Road Trip

Be Warned! This post is very, very long. It will take you some time to read through. It will be worth it though.:)

Our trip started out in Kirtland, OH. We visited the Kirtland visitor's center for the LDS church, and surrounding outbuildings. We even had the chance to visit the Kirtland Temple. It is belongs to the Community of Christ church, but they give tours through it. Having been studying the Doctrine and Covenants this year, it was really neat to go in the temple and see where some of the revelations were given to the prophet Joseph Smith.
Newel K. Whitney's home. It is the original.

The saw mill restored in Kirtland.

Next stop NY! Thanks to Lee's brother Jarett and family, who allowed us to crash with them!

This is at Hill Cumorah. This is where the Gold Plates were hidden up until given to Joseph Smith by the Angel Moroni to translate. The Angel Moroni.

The is the replica of Joseph Smith's home when he was 14, and saw Heavenly Father, and Jesus.

Inside of the home.

My parents came with us on our trip, and they made the trip even more fun! Aren't they cute?!

One the highlights of our trip was visiting the Sacred Grove. This is where Joseph Smith saw God the Father, and Jesus Christ. The feeling and spirit there was inspiring. You can't really explain it, unless you have experienced it.

This is the E.B. Grandin printing press. This is part of the original building where the Book of Mormon was published. They would use the ropes to lower down manuscripts and other heavy items to the ground.

This is how they "sewed" the Book of Mormon together.

This is a faxed copy of some of the translated pages of the Book of Mormon.

This is the Martin Harris Farm. This is not the original house that was there, but it is the place. Martin Harris was very helpful in getting the money to help print the Book of Mormon. I think this is Lee pondering. He likes to ponder quite a bit. :)

While in NY we went to the pageant at the Hill Cumorah. It was great! This is the Angel Moroni in the background.

This is the stage setting they put up for the pageant. Over 800 cast and crew participate in the pageant every year! They do an amazing job, and you can tell how much they love being there. All of them are volunteers.

The cast mingles with the audience before the show to help explain the pageant and be "mini" missionaries. This is with "Father Lehi". One of the first prophets in the Book of Mormon.

This is the Peter Whitmer farm in Fayette, NY. This is a replica of their home. At this location is where the LDS church was organized, April 6th, 1830. This is the view from behind the home, and part of the farm located there. It was a beautiful setting.

We had the opportunity to visit one of the finger lakes while in NY. We stopped by Seneca Lake. I was surprised on how big it was. Our kids enjoyed throwing rocks, skipping rocks, etc...

Kale loves the water!

Carson playing by the water.

This is Niagara Falls! It was magnificent, beautiful, incredible, and more. We were able to ride the boat, "Maid of the Mist", down through and around the falls. Totally worth the money, trust me. They provide the ponchos because of the amount of mist and water coming on the boat. The kids LOVED this boat ride. They loved getting wet, and seeing the falls. I was amazed on how big they were. You could see the mist rising up from the water a couple of miles away.

Any one up for cliff jumping off this?

This is when we had disembarked from the boat, and decided to walk up some stairs right next to the falls, without our ponchos. BIG mistake. We got soaked!! It still was fun, and the kids still loved it.

The picture after. We were all wet, and had to go and change our clothes before walking around some more. We had so much fun here, and we were glad we took the detour and time to stop and see the beautiful Niagara Falls.

We had a great trip! We had some much fun, and loved everything we saw. I highly recommend going to these sites if you have the time and money.:)

Carson's Special Day

I am really behind on this blog! I want to start with our very special day last week, July 11th. Carson was baptised! He was very excited and ready for his day. Everything was great! He was very lucky because both sets of Grandparents came for his baptism. This picture was actually taken the next day since it was pouring rain during his baptism. :) His baptism was his own. He didn't have to share his special day with anyone. How cool is that!

Here is Carson and his Dad right before the program started. Don't they look fantastic! Lee did a fabulous job with the baptism and confirmation. (Carson did have to be baptised twice, because Lee forgot to say amen before plunging him into the water.) :) I am sure Carson will remember his baptism forever. He is a great kid, and we are so lucky to have him in our family. Congratulations Carson! We love you so much!

I will try to post more later about our great vacation we had this week. It was so awesome. We visited Kirtland, OH, and then went up to NY to see all the Palmyra church sites, and visit with Lee's brother. To top it off we visited Niagara Falls. More to come.....

Happy 4th of July!

We were invited to go to our friends house on Saturday for a fun 4th of July party. We played volleyball, corn hole, shot the BB guns, rode four wheelers, and ate alot of food!! Thank you to the Donald's for opening their home to all those people! We had a great time! We hope everyone else had a great weekend as well.
The kids as always enjoyed the fireworks! The sparklers are always a big hit with everyone!

Kale was so fun this year. He was so excited with every firework, and loud boom! He kept saying, "I love fireworks Mom!" We all got to be waaaay to late, and were a little tired and cranky for church, but it was worth it for the fun we had.

We had a fun holiday weekend. On Friday, we decided to hop on a ferry to cross a small section of Lake Erie, and head on over to Kelley Island. Lee had heard about these really cool glacial grooves on the island, left from a glacier thousand of years ago. It was amazing to see the way the rock was sheared off. We walked across the island to get there. It was only about 2 miles. Lee being a geologist, was very excited to see the grooves.

The kids favorite part was going on the ferry to get to the island! They had so much fun riding on the ferry, and crossing on the water. We could hardly get them to disembark.:)

We were surprised on how big Lake Erie looked once you were on it! It is one of the great lakes! It was very blue, and the weather was fantastic!

They liked how the boat was rocking back and forth, and moving the water all around. The ferry ride was a little pricey, but worth it the one time we probably will go out there.