A Summer Wedding

As you can tell from previous posts, it has been a busy summer for the Shurtz Family.  From the end of April when Nicole flew to China until August when she and Matthew Cragun were married, we have been juggling schedules and vacations as we tried to keep up with everything that was going on in our family.   Despite occasional bouts of stress, it has been a wonderful summer. 

 

Somehow everything came together in the six weeks that we spent planning the wedding, and it was a wonderful (and warm) day on August 2nd as our families got together to celebrate Matt & Nicole's marriage in the St. George Temple.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Reception in Enoch

 

 

 

 

After a honeymoon in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, Matt & Nicole loaded up everything they could fit in their car and headed cross country - first stop Rochester, Minnesota, for an open house at Matt's home.  Roger and I flew out to Rochester by way of Minneapolis on August 14th.

We rented a van and on Friday morning explored the surrounding countryside, driving around Lake Minnetonka to look at the beautiful homes that surround the lake.

The license plates on the cars in Minnesota say "Land of 10,000 Lakes", and I believe it. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It seemed like everywhere we drove we saw lakes - big ones and small ones - and people out enjoying them. (We flew into Minneapolis at night, but when we flew out it was daytime and we could look down on all the lakes from the airplane.)

 

We met Matt & Nicole and Lacey & Jordan Mecham (friends from Cedar City) at the Mall of America Friday afternoon. 

We thought Matt was exaggerating when he said it was the biggest mall in the United States.  I now admit that he wasn't.  It was at least four stories tall and had an amusement "park" right in the middle of it. 

We ate in the Food Court and looked straight out on a Ferris wheel, roller coasters, and other rides.  Matt said that you don't find just one store of say, "Bed, Bath, & Beyond" in the Mall - there are probably four of every brand name store scattered through the Mall.

After lunch, Matt & Nicole went shopping.  Roger and I went with Matt's parents, Brian & Leanne, to do some sight-seeing.  We drove to Minnehaha Falls which is a state park located in the middle of Minneapolis. You walk along a sidewalk, walk down some stairs, and find yourself next to a waterfall that is 53 feet high. The falls are part of Minnehaha Creek which starts at Lake Minnetonka and flows to the Mississippi River. Once you start walking along the creek, you can’t even tell you are still in the city. It feels like you are out in the woods somewhere. 

 

 

Later the four of us met Matt & Nicole at the St Paul Temple where we were able to do an endowment session before leaving for Rochester.

 

Saturday afternoon (August 16th) we were given a tour of downtown Rochester, which included the corn cob water tower (which I was interested in because it sits on the Seneca property - which bought out Green Giant.  My dad retired from Green Giant a.k.a. Seneca - well, from the American Can Division of Green Giant.)

and the Mayo Clinic which is actually more than one building in a high-rise complex in downtown Rochester.

 

 

The Open House was Saturday evening at the home of Matt's parents. 

 

 

 

On Sunday we went for a walk around the neighborhood, went to church with the Craguns, and that evening enjoyed a Cragun family tradition called "fat night".   Fat night consists of deep-fat frying anything that you want.  They're continually experimenting, and they get quite creative.  They fried shrimp, cheese sticks, jalapeno poppers, pickles, donuts, crab meat & cream cheese wrapped in won-tons,  zucchini, strawberries, and some other stuff that I can't remember.  My favorites were the won-tons, cheese sticks, zucchini, and donuts. 

Afterwards Roger and I had to head back up to Minneapolis so we could catch our flight out on Monday morning (Aug 18th) to go back home.  We had a wonderful visit with the Craguns and enjoyed the opportunity to get to know them.   Matt & Nicole left Rochester that same Monday morning and headed for Hampton, Virginia, where they will make their home while Matt goes to graduate school at Old Dominion University.