2012 Kjar Sisters Retreat

This past weekend was the annual Kjar Sister's Retreat...it was my year to plan it, and anticipating each activity with these fabulous women was almost as much fun as the activities themselves. :)

One of my favorite parts was Friday's lunch at the Beehive Tea Room. Our afternoon tea party was just lovely. That establishment is a perfect example of how we shouldn't judge a book by its cover. After coming in from downtown Salt Lake City streets, you walk down a hallway and back into the most beautiful, enchanting rooms! The decor was eclectic and cozy, and the china and silver used was absolutely lovely as well. We all had a great time enjoying our hot cocoa and herbal teas with freshly baked scones (one was lavender white chocolate. So. Good.), 3 kinds of delicious tea sandwiches, and then dessert of fresh berries and whipped cream along with a rich cake-truffle. We talked, and laughed, and sipped...remind me why we weren't all speaking in English accents ladies?? ;)

The cooking class at Sur La Table was fantastic as well! We could tell our chef/teacher loved what she did, and we all had a great time learning how to make some fabulous dishes...sweet corn, tomato and pancetta risotto...grilled salmon with cherry-lambic barbecue sauce...zucchini carpaccio with shaved parmesan (my favorite)...and blackberry and sage-honey tart (my other favorite:).  

After a day of getting pampered, shopping, and enjoying delicious food together, the night was not over. :) Back at The Armstrong Mansion, a lovely B&B in Salt Lake, we changed into our pajamas and satisfied our sweet tooth (sweet teeth? ha) with some Nutella fondue and exchanged our "favorite things."  One of them even came from overseas...LaCol picked out a Venetian mask for each of us from her trip to Europe last month. They are gorgeous and we couldn't resist putting them on, and laughing our heads off at how crazy, err, fabulous we all looked in them. ;)  We also did a neat craft of transferring photos to wood. I first heard the idea from my brother, and I used the tutorial here. I think I still need to give it a few more tries and really master it before I do anything on a large scale, but I think we had fun and all the photos used had such special memories! :)

Saturday morning we all got extra beauty rest and slept in, then enjoyed a scrumptious breakfast served at the Mansion. I wanted the day to be super relaxed, and wasn't thinking about the time! We left at 1:00pm and I didn't realize that's when the Downtown Salt Lake Farmer's Market closed, our first activity for the day.  We rushed there and caught a few vendors selling their fresh produce (how was that lemon spinach Becc?). I love farmers markets! The plan was to get lunch from the vendors there and then go to Liberty Park and ride the ferris wheel. :)  Time just wouldn't allow...we all needed to get back to our kidlets. :)  So we had lunch at Tony Caputo's, followed by gourmet chocolate. It all came to an end too soon.

I look forward all year to spending this time with such incredible women that I'm blessed to call family. Thank you so much Mama & Papa Kjar for making it possible!! And I already can't wait for next year, Sharla is planning it, and I have no doubt it's going to be a riot! :)

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PS - The kids normally stay home while we "big girls" have our time away, but being that I'm Ava's breakfast, lunch, and dinner she needed to come along ;) and she was a sweet addition to the group! Everyone was so great with her, she was loved-on constantly. And thanks to my sweet Adam and  awesome friend Kira I knew Brooks was in good hands! He had a blast with Kira and her kids most of Friday, I loved getting pictures she'd text to me of the fun he was having! And I know he loved every minute of Daddy-time, especially their In-N-Out date. :) Thank you SO much Adam and Kira!