Married 14,600 Days

Yikes!  My Parents and my Aunt Anne and Uncle Danny have been married 40 years as of April 12, 2008.  It was a double wedding with two sisters and two Sigma Chi brothers who played basketball and football at the University of Utah.  It must of been quite the event!  Can you guess which one played basketball (my tall Uncle Danny)?  My Dad played football and was, as my friends can all very accurately quote me since they might have heard it several times, 1964's Most Inspirational Player of the Year.  Yep, I have seen the trophy in the trophy case!

My siblings and I planned a surprise party to celebrate their anniversary and had so much fun just being together.  We swam, we went on walks to Angler's Lake, saw rare birds (thanks for pointing them out Spence), went to an animal farm, fed carrots to the horses, barbecued, watched a little conference, cooked yummy food, played Rook, consumed A LOT of Thrifty's ice cream, and two precious babies arrived the Tuesday before and the Tuesday after the event.  Phew....that was close! 

By some miracle we actually did surprise them.  My parents turned out to be difficult people to keep home for a weekend.  We stealthly arrived (as stealthily as is possible for 25 people), stood at the front door, and rang the doorbell.  My sister Rebecca said she "was so excited [she] had butterflies".  My parents answered the door, we sang happy birthday to them (yes...all their special events are within 7 days), and then wished them a happy anniversary.  It did take them a second to register what was happening.  I can't remember anything more fun than surprising them with a such a fun weekend.  How I got $500 of groceries in the house with no one noticing is nothing short of miraculous.  They knew I was coming home to celebrate their birthdays after I discovered my mother's "great idea" to spend conference weekend in Utah.  I told her my plane ticket was non-refundable....the first of many lies over the last few months.  Thank heavens the lying is over!  We love you Mom and Dad.  Thanks for your persevering example!

This photo is one of the few wedding pictures we have of them.  I used photoshop to make it look like a painting and really love the effect it had on the image.