Temple Day Trip

Let me just start by saying how much I love the temple. It is such a special place, probably my favorite place on this earth! I love the peace there. I love that I can feel God's love for me and all his children there. I love the understanding and perspective I leave with. It is a place I hold dear and sacred.

So, Dan and I made Saturday our Temple trip day. We were spoiled in Seattle to have the temple only 30-45 minutes away. Now we are a good 5 hours away from the nearest temple (And that is definitely pushing a bit above the speed limit the majority of the way). We left the house at 6:30 Saturday morning and made it to Birmingham, Alabama by 11:30. It is a small temple and they only do a handful of sessions throughout the week, so we were sweating it hoping to make it for the noon session (the last one of the day). Luckily we made it there safe and sound and with some time to spare.
Southern Alabama is actually quite lovely in many areas. I never realized it, but if you stray very far north of the coastline where we are at, there is not much! It is mostly fields, farms, small towns...basically the country. We got to see some large plantation looking properties, a cotton field, and even trees changing into their autumn colors (something I didn't think would happen this year).

The Birmingham temple is beautiful. We had a wonderful session and I really had some eye-opening learning experiences. It really made the 10 hours of driving in one day worth it!Our trip home was much more relaxed and we had a better idea of where we were going. We wanted to stop somewhere to eat that was kind of authentic to Southern Alabama area. We found a little cafe stop kind of in the middle of nowhere called, 'It Don't Matter". We were a little hesitant, but when we had passed it in the morning there were a ton of cars there and then on our return there were still a ton of cars. So we thought we'd give it a try. We did the Southern Buffet and it was full of interesting southern foods. Like Fried trout, Fried Catfish and squid, hush puppies, baked beans, a Cajun Gumbo (with actual crawdads and shrimp in it), and so many other things I don't have names for. Some of it tasted great, some of it was OK, and some of it I can say I tried. Unfortunately, after only about a minute of being there I started coughing like crazy and I couldn't figure out why. My allergies really started acting up, which made for a slightly uncomfortable meal. After a little bit, a woman at the next table lit up her cigarette and we realized that smoking in restaurants is not illegal here - hence the crazy coughing fit! Ultimately I wasn't totally pleased with the place, smoke, and food for the price...but it was the experience that counted.