Trip to Salt Lake City

May 5th through May 12th is Utah Archaeology Week. To kickoff the week there is a big Open House in Salt Lake City on the 5th and then to close it there is another Open House in Cedar City.

Since I had to go north for the Open House I decided to take Josh with me and make a weekend trip out of it.

On the way up north we stopped by the BYU Field School. They are currently working on an excavation at Wolf Village. The site is amazing and according to my old professor the site has the largest known Fremont pit structure AND 10% of all shell artifacts ever found in association with a Fremont site came from here. I'm excited to hear more about what they find.

[Wall and hole associated with a partially excavated feature]

[Me and Katie Richards (my old partner in crime)]

The next stop on our trip was Provo. Here we stopped by to see my cousin Cheryl and her 6 kids! I was excited for her to met Josh (since we had been together for 14 months!) for the first time. 

Later that night Josh and I went to hang out with the Neilson cousins: Tiersha and Josh, Tahnee and Tyler, Kasey and Preston, and Karilyn, John, and Eli.We went to J Dawgs for dinner, Cold Stone for dessert, and then to Tahnee and Tylers place to watch the NBA basketball games.

It was so much fun to see my cousins and to catch up with everyone!

*Why didn't I take any pictures?!*

The next day Josh and I headed to Salt Lake City to see the new City Creek Mall. It was full of really expensive stores that we can't afford to shop at but it was still fun to browse.

Later that night I went to a baby shower for my cousin Natalie. At the shower I was able to spend some time with my Stringam family: Bekah, Michelle, Cheryl, Natalie, Aunt Clarese, and Aunt Karen.

*Again, why didn't I take any pictures?!* 

The next day, Saturday, was the Open House for Utah Archaeology Week. 

The Open House consisted of a lot of booths from various CRM firms and a lot of activities (face painting, coloring pages, decoy ducks, Navajo tacos, corn grinding, atlatl throwing, etc.). I was also able see a lot of friends that I hadn't seen in a long time including Lacey, my roommate from my Freshman Year at BYU!

[All the booths]

[Sam at our company booth]

[Fremont figurine cookies]

The day was a HUGE success!

On our way home, Josh and I stopped by my Aunt Karen's retirement party. Here Josh got to meet a lot of my Stringam family. I think he was a little overwhelmed but my family made sure that he felt welcome!

It was a very busy weekend, but we had a blast!