Heading Home!!!

Day 10 (Friday, July 17, 2009):  We packed up and headed off to Philadelphia.  But before this we went to Lancaster, PA--Amish Country.  It was really interesting to see the Amish people in their horse and buggies and to see them plowing fields by hand.  I have to admit that I am somewhat envious of these people because they really have their priorities straight--family first no matter what and anything that takes away from that (electricity for example) is not necessary.  I'm not saying that I want to go without electricity myself but I often think about how crazy and busy my life is on a day-to-day basis and how I'd love to slow down a bit.  Not really sure how to do that at this point in time but I can definitely appreciate what the Amish are striving to do.  Here are some pics of us in Kettle Village.  The kids had a great time decorating gingerbread men at the Amish cookie store: (Max said his gingerbread man was bitten by a wolf!)

Well!!!  What an AMAZING time we had!  I can't believe how amazingly well this trip went!  We had SOO MUCH fun and it was nice to be out of AZ during one of the hottest months of the year.  I was afraid that we would all be tired of each other by the end of the trip but we can't stop talking about what we want to do next summer.  I am soo grateful to now have so many more wonderful memories with my family and can't wait to create some more!!!

Hershey, PA

Day 9 (Thursday, July 16, 2009):  Our vacation was quickly coming to an end but we saved the best for last (in the kids' opinion).  Hershey is the most beautiful and clean town I have ever seen.  Milton Hershey was an amazing man and did many great things.  As he and his wife were never able to have children, he has made a great place for children everywhere.  There is an orphanage and a boarding school for under-privileged children, the whole town smells like chocolate, AND Hershey park is THE BEST amusement park I have every been to!  (I think it kicks Disney's butt)  We were not dressed appropriately for the park as we quickly noticed that we were one of the very few people not wearing a swimsuit.  Chris ran back to our hotel to remedy the situation as the amusement park also had a huge water park right in the middle of it all!  So we spent the ENTIRE day being wet!  We would dry off long enough to go on a few rides and then head back to the water slides to cool off!  We even got rained on for about 20 minutes during our day there--but that was all the rain we experienced our entire trip back east so we are not complaining, it just added to our "wetness."  But it was soo much fun.  I can't remember the last time I was at a water park going down huge water slides!  It's been years!  And it was just soo much fun being around a bunch of people who didn't care about their hair, make-up, or clothes!  I know by the end of the day I was looking pretty ratty but I was enjoying every minute of my time there!  This was the kids' favorite place--hands down.  Even Tatum couldn't get enough of the water slides.  Here are some pics of our experience:

Kirtland, OH

Day 7 continued (Tuesday, July 14, 2009):  I honestly didn't think our vacation could get any better but then it did in Kirtland, OH.  We sure did a lot in one day here.  Our first stop was the Kirtland Temple built by the saints and dedicated by Joseph Smith.  Soo many amazing and wonder things happened right inside this very building but I sure felt sad as I walked through it. This building is owned by the "Community of Christ" church and it just feels soo empty inside.  I wanted so much to see the "glittering" walls that the early saints had donated their best china to be crushed into the stucco but the building has been painted over several times.  Nothing about the outside of the building is in its original state.  The tour guide was unable to answer simple questions about certain symbolism in the temple.  But as we crossed the street over the the Newel K. Whitney home and store site (that IS owned by the LDS church) everything became so much more important and inspirational.  I had heard of Newel K. Whitney before but being here in his hometown and hearing his whole conversion story and how he stayed faithful to the end was just amazing to me.  I have a WHOLE new appreciation for Newel and his wife Elizabeth Ann and their many sacrifices they gave for the Lord.  

The Newel K. Whitney Store:

"The center of the town--a gathering place for the townsfolk."

The Whitney Home:

Painted yellow because they were very wealthy 

and yellow was the most expensive paint color of

the day because it had to be imported from Europe.

Inside the Whitney home

This is a crib as used in that time.  The silver

thing is a baby bottle--made out of lead!!!

This is an upper room of the store where 

"The School of the Prophets" was held.

Several sections of the Doctrine and Covenants

was received here.  This small room fit 30-40 men at once!

 

Day 8 (Wednesday, July 15, 2009):  This morning we headed over to the Johnson Farm.  We wanted to hit one more church history site before heading back to Pennsylvania.  I was sure glad that we decided to do this because this ended up being my most favorite church history site we visited.  The events that happened here are both horrifying and amazing.  Once again I gained a much deeper appreciation for the Johnson family who also stayed faithful to the end.  They were also a very wealthy family--the 2nd wealthiest in the area.  They ran 5 businesses including a farm, dairy, and cheesery AND they had 9 children in this home--they ended up having 15 total children by the time they reached Salt Lake.  Here are some pics of the inside of the home that the church restored near perfectly as it is 85% original.

This is the original "feather painting" 

restored as Elsa Johnson had it.

The church matched the colors as perfectly

as they could to the original paint in the home.

All mantels are original as well--torn out over 

the years but left in the attic.

This was Joseph & Emma's room for a time.

The floor was originally painted this pattern.

This room was called a "Hallowed Ground" as

Section 76 of the Doctrine and Covenants was received

here and God the Father and his son appeared in this very room.

Joseph and Emma lived here for a time.  This is the room that Joseph was forced out of one night and taken from his sick child and drug out a ways from the house by mobbers who beat him, tried to poison him, and tarred and feathered him and left him for dead.  They were trying to prevent him from preaching the next morning but it didn't work.  His wife and friends spent the rest of the night cleaning him up and he preached on the porch the next morning all scratched and bruised.  Here is a picture of the porch he preached on:

This whole place was just filled with the spirit.  What an awesome place to be.  To stand where I stood is an experience I will never forget.  My testimony of Joseph Smith has only grown stronger being here.  And I most definitely have a greater appreciation of the early Saints.  What amazing and extraordinary people they were.  I have soo far to go in my own life to even compare to these amazing people.

Niagara Falls, Cananda

    Day 6 & 7 (July 13th and 14th):  Oh my goodness!!!  I don't even know where to begin here!  We drove up to Canada from New York--passing through some of the most BEAUTIFUL places in the U.S. that I have ever seen.  Pennsylvania and upper state New York are absolutely breath-taking.  I was really nervous about crossing the border with the kids--it seemed like everyone I knew had some sort of horror story in border-crossing--but we had no problems what so ever.  I had never been to Canada myself and was soo excited to see another country.  The falls were absolutely amazing and are very deserving of being one of the seven natural wonders of the world.  The first thing we did was go on the boat--"Maid of the Mist"--that takes you right up next to the falls!  We were all given blue ponchos for the trip and boy was I glad we had them!!!  They even had a poncho in Tatum's size!!!  She just knew that she was as cool as everyone else in her little blue poncho!!!

To say we got wet is an understatement--we were soaked!!!  The closer we got to the falls, the harder it seemed to rain down on us!  Carlie and Ethan LOVED the shower, Max ducked down to stay dry, Tatum....she did her best to keep her face dry!  But she didn't cry!!! 

    

    The kids were ready to go again as soon as we got off! We then took a walk downtown to dry off and see what else there was to do in this beautiful town.  Max was most excited about the many "haunted houses" on the main street--it was all he could talk about.  We had grabbed a few brochures on some of them and set off to find them. 

 

    Well....all Max wanted to do was look at the outside of the places.  Once we actually got up to them he most definitely did not want to go inside.  So here is a picture of Max and his favorite monster guy!!!  (It's Frankenstein with a Whopper from Burger King)  So we spent the rest of the down seeing the sites of downtown Niagara Falls.  

On day 2 we were off to the "Journey Behind the Falls" adventure.  Here is where we took a walking tour behind the actual water falls.  We wore beautiful yellow panchos for this event.  We were once again very wet--Carlie made sure to get as wet as she possibly could.

So all in all we LOVED our time in Niagara Falls. Here is a few more pictures we took of 

this beautiful place:

On our way out of Canada we drove to a little town called "Niagra on the Lake."  It is a beautiful little town with BEAUTIFUL homes with perfect lawns and fun little shops.  The "lake" is actually Lake Ontario.  Here are some pics of this place:

I found my DREAM home here!!!  LOVE the RED!!!

Palmyra, New York

Day 5 (Sunday, July 12, 2009):  Day 5 and we're still going strong!  What an amazing place Palmyra, NY is!  I've read about these church history places many times but it's a whole different experience being here and seeing these special places with your own eyes!  This just reconfirms everything I know to be true.  To be standing in holy and hallowed places is a surreal and awesome experience.  Our first stop was the historical landmark of Joseph Smith's Farm.  Here is a picture of us in front of the log home that the Smiths lived in for a number of years.  

The log home was a very tiny home with barely enough space for me to stand upright.  It was hard to believe that a family consisting of 2 parents and 7 kids lived in this home all at the same time!!!  

We learned that the Smith's oldest son, Alvin, designed and built the majority of the frame home just down the road a way.  He died, due to Dr's error--he gave him some medicine that clogged up his intestines and killed him in about 2 days--before the completion of the home and so they hired out the last of the work to a man who decided he wanted the home for himself.  He lied about the Smiths and bought the home right out from under them 1 week before their last payment of $100 was to be paid.  A good friend of the Smiths bought the home back for them and allowed them to "rent" the home for about 18 months.  Then the man's daughter was getting married and needed the home so the Smiths moved BACK into their tiny log home--rough deal all the way around but the Smiths were amazing people to be able to deal with the situation.  Here is a picture of the frame home.

Views of the inside of the frame home:

Kitchen with original brick

"Dry Sink"

Fireplace in living room in which Joseph hid the plates for a time

Potty Chair--picture taken by Carlie--the kids got a kick out of this!!!

Next we visited the "Sacred Grove."  What a most beautiful place.  This whole area of upstate New York is absolutely breath-taking with its lush greenery!  The Sacred Grove has several walking paths to take.  I could have spent all day there--or at least a couple of hours.  With kids, we walked through it and tried to take in as much as we could.  Here are some pics of us in the Sacred Grove:

And the BEAUTIFUL Palmyra Temple!!!  The flowers here were most exquisite!  You just don't see flowers like these in Arizona!  And green, green, green all around!  Amazing views everywhere you look.  Here are some pics!!!

View of the Temple from the Sacred Grove

Next we hit the book bindery where the first Book of Mormons were printed in the town of Palmyra.  It was a major undertaking to undertake such a project back in the day!  It took roughly 6 months to print and produce 5,000 copies of the book.  Here are some pictures of the actual printing press where this took place:

And to top the whole day off (figuratively AND literally) we went to the Hill Cumorah! It was such a beautiful day to take this little hike.  The weather was absolutely perfect--we were told that the pageant had been rained out the night before.  It was quite a steep climb--no easy feat. The kids ran right up the hill with little difficulty....Chris and I made it up almost completely out of breath!  But the view was totally worth the effort!  What an amazing place to be standing knowing everything that happened there!  My appreciation for Joseph Smith grew by leaps and bounds today learning all that I did.  Here are some pics of us at the top of the Hill Cumorah: