Our Trip to Nauvoo

A couple of years ago Joel's parents decided that they wanted all of their family to go to Nauvoo to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary. The date finally arrived so we, along with the other 7 families, made our trek to Nauvoo.


Since Joel travels so much we started to save his frequent flyer miles on SW. We booked airplane tickets from Boise to Kansas City and on June 19, we boarded our plane, free of charge. Chloe's first time flying was very exciting. We got up above the clouds and she gazed out her window for a long time and finally turned to me and said, "So where is Heavenly Father's house?"


We arrived in KC that evening and rented a mini van. We drove 20 miles to Liberty and stayed the night in a "daddy's gone all the time, so we get free hotels!"


Saturday morning we went to the liberty jail and took the tour there. We loved the presentation and learned of the terrible conditions there while the prophet Joseph Smith along with others, were imprisoned here for 4 months and endured many hardships.



We drove about 30 minutes to Far West Missouri and saw the temple corner stones that the pioneers laid in hopes to build a temple. But because of the great persecution to the saints, they were driven out of Far West.


Adam-ondi-Ahman was our next stop. We hiked around and tried to find the remains of a nephite alter that is believed to be the alter Adam used after he was driven out of the garden, to offer sacrifice to the Lord. We didn't find anything, but had fun hiking around and thinking about what will happen on this holy ground one day.
When we all got back into the van to leave, Chloe said "well, we didn't find Adam, but I'm glad cause he was naked."


We were excited when we got to Jamesport, an Amish community. The Amish mission is to live closer to God; so they lead a simple existence without electricity, phones or computers. Their clothing, homes and lifestyle reflect these values. We saw many horse drawn buggies and enjoyed a fabulous home made lunch of meat, potatos, gravy, vegetables, bread and jam and pie for dessert! We loved roaming their shops filled with handmade quilts and other items.



We drove to Keokuk Iowa and checked in our hotel then drive the 12 miles to Nauvoo and watched the BYU ballroom dancers do a show in the outdoor pavilion. It was really good!
Sunday morning we went to the grocery store in Keokuk. We cooked all of our meals. We then drove to Nauvoo and met the Hammer family at the condos that we all stayed in. We went to a 2:00 sacrament meeting and enjoyed hanging out and visiting with everyone at the condominiums. All 8 siblings were there with (most) of their families. 45 people in all.


Monday morning we started with a family meeting in "the grove". This is where church meetings were held for the pioneers. We learned about ancestors who lived in Nauvoo and made the trek West. Austin Hammer who is a GGG Grandfather was killed at Hauns Mill.

OLD NAUVOO: It was hard to believe that in 1839-1846 Nauvoo had 2,500 homes. It became one of the largest cities in the state, even larger than Chicago. Today there are 30 restored homes to see.


Horse/Wagon tour ride


Chloe petting Clyde and Charlie; the horses from the wagon tour.


The final resting place of Hyrum, Joseph and Emma Smith. The Joseph Smith homestead in the background. This is all owned by the R.L.D.S. church.


The Mansion House
The Smith family moved here in 1843. It eventually had 22 rooms as the hotel wing was added for additional income.The smiths housed many people here, and when the martyrdom toom place Joseph and Hyrum's bodies were brought here. Emma lived here with Lucy Mack Smith, until she died here.


Brother Warr from Meridian, showing us how to make a horse shoe in the Blacksmith shop.


Our awesome "prarie diamond rings" from the Blacksmith shop


Scovil Bakery and the yummy gingersnap cookies.


One of the original sun stones from the temple. The other is in the Simthsonian.


The end of the Trail of Hope. The saints crossed the Mississippi River while it was frozen over and 30 degrees below zero! There is a pioneer exodus momument located here, it is very moving to see the 2,600 names of those who died before reaching the Salt Lake Valley.


This is a game that Joseph Smith claims to have never lost.


The girls playing like pioneers at "pioneer pastimes"


The boys trying out some pioneer stilts.


The family back in 1839.


A really fun pioneer game...getting the iron ring to stay upright with the stick. Once you get the hang of it, you can't stop playing!

Weather
When we arrived in Kansas City it was rainy and VERY humid. It rained off and on for the next 2 days. While we were in Jamesport we had a huge downpoor! That was exciting. While we were in Nauvoo we had 2 days where the heat index reached 110-120 degrees!! It was SO HOT and HUMID! We were all drenched with sweat. (kind of gross) We had a couple of very delightful day of 80 degrees and a nice breeze.

Shows
We saw 5 shows in all at Nauvoo. The first show was a special picked BYU ballroom dance team for Nauvoo. They perform for 2 weeks in Nauvoo. They were GREAT!


ANNA AMANDA was a children's musical. The kids loved this and Chloe was chosen to go on stage at the end of the performance. She almost started to cry she was so nervous.

Chloe with "Anna Amanda".


HIGH HOPES AND RIVER BOATS
This group of young adults are hand picked to perform in Nauvoo. There is 10 girls and 10 boys. They have amazing talent. They perform Anna Amanda, High hopes and River boats and Sunset on the Mississippi with the Senior missionaries.


SUNSET ON THE MISSISSIPPI
This was our favorite show. This is a picture of Joel's Aunt Charleen and Uncle Frank.(center couple white hair and hat) Charleen is Gary's sister. They have been serving a mission in Nauvoo for a year now and will be there another 6 months. This show is performed outside which makes it very fun to see all the fireflies!


RENDEVOUS
This is the show the senior missionaries do that is about life in Nauvoo. It is in the Cultral Hall.

The Nauvoo Temple

All 8 siblings and spouses were able to do an endowment session together in the temple.
All cousins 12 and older were able to do baptisms in the temple.
It was a big highlight of the trip. Probably our favorite!


This is a statue of Joseph and Hyrum as they left Nauvoo and rode to Carthage. It is across the street from the temple An interesting story is of Joseph's horse, Charlie. He was a very large animal and made for battle. He would stand next to a cannon and not flinch. He also chased after mules, because he didn't like them.


Anniversary Dinner

We had a nice dinner and program for Joel's parents. This is a picture of us all reciting the proclamation to the family. Each family had to memorize a paragraph.

Cousins
The kids are very lucky to have cousins their ages on both sides of the family. They love to see them. Cousins are a special part of their lives.


Chloe with her girl cousins. All of them have January birthdays! Hannah is 3 and Isabelle is 2. Chloe is 5. There are boy cousins she plays with too. Logan and Stockton are 7 and Ethan is 4.


Haileys group consists of Alyssa-12, McKenna-10 and Maiya-9


Caden has a ball with this group. Jace-15, Cade-14, Brysan-13


Coelton's troop are Austin-17, Paige (not in the photo)-17, and connor-16.

Carthage

Joseph was hit several times and fell out the second story window. 5:15pm June 27.



This was the second gunshot that came through the door and struck Hyrum in the face.

Hannibal
This town is located about 90 minutes south of Nauvoo. It is the birthplace of Mark Twain. Also Molly Brown was born here and was on her way back to Hannibal when the Titanic sunk.


We enjoyed an hour long tour of the infamous CAVE from the adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckelberry Finn. Good thing "Injun Joe" wasn't there.


Independence
From Hannibal we drove 4 hours to Independence. We stayed the night there and on our last day we went to the wonderful LDS visitors Center they have there.


We also went to the R.L.D.S. temple. They have changed their name to the Community of Christ Church. This was very confussing for the kids to understand.


We flew home on June 26th. We had a WONDERFUL time. Many memories made, and good times had. Our testimonies were strenghtened and I think we all learned something along the way.

Summer Vacation- Part one

Ouch!
The first day of our summer vacation landed Caden in the Dr's office with several stitches in his arm. He was playing four square in the drive way and dove for the ball and ended up in the road. He is embarrassed to tell everyone that he got stitches playing four square...and not some mean tough thing like football, or shark bite.

Lifeguard on duty
Coelton finished his lifeguard certification and got a job at the local city Pool. He teaches level 1 and level 2. The 3 year olds LOVE him, and at the end of one of his sessions a little girl drew him a big picture that said, "You are the best swim teacher and I love you." He also life guards and on the second day of work he jumped in to save a little girl. When he got her out, he leaned her over his arm to get the water out of her and she threw up all over him. The good thing is it earned him the employee of the week!


Swim Lessons
The girls did a session of swim lessons with their usual teachers Stacy and Kara. They are sisters and teach in their parents backyard pool. Hailey completed level 4 for the second time and Chloe completed level 2. They had a great time being in class with a few of their friends they don't get to see very often.
The summer weather for the month of June has been unseasonably cold. It rained a lot and the temperatures stayed in the 70's for several weeks. Good thing the pool was heated!




Shut up and RUN!
Joel and I ran the Sawtooth Relay with 2 other couples in our ward. Our team name was shut up and run, due to the endless complaining of aches and pains. It is a 62 mile relay from Stanley to Sun Valley. We woke up at 2:45a.m. to make the 3 hour drive to Stanley. Our first runner started at 6:30a.m. We were happy to not have the 3am start time. Each runner on the team runs 2 legs of 5-6 miles. We finished at 3:30pm...for a not so bad 8-1/2 min. per mile average. We were very happy with our times considering the high altitude and the many hills and steep down hills. It was very beautiful, it rained half the day and was bright and sunny the other half of the day. We like to run the races and it keeps us moving, which helps us stay young and healthy so we can chase after the kids. Coelton is a hard one to catch at a 4:48 mile!




Welcome to Belly Acres
Brother Campbell who lives in our ward invited several families to grow a garden on his farm. We jumped at the opportunity. We are the proud owners of a 25x25 piece of land that is now growing rows of corn, cucumbers, potatoes, watermelon, lettuce, carrots, beans, tomatoes, pumpkins, zucchini, cantaloupe and lots of weeds. Brother Campbell irrigates the garden and we weed and take care of it. He put up the big belly acres sign and another one that says, quiet...weeds growing. I never thought I would ever be like my own Mother who told me I wasn't to come back in the house until every last weed in the garden was pulled! I love to see my kids working hard, and seeing the law of the harvest.

Month of May

Nationals at Lagoon

Hailey's clogging team made it to nationals this year. It is the largest clogging competition in the world. Her team danced 2 dances; mary mack and disco remix, each dance took 3rd place. She also competed in a solo and took a 1st place! Of course, we all love it when they get to go to nationals because that means we get to play all day at Lagoon! We arrived on a friday night and stayed in a "daddy travels so much we get FREE hotels." We went home on a Sunday. It was a great weekend.


Memorial Day Weekend

We never go camping over memorial day weekend. Too many people, and we hate crowds. But as I looked at our summer weekends, there wasn't any free ones, so I booked a camping trip over memorial day.
We took our trailer to Baumgartner campground. It Is a beautiful place outside of Featherville on the beginning of the Boise River. We read a book together! I grabbed Peppertide from my bookshelf and started to read it to the kids on the 2 hour drive to the campground. We were all hooked and ended up reading the book each night before bed and a little during the day as we laid around the trailer. We finished it on our last day there.
We also hiked a lot and wished we had some 4-wheelers as we watched all the other campers ride the beautiful trails. But we didn't let that get us down...we unloaded our running shoes and filled them up with our feet and took off for a 4 mile run! Chloe brought her bike and we all took off together down the road, even Hailey and Caden. Needless to say some made it 4 miles and some didn't.
We also got up early one morning and soaked in the natural hotsprings there. It was lovely.
We played Uno each night and that was a blast. The best part was being together and watching Coelton go through texting withdrawl. Although it was very amusing at 2am when Hailey woke us up looking for the "camping glasses". We realized that she was half asleep looking for the flashlight!




Look who learned how to ride a 2-wheeler

We took off her training wheels and she took right off!


Preschool Graduation

All the kids wore their preschool t-shirts that Mrs. Hart made for them and their adorable caps. Chloe learned a lot this year and is very ready for Kindergarten.



Look who's 40!

We had a lot of fun celebrating Joel's birthday. On his birthday I hung a big banner outside. The girls wrote a scavenger hunt for Joel to find all his gifts. Hailey especially spent a lot of time writing it and making sure it all rhymed. The girls also made Joel a shirt that said "I'm 40". He walked around with a inflatable cane that said he could hit anyone who teased him about his age. He took full advantage of that. The boys blind folded him and put him in the truck and took him to Fast Lanes where some of coelton's friends met them. They all rode the race cars and had a great time.
The next night I took Joel to Fudruckers, where a few friends were waiting to surprise him. We then took in a movie and smoothie afterwards. Great fun!

Mother's Day

I always love waking up on Mother's day and realizing that "Hey, today is mothers day...I get to be pampered a bit today." I use it to my advantage as I watch my family pick up messes, cook dinner and do the dishes.
I always get breakfast in bed, and each of them include a card to me on the cookie sheet with my food.
I sit in bed and read the cards as I eat. It's so fun. This morning we all sat in my room on my bed and floor all morning laughing, talking and wrestling. My heart took a picture. It was a great start to a terrific Mother's day.
My 5 year old came into my room while the rest of the family was getting ready for church. She saw that I was still in my PJ's and said "Mom, since you get to do whatever you want today, are you going to church or not...cause if you stay home I want to stay with you. All's they give you at church is bread and water."
We had a nice talk about the sacrament and that even on Mother's day mommy chooses to go to church.

I miss my own mother a great deal, and hope that she realizes what a wonderful Mother she is. I know that she is watching over us and she is still my mother, even though she is not here physically, I feel her near. Happy Mother's Day Mom!