Temple Trips: April 2023

Tuesday, April 25, 2023

Bountiful Utah Temple

My second temple is my beloved Bountiful Temple. James and I were married there in 1995

When I was in high school, President Ezra Taft Benson announced in general conference that a new temple would be built in Bountiful Utah, my hometown! I remember attending the ground breaking, where we had to park very far away and walk to the site where my temple would be built! We walked in a huge group of people and I felt like we were walking to Zion! I decided that day that I wanted to be the first bride married in the Bountiful Temple, my temple!

I graduated from high school and went away to college, but when I visited home I checked on the progress of my temple. A couple years later, I got engaged to my husband James. We planned our wedding over Thanksgiving weekend in the Salt Lake Temple. But the Bountiful Temple would be dedicated only a couple months later, and I'd wanted so badly to be married there! So I talked James into waiting until the Bountiful Temple opened, and we were married on the day the temple opened, January 17, 1995. I could have been the first bride to be married there if I had wanted to, but I would have had to be married at 5:30 in the morning! I chose 2 o'clock instead, and I was the 35th bride married on the day the Bountiful Temple opened. We were married in sealing room 7.

Years later, in 2000, we were sealed to our twins in that same sealing room. We had adopted them after being their foster parents for 15 months, and were blessed to be sealed to them in the same place that our Eternity began. Our other three boys were also there with us, everyone dressed in white. And even many more years later, in 2022, our son James was married to his beautiful bride Ellie in the Bountiful Temple also. I have been to this temple more than any other temple, and it will always be "my temple." For many years as our children were growing up in Lander, Wyoming, we made monthly trips to Bountiful to stay with my parents and attend the temple. They knew how important the temple was to us, even from a very young age. And now for many of them, the temple is just as important!

If you are visiting Bountiful to attend the temple, don't miss trying out Nielsen's Frozen Custard. Every time we go to visit Bountiful, we always get some frozen custard and other treats at Nielsen's, it's our family's favorite. There are also lots of other fun places to eat in Bountiful, like Pace's Dairy Ann, and my all-time favorite, the Olive Garden. The Bountiful Temple is located at 640 South Bountiful Boulevard.