our house (I can turn that into a verb, don't you think?  Lol!  That's the system of organizing that comes from the book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up which we are reading for book club!)  This is Ben's new, improved drawer from under his bed.  I have my doubts about whether this is a sustainable improvement, but here is week 1 of the experiment: