Thanks to Karen for writing this whole event up.......
OUR SISTERS TRIP OF 2024—TO ST. GEORGE
Well, we just had a wonderful Sisters Trip--our 15th one, I think! (We had our First one in 2009, so maybe this was our 16th…??). We decided to go to St. George this year instead of anywhere more “exotic”, and the weather was beautiful, and our whole time was really lovely. It was a very nice, enjoyable trip and there were SEVEN of us who went together in two cars….(just not Lar…) Janis and Karen left Blackfoot in Janis’ car at 7:30 Monday morning—March 11th, and arrived at Dee Ann’s in Grantsville at 10:25. Janis went with Kathy and Janell and got to St. George first. Dee Ann took Karen and Ruth—picking up Darla at her home, and the four of us stopped and got food at a Burger King along the way. I think the other three got a bite to eat somewhere along the way, too, but they arrived ahead of the four of us.
The day was really nice and sunny, and things got more and more beautiful as we drove along. Hal and Janis’ daughter, Emily lives there in St. George with her innovative husband, Jim and their three darling children, and they were taking a Spring Break Trip with their kids—vacationing in Costa Rica---so they let us stay in THEIR HOME!! It was SO NICE!! I think they had four bedrooms in the main home—plus they have a little Casita where Darla and Karen stayed.
We were really happy to see such lovely accommodations when we arrived! The home is big and roomy with a gorgeous Great Room and a fantastic Back Yard with a pool, hot tub, lots of trees and white fence, plus a Spectacular VIEW of mountains across the way.
This first evening we arrived—after getting our things put away and examining our new accommodations—we decided on a fun place to go for dinner. Emily had texted Janis a whole big list of fun places to eat in St. George—so we settled on a place with a funny name—called “Wood * Ash * Rye” and got in quite quickly after arriving. I looked on line today to see what is said about this unique restaurant, and it says they “curate one-of-a-kind recipes that rotate with every season”…..And they indeed DID have “one-of-a-kind recipes”, and they were unusual but very tasty!! I think we ALL enjoyed eating those expensive items much more than we figured we would!
I looked back through their menu--and just to mention a couple things--I think we ordered: buttermilk biscuits (layered biscuits served with salted butter), local salad (with baby romaine, bacon, expresso cherry tomato and rye croutons), plus house bread (country olive bread), crispy brussels sprouts (mustard cherry vinaigrette, dried bacon, blue cheese) grilled vegetables (seasonal vegies, chermoula, lemon and maldon salt) with crispy potatoes (crispy fingerlings, pork belly, jalapenos, chipotle aioli, chorizo oil, pepperjack cheese), and hummus (garden vegetable crudite, grilled in scallion oil.) These things actually tasted very delicious, and even though it cost each of us seven sisters $34.75 EACH—it was worth every penny and really made a memory!! Don’t you all think? π π
I don’t remember what we did when we got back home Monday night, but it seems like we kinda gathered around in the kitchen and ate little goodies that had been set out on the counter by us all… Dee Ann says she thinks she remembers Janell going out and getting in the hot tub all by herself that night, and I’m really glad she did that because that hot tub looked really tempting!!
The walking path going round back of Jim and Emily’s house looked really inviting, so after first getting up Tuesday morning, a nice big group of us sisters took off and went walking. After coming back and getting ready for the day, we were eager to ‘hit the stores’, so that’s what we did. (Isn’t that cool how I made it sound kinda like “I” was one of the Walkers??)π
Here is a back view of Jim and Emily's house from the walking trail....
We pretty much stayed together and ended up at Ross’ all together and at other stores, finding fun clothes and things to take home.
After shopping the first half of the day, we eagerly went and had a nice lunch at Chuck-a-Rama, and all enjoyed eating to our hearts' content! We sat in a little side room and enjoyed just relaxing and eating and talking—and being able to go get more delicious food any time we wanted.
That afternoon we continued to ‘shop till we dropped’, and I cannot figure out if we went somewhere to eat that night, or not…. Does anyone remember? Maybe we had just eaten so much at the Chuck-a-Rama that we decided not to go out to eat that night....?? By the pictures I took, I see that we were at the Red Cliffs Mall at 2:00 p.m. Then, according to my pictures, at 7:30 p.m. that night, Audra and Sebi were at the house, visiting with us. Sebi went outside and relaxed by the pool…(or in the living room on the couch…?), and Audra sat down and watched us play a game of Probe, and ended up playing a little while with us when Ruth took a phone call. We had lots of fun food around and continued to pick at stuff as much as we wanted, and just sat and talked till lots of the sisters changed into swimsuits and went out and sat in the hot tub. Everyone but Ruth and I sat out there and laughed and talked for a nice long time.
Wednesday we got up and took our sweet time getting going, but some of the sisters had various things to do that morning… Darla and Janell went over to The Skin Institute for some services. Darla got a back treatment while Janell got a deep for facial. The others enjoyed a slow morning and some downtime at the house. We then met up at Bear Paw CafΓ© for a very nice brunch on this day. The wait-staff seemed to take a pretty long time waiting on us and serving our food, but we enjoyed just sitting and visiting with each other. I took a video of everyone’s food after it was served to us, and we all seemed to really enjoy what we had—whether it was breakfast food or lunch. (I have a very nice picture of all of us with our yummy plates of food in front of us, and I wish I could insert it here….)
We wandered around in some stores, and I admired a big rhinestone ring in one of the stores, and lo and behold—it ended up becoming one of my birthday presents the next day—Thanks to Kathy Rae’s thoughtfulness! π One of the stores had some cute cards with ‘interesting’ verses and one of the verses I copied down was talking about getting older versus being young, and it said: Bifocals and a nose ring, support hoes and a mini skirt, cellulite and bikinis, varicose veins and short shorts, A walker and in-line skates, depends and a thong, dentures and a pierced tongue, gall bladder scars and a belly ring, corn pads and a toe ring, and liver spots and tube tops. (I probably shouldn’t include that silly thing in here, but I have a Worse one that I will leave out!!) ha~π
I’m sure we all shopped and continued to have a fun time doing things around St. George that afternoon, but that evening we had reservations to go to The Red Lobster, so we did and were seated in a nice place away from people (for a while) – and our waitress wasn’t very attentive to us, but most of us really enjoyed our food. I noticed Janell’s tasted pretty Awful, and she was very disappointed, but several of us really enjoyed what we ate. I had coconut shrimp and popcorn shrimp and really loved my food. Kathy and Dee Ann ordered crab legs and got nice big plates full of them and seemed to really enjoy them. Ruth got salmon, Darla got flounder and Janis had a bowl of soup and something else—I can’t remember for sure what it was. We had a nice little dining experience—for the most part—then went back to the house and tried to watch a movie.
I say we “tried to watch a movie” because it was quite an interesting experience all in all. We ended up calling Jim and Emily in their rental place in Costa Rica, (!!) and they walked Kathy and others through the ‘setting up’ process until we were able to actually watch the show. We settled on the movie “Courageous” and really appreciated the feeling the movie generated in us. Jim and Emily have a nice big theater room in their home, so we all settled down there and comfortably enjoyed our show.
I think a couple of the sisters sat in the hot tub that night, while the rest of us headed to sleep, but I honestly can’t remember who did what!!
Thursday morning—March 14th---was MY Birthday—Karen Hone’s 77th!! I noticed something interesting about the birth-dates of us 5 sisters born into the Phelps family: When I, Karen, turn my new age in March—all five of us sisters are at that time —Four Years Apart from each other! Karen is four years older than Robin, Robin is four years older than Darla, Darla is four years older than DeeAnn, and DeeAnn is four years older than Kathy. So—I am SIXTEEN (16) years older than Kathy Rae!! Interesting, eh??
(And of course—we do not have our dear Robin with us any longer, having lost her November of 2022.)
That morning a knock came on the door and there stood Kathy—delivering a humongous bouquet of a dozen red roses to ME—a Happy birthday gift from my dear husband Dennis! Wow—it was really Beautiful (and I’m still enjoying it now!!) (He was back at home in Blackfoot and had called ahead to a flower shop and a delivery girl had brought it to the door.)
We all gathered in the house and took some pictures of us standing in the living room before all getting in one car and going to Cedar City to head to the temple.
DeeAnn drove us all in her car—six of us—but Kathy had had a bad night and didn’t feel well this day, so she didn’t come with us. (DeeAnn wants me to mention that Janis was worried we wouldn’t make it in time because of her driving…but we made it Just fine! And we really Appreciated DeeAnn driving us…π) The temple session was really nice and we all enjoyed the peace and comfort we felt there—(even though we were sitting on the men’s side…) :), and we didn’t even get a picture taken of us outside, I think. While Kathy stayed home, though, she was really busy doing odds and ends—straightening things up and getting things for ME to have a fun Birthday Party!
We contacted Kathy as we rode back home, and had her meet us at the Longhorn Steakhouse where we had a delicious birthday dinner for ME!! π We got in really quickly after arriving at the restaurant—right around 5:00, and as the time went along—the place filled up really fast! Our meal was fun, and I really appreciated having it. We told the waitress it was a birthday gathering, so they brought me a nice little dish of ice cream with a delicious topping and my sisters sang Happy Birthday to me.
When we left the steakhouse, we drove around and looked at the new Red Cliffs Temple. It is really beautiful!
When we got back to the house, we saw that Kathy Rae had decorated things all up really CUTE with balloons, and had purchased a delicious chocolate birthday cake and TWO kinds of ice cream for us! So we had me a little PARTY!! It was REALLY FANTASTIC to ME!! (I sincerely thank you ALL for how NICE that was!!) They all sat around the table and indulged me as I related to them a bit about how our family left Illinois and moved to Idaho back in 1960. I rambled on way too long, I’m sure, but then we played a rousing game of Catch Phrase for a nice long time, and that was fun.
When it started getting late, I got really tired for some reason, so I went back over to the casita, and I didn’t pay much attention to what the rest of you did. I washed my hair and showered and got to bed about the time Darla was coming over to join me and I figured I would head right to sleep—really quick. But I started trying to go to sleep around 11:15 and found I was still awake at 1:03 when I received a text from Janis saying, “Is DeeAnn out there in the casita with you?” I answered, “No! Is DeeAnn MISSING ???” So Janis and I texted back and forth and Janis finally found DeeAnn asleep on the couch in the t.v. room!! DeeAnn slept there all night long and the next day she exclaimed excitedly, “Oh My! I slept for EIGHT WHOLE HOURS!!” (We thought that was kinda funny!) But all in all—I had a WONDERFUL BIRTHDAY and I sincerely appreciate all the presents you gave me, and all the attention and Love I felt!! Thanks SO MUCH to ALL of you!!
On Friday we woke up and it was no longer bright and sunny—but it was still Warm! We gathered up our things to head home. We all packed ourselves up and waited for our rides home but before leaving we for sure got a picture out back by Jim and Emily's pool and beautiful tree that was in full blossom!
Brad came to pick up Ruth to take her to Arizona or somewhere else for a fun little get-away to celebrate their Anniversary which had happened on the 12th while we were all there in St. George. Larry came to pick up Darla, too, and they had plans of staying another day or two, but both just decided to head on home and relax there. Janell rode home with Kathy but before leaving St. George they stopped at the cute Pinkbox Donuts Shop where Janell had been wanting to go before they left. They both bought a dozen donuts to take home to their grandkids (and themselves, too;)
DeeAnn took me and Janis home as far as her house there in Grantsville. Janis and I went in and visited a few minutes at Kathy’s, then Janis drove me on home. (Janis and I then went to Melina’s to dinner with our husbands here in Blackfoot.)
Meanwhile, I forgot to mention that DeeAnn’s car left with us in it before Kathy and Janell left, but somehow as we drove on the back-roads heading into Grantsville, DeeAnn saw a car that looked like Kathy’s and she sped up till she passed it and we discovered that it WAS Kathy and Janell!! They had somehow gotten ahead of us, and we all pulled into the homes in Grantsville at about the same time!! π
This concludes all that I wrote about the trip, and I’m sorry I left out what most of YOU guys did (girls, I mean), but suffice it to say—we had a GREAT time and I think it was just marvelous that Ruth and Janell and DeeAnn and Darla went ahead and kept with the plan of all of us getting together in St. George even though they were SO TIRED!! They had just been home 4 or 5 days from being in Sant Maarten and Antigua for at least TWO WEEKS, so see--it was amazing that they went ahead and kept the plan of us ALL getting together like we did!!
I’m sincerely grateful to ALL of you for being my sisters and for being so thoughtful and for putting all that effort into all of us getting together like that! And wasn’t it amazingly wonderful that Jim and Emily let us actually STAY in their beautiful home like they did!! Everything was SO NICE—and all that we did was SO ENJOYABLE!!! Thank you!! Thank you!! I sincerely LOVE YOU ALL !!!!
Love Forever, Karen (the Oldest!)
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