Some Catching up !

I know it has been ages since we've written in this blog, that was because we had issues with our computer, but thanks to Eric Kerns, we have her up and running again!

             I had to include this picture...It is a cruet set I saw in the John Wood home and museum in Quincy, Illinois...I fell in love with it and am looking for one to purchase...so every antique shop I go int, that is my mission to find one to take home...It is very typical of the time period of the mid 1800's...Isn't it beautiful...If you see one call me OK?

This is our Rendezvous cast..(Lucy Mack cast) Everyone but the Ririe's!  We have become like family..We have great fun together!

  We got to go to Springfield, Illinois to the Lincoln museum and Library..Here we are with the first family!
                   We loved the experience and highly recommend the museum for a family trip!

This is at the tomb of Abraham Lincoln..Thought it was funny that everyone must rub Lincoln's nose for good luck...notice the shiny tip of his nose...Inside there are several statures of Lincoln and they are about 2 feet tall and are amazing.  A very reverent place I might add.

                                           Lincoln's tomb inside the building !

                                            One of many statures of Lincoln...He looks so pensive.

             Dallin Oaks speaking at the Visitors Center about the Prophet Joseph.  This was all a part of the Extradition hearing re-enactment...He spoke and gave an amazing testimony of Joseph Smith and then there was an open house afterwards...Both auditoriums in the Visitor Center were full and the stake center (video feed) was full too.  There were lawyers everywhere..Judges too, people from all over the state and even out of state came to attend.  During the day there were scholars presenting in different places in the city about the different aspects of the extradition hearings in the 1840's.   We sat right next to Olene Walker, the past gov. of Utah.  Lot's of dignitaries in town.. The next day in Springfield, Illinois the re-enactment took place and was sponsored by the Lincoln Library and the Illinois State Supreme Court.  Actually was a big deal!

                               I'm opening the Post Office for the day...It is also a Dry good Store

                    This is the way people carried water..we have a standing joke that Mom would ask her son to run some water up to their father working on the temple....Nauvoo's first running water!  HA!

                              Sorting box for the Post Office...One of the first Postmasters was Sidney Rigdon..it was                                                                      on his kitchen table~!

   Served in Nauvoo on the Road, and we went to Donaldson to a jpumpkin celebration...I loved this idea and wish we could do this at our little farm...It is a rubber ducky race...two hand pumps and see who gets their rubber ducky back first...It was great!

                              This young man from New Jersey, Sergio Galvez was amazing.  We connected with him and were amazed at his testimony.  He has been a member for two years and was so thrilled to come to Nauvoo...alone, on the bus...took a taxi from Ft. Madison to Nauvoo !!!  He was documenting everything with his camera...He said that he couldn't believe it was real...He saw things about it on movies, but he is going to tell everyone that Nauvoo is real!  Loved him, he went to the temple 2 or 3 times in the time he was here.  Hope we can stay in touch!

                     This was fun, we went to a High School Football game (homecoming) in Ft. Madison just for fun...what great kids are here in the midwest...clean cut and great kids...This couple are friends who live here in our building ...the Pincocks from Rexburg, Idaho...Really sweet people

                                Elder Ririe and I  served in the Lyon Drug store together...he was a botanical kind of apothecary, and this is his herb garden, he would us the herbs here to concoct a medicine to prescribe to his patients...Isn't it beautiful

Carthage Jail October 27th, 2013

Today we served at the Carthage Jail Visitor Center

This is always one of the most spiritual sites in our service in Nauvoo. I, at least always get a little nervous when I see that it is on our assignment list which comes out every Friday for the following week. Giving tours of the jail is like spending the whole day in a very spiritual testimony meeting: it is very "draining".  I often feel like a "wet rag" as we drive back to our apartment in Nauvoo.  

Today was no exception, as we had a fairly busy day.  We would just finish one tour and there was another waiting for us as we entered the visitor center.  There were four of us senior missionaries assigned today.
When a guest arrives we show them around the visitor center and then invite them into the movie which is 18 min. long.  As soon as it is over we then start the tour of the Jail, first taking them into the summer kitchen (shown in the picture above as the yellow part to our left),(which was not there when Joseph was there---it was built on in 1850, but was not removed when the Church restored the jail in the 1960's) and then into the jail itself in the inside kitchen where Joseph and those with him ate meals prepared by jailer George Stigal's wife.  Then we go into the parlor and then into the debtors cell where Joseph spent the night of June 25th with 10 others of his group --all sleeping on the floor as there was no furniture at all in this cell.  While we are here, another tour is coming down the stairs from the martyrdom room.  When they leave, we go upstairs to the criminal cell and explain the aftermath of the martyrdom with Willard Richards hiding John Taylor from the mob, and then go into the martyrdom room, where we get to testify of the life and prophetic calling of Joseph Smith.  It is amazing, that every time, as I entered that room, I felt  like a "warm blanket" had just been placed over my shoulders, and I am enveloped in it until I leave the room. There are very few dry eyes on each tour.  We then take them outside through the front door of the jail, (which the mobs used to enter the jail), passing another tour that had just entered the jail through the kitchen.
We "orchestrate" four overlapping tours in this manner all day.
It takes some coordination...
       Dad left some room for me to say something...It always amazes me that the Lord really does know the beginning to the end....It wasn't by accident that two apostles were with Joseph and Hyrum in Carthage and they survived.  It is in keeping with the law of two witnesses...If they weren't  there we couldn't have had the account witnessed by them and all we would have had is the mobs version of what happened.  Think about it...Joseph had sent the other apostles on missions to keep them away...he prophesied that Willard Richards wouldn't have a hole in his garment, but he would witness bullets flying  and friends falling on his left and right..for a 300 pound man it was truly a miracle he didn't get hit in that small room with bullets flying everywhere...and John Taylor surviving at least 5 wounds and covered with a filthy mattress to hide him from the mobs...I know Joseph and Hyrum sealed their testimony with the sacrifice of their lives that sultry afternoon in June, 1844.  I love them.