Nauvoo Temple

So as I said, while we were in Nauvoo we got to go to the LDS Temple there (click here to learn more about temples!)  The temple was beautiful!!

As shown here, the temple was originally built in 1846.  When the members of the church left to go to Utah, the temple was burned down by those who persecuted the church.  It was rebuilt in 2002.

This statue is entitled "The Prophet's Last Ride" and depicts Joseph and Hyrum Smith as they road to Carthage Jail, where they were killed.

All of our temples are very special and have a wonderful feeling, but it was especially neat to visit this temple that had so much historical significance.  The early members of the church worked so hard to build this temple, and then had to leave it behind.  They were sad to leave their temple and their beautiful city behind, and I don't blame them!  But they knew it was what they needed to do.  They had such great faith!  I'm so glad we were able to visit Nauvoo!

Adventures with Mom and Dad, Part I: Nauvoo

So as I previously mentioned, my parents were able to come out for about a week and a half to visit us!  It was so fun to have them here and we were able to do lots of cool things with them.  They arrived on Wednesday and got the grand tour of Le Mars!  (My mom had been out here before, but my dad hadn't).  On Thursday my dad had to do some work, so my mom and I spent the day in Sioux City shopping for a few baby things :)  On Friday morning we started off on a road trip to see some historic sites for our church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints).  Our first stop was in Nauvoo, Illinois.

Back in the early days of the church (the mid-1800's), Nauvoo was its headquarters.  After a couple years the people moved out west to Utah.  A few of the buildings from back then have been recreated for historic purposes.  The pictures below show our hotel (the Woodruff Hotel), one of the other hotels in town, a statue of Joseph Smith (the first prophet of the church) and his brother Hyrum, and a couple pictures of downtown.    

  

 Here are some pictures of some of the buildings that have been recreated.  In each one there are people there to tell you about what the building was used for.  The big white house in the middle was where Joseph Smith and his family lived.  The others were businesses and a school house.

 The Trail of Hope was really cool!  It was a trail lined with plaques, like the ones pictured here, with excerpts from people's journals about their feelings and thoughts when they had to leave Nauvoo.  They loved their city that they had worked so hard to build, but they faced much persecution there and felt that they needed to move west.  The Salt Lake Valley in Utah has been the headquarters for the church ever since.

 Nauvoo is located right along the Mississippi River.  Here are a few pictures of the river as well as a recreation of what they probably used to get their wagons across the river.

 We also got to go see Carthage Jail while we were in Illinois.  Joseph Smith was imprisoned here on false charges.  His brother Hyrum, John Taylor and Willard Richards were also imprisoned.  While they were here, a mob came and killed Joseph and Hyrum.  John and Willard survived and John later became the 3rd prophet of the church.  This was probably my favorite part of our trip because there was such a great feeling here.  That might seem strange, since such a sad thing happened here, but you could just tell it was a very special place.  It reaffirmed to me that Joseph Smith was a true prophet.  He was such a Christlike person and a great example of how we should live.

We also went to the Nauvoo temple while we were there, but I will do a separate post for that soon!

Excuses

Alright...I am a major blog slacker.  I admit it.  I still have a goal to post more often, but we have been super busy lately!  So here are my excuses:

1.  We have been doing a major home improvement project that has taken up pretty much all of our free time.  It included:

• Hanging all new baseboards and casing upstairs
• Mudding, caulking, and painting the new trim
• Sanding, priming, and painting the window and door frames (which took FOREVER! They were a pain!)
• Sanding, priming and painting the doors
• Installing new hardware on all the doors
• And painting a few rooms

   Yeah...like I said, lots of work!  We still have some work to do to get it finished up, but it is looking awesome!

2. After we got started on this huge project, we found out that I was pregnant!!  We have wanted a baby for a while and couldn't be more excited about it!!  But after working all day then coming home and working on the house (when I wasn't too exhausted) the last thing I felt like doing was blogging :)  I am about 16 1/2 weeks along and am due December 4th.  Here are a few pictures of my growing belly (This is for you, Grandma!):

3.  My last reason for being a slacker is that my parents have been visiting for the past week and a half and we have been having all sorts of fun!  I'll be doing a post about our adventures soon (possibly a few posts because I have LOTS of pictures!).

So there you have it!  I don't know about you, but I feel like these are pretty good excuses :)  BUT I promise that I will have posts about our project and my parents visit soon!  {.....hopefully....}

St. George

We recently went to St. George, UT to visit Clint's parents!  

One thing we did while we were there was ride on their dune buggy.  It was a lot of fun!  Here are some pictures from a ride we went on in a canyon near Leeds:

It was really pretty!  We also took a drive one day through Snow canyon and did a little exploring:

Trying out the timer on the camera:

Clint was a little more adventurous than the rest of us...

We also did a lot that we don't have pictures of.  We got to go see Brian Regan at the Tuachan Theater.  For those of you who don't know who he is, he is a comedian.  Our FAVORITE comedian!  He is hilarious and his show did not disappoint!  We got to celebrate Mother's Day and Clint's birthday, go swimming, and mostly just enjoy not being at work!  It was nice to have a break and get to visit family :)

Warrior Dash

Last weekend we went to Kansas City with our friends Ryan, Tifany and their 3 kids.  Our main purpose for going was to do a race called the Warrior Dash.  They have these races all over the country.  It is a 5k...with obstacles!  To learn more about it you can go here.  To see what kind of obstacles we had to face go here, except that instead of the junkyard cars we crawled under barbed wire, and instead of the Storming Normandy we ran through a big pile of tires!  The last obstacle is crawling through a big mud pit, as pictured below:

Tifany and I ran first while the guys stayed with the kids and then we switched.  We are the ones with the awesome pink bandannas:

 Yay!  We survived!

 The medal we got was awesome!  It says "I survived.  Warrior Dash 2012"

 Here's Clint crawling through the mud:

 The race was a blast!  I would definitely recommend it!  As long as you don't mind getting a little dirty :)

 After we got all cleaned up we went to the Royals vs. Yankees game!

 We all got decked out in Royals getup to support the local team.

 This awesome hit got two people home!

 The stadium was really cool.

 They had these fountains that were really neat.  And once it got darker the fountains were all lit up.

 The Royals beat the Yankees 5 to 1!  It was a great game.

We saw some other sites on our trip, but Clint and I will be going back to them with my parents next month so I will post about them then :)

What a fun weekend!

Bunnies!

So the other day we found a little surprise in our window well (I know...we really need to get a cover for that thing).  Anyway, we found two adorable little bunnies!

 Our friends were over and their kids were so excited!

They decided to keep one and one of the neighbors kept the other one.  Aren't they so cute?!