UTAH: Day 2

Gird your loins, this is definitely the most photo-heavy recap post, but we saw so much on this day and I don't want to cut any of it out! We spent the day touring the city of Salt Lake and talking about life, which made for a pretty wonderful day.

We started the day at Bruges, a tiny little restaurant that serves the most amazing Belgian waffles I've ever had. There are little balls of sugar in the batter, and I can't even explain the deliciousness. They also have some of the best hot chocolate I've ever had, and I've had a lot of hot chocolate in my day.

Relatively normal...

And then the bright sun was just too much.

Our bold little friend at breakfast

Then we headed to Temple Square, where a lot of important buildings for the Latter Day Saints are located. Now I'm not Mormon, nor do I have any desire to be, but I'm absolutely fascinated by their faith system and culture. And this is like the heart of that entire church. The temple itself was beautiful and huge. We saw a lot of brides and grooms taking photos there too, which was astounding. They were all gorgeous but looked like babies.

The temple

I liked the trees

A sanctuary of some sort on the temple grounds

And then J and I went and stood near the door where the newly married couples come out and greet family and friends after the sealing ceremony. No lie, in less than 5 minutes, 3 couples came through those doors one after the other. Not a lot of time to enjoy the moment, if you ask me. All I'm saying, there best not be any other brides around on my wedding day.

If you look closely, you can see one of the sets of bride & groom

We then went over the Joseph Smith building, for a beautiful view of the city. I mean, how gorgeous is the temple and city of Salt Lake?

From there, we walked a couple blocks to the Utah State Capitol. Also beautiful!

We had lunch at a cute place called Em's and then Jarah drove me around the Utah University campus (or the U, if you're hip with the lingo) a bit and showed me the hospital where she works. From there we went to the SLC Library and then to a part of town called 9th and 9th. I loved that area because it had a lot of cool boutiques and reminded me of Austin.

We also stopped by my version of Heaven on earth, Great Harvest Bread Company. There are few things in life I love more than fresh bread and baked goods, and at this beautiful place, they give you huge samples for free, like that giant slice of pumpkin chocolate chip bread in the foreground. Also pictured the best sugar cookie ever and some tasty white bread. 

Then we stopped by Salt Lake East High, which may look like just another high school, but if you're awesome you'll recognize it as the setting of...

HIGH. SCHOOL. MUSICAL.

And you better believe I made sure we stopped by in the daytime so I could pose in front. I will spare you all the song references that are going through my head as I type.

Favorite ever

We then did a little shopping, including a thrift store where I found this gem...

I was thisclose to taking that baby home. After a frantic trip to Sonic for some hydration, we went to see the stage version of The Diary of Anne Frank to support a good friend of Jarah's. I had never seen the play, and I was so impressed!

Another great, full day! I already knew by this day that I wasn't going to want to leave. Next up: baking, Park City, hang out time, and more!