Flashback Friday!! I’m taking this blog post’s party back all the way to October 2020 because – you know me – “better late than never.” 🙂 I’m excited to finally share the photos and details of this St. George adventure because it’s a good one. I had heard of Glitter Mountain from St. George friends while we were living in San Diego — supposedly there was this hill in the desert that actually glittered and glowed from the unique rocks there, and that you could take some of the “glitter” rocks home with you — talk about magic! I always wanted to go see it with the girls whenever we visited home, but man. It was hard to do more than visit our 2 families (plus my aunts, uncles and cousins) whenever we came to STG. Moving here, though, made going to Glitter Mountain to the top of my “fun to-do’s” list and we made it happen ASAP – right at the beginning of our fall break!
Okay so it turns out that “Glitter Mountain” is actually a gypsum mine, something we learned literally upon arrival, ha! All I did was shoot out the idea to my fam, pull up the address in GoogleMaps and we were off – my sister and her kids following along. Half of the adventure was getting there, too, ohhh my. Don’t be worried when you start to drive down majorly bumpy, duty desert backroads — the crazier the drive gets, the better! You eventually end up at that pretty little mine and wow, they don’t call it “Glitter Mountain” for nothing. 🙂
Look at how the ground shines! It’s something else, honestly.
We finally pulled ourselves away from the glitter patches in front of the quarry and made our way down into the quarry — it’s not too big of a spot, and for the beginning of Fall Break 2020, it wasn’t too crowded!
The rock! Isn’t it stunning??
You’re not allowed to excavate any gypsum stone (unfortunately a good chunk of people were doing that), but the shards on the ground are all yours!
Or should I say ours? 😉 The girls each took a small handful of glitter rocks from the ground — some rocks ended up in their special collections, some were lost, and some are still being found floating around the house by yours truly.
The adventure was fun. We had just moved into our rental a couple days before, so getting out to explore and play was totally needed, too. I hate to say it, but going to Glitter Mountain was pretty much the last adventure we’ve been on. 🙁 We got sick soon after this, the holidays hit, January was basically non-existent (it flew by), and here we are – half-way through February and speeding toward March. Life is flying. Life has felt kind of intense lately, too. Not just because of busyness – it’s just been heavy in a few ways. I ache for the people in Texas and I worry about “what’s next” for the world. A couple close family members are trudging through some rocky, rough valleys. Our own little girls have been working through a couple things that have left their Mama and Daddy feeling somewhat stumped as to what to do to help them (sorry to be cryptic and I don’t mean to be dramatic — the girls’ stuff is still pretty “little,” but it’s stuff we haven’t faced before as a family and as parents, so it’s made us buckle up). I found myself finally crying about life’s intensity a couple days ago and not even because I hit a breaking point – I honestly felt okay when I started crying – I think my body just needed to cry?? Has that ever happened to you? Do you ever feel your body needing to cry? I usually try to gulp those kind of tears down, but a couple months ago I read an article that scientists have found that emotional tears release endorphins and other healing hormones, so if you feel the tears coming on, let ’em fly. CRY! Don’t hold the tears in! Just go to your room and close the door and let your body cry. You’ll feel loads better when you’re done (those hormones will go to work! Aren’t our bodies amazing??). I felt loads better when I finished crying the other day. It was kind of like my mind said, “Okay, I’ve finished the sentence of everything that’s been hard lately. Those tears were the question marks, the periods, and the exclamation points! Now I can move on. I feel confident again.” Because I did get up from that little crying session and I just felt better: more calm, more capable, more chill. Hallelujah. 🙂
If you’re going through something, too, friends, my heart goes out to you. Honestly, what I should say is that my heart just goes out to you, because I know you’re going through something. Every single person on this planet is going through something. We think we see perfectly happy people and families everywhere we go and guess what, their smiles may be there – as they should be (I believe in being optimistic)! – but everyone is carrying loads. Thank goodness life always shakes out. I can say that I believe in that, too: life always shakes out. Life always mellows out. Rollercoasters go up and down and all around and, eventually, they coast to a slow, sweet stop.
Thanks for the ride, Life. Twists and turns and tears included.
