Back in March, we had the opportunity to tour the Draper Utah Temple during the open house and then to attend the last dedication session in Plain City with G&G Price and Uncle Mike & Aunt Janeal.
The last dedication I'd been to was for the Nauvoo Illinois Temple in 2002 and the last open house was probably the Mount Timpanogos Utah Temple in 1996 as a freshman at BYU. We're looking forward to the Open House for the Oquirrh Mountain Utah Temple open house -
Anyone who will be in SLC during June or July, let's go!
The Draper Utah Temple open house was hugely attended. They had several stake centers in the area where you parked your car, went inside to wait your turn to watch a short movie about temples and about the Draper Temple specifically. Then we got into a big charter bus. Remember which 'color' bus we were on (green) so we could get back to the car later. The evening we went, there was a line that began when we got off the bus. And we just followed the line of people through the walkway and all the way through the temple. There was no time to stop and really look around. Entering the Celestial Room though, there was a split in the line and you could choose to go right or left around the center island. We went left and actually did have a bit more time to walk slowly and see the chandelier and beautiful furnishings and the patterned windows and get a little oriented inside the building - I'm pretty sure we were in the center of the building, directly under the steeple because the ceiling was so high. Then we followed the line into a sealing room where we sat down and a couple talked a bit about eternal families.
Then back in line and back out the doors to the Stake Center next door for a cookie and some water and beautiful pictures of temples around the world and some incredible paintings of the Savior's life. Then out the back door - and into a line for the bus - choose the green (not red or blue or yellow) bus to get back to our car. Then we drove back up to the temple so I could take a picture or two (in the dark) and then wander around to see some of the huge houses. And it began to snow!
This is my feeble attempt at a picture of the temple glow - but it was snowing & I didn't have the settings correct, or a tripod to keep things steady. Still pretty neat with the vertical cone of light.
We are so grateful to be living so close to so many temples. Any direction we go we can see one lit up at night from a hilltop or glowing in the midst of the city. It was fun to go to the open house and participate in the dedication, but we look forward to attending when we aren't rushed out the door for cookies.