Nauvoo and Church History Sites (June 2011)

The beautiful Nauvoo Temple
The room where Joseph and Hyrum Smith were martyred. We loved visiting Carthage Jail. It had a great spirit about it.

My two little pioneer girls!

And some pretty cute big pioneer girls!!
Both big and little girls loved the pioneer dress ups in Nauvoo.

We were able to stay with Uncle John and Aunt Cindy in Kansas City as we passed through and went to Independence, Missouri.

At Nauvoo
We ate a picnic lunch every day!
We even ventured from the norm and ate grilled hot dogs that grandpa grilled for us on his table top grill. The kids thought that was the greatest thing ever.
At Martins Cove - we were able to have a tour by Jim and Carolyn (my sisters inlaws) who are serving a misison there right now. They were awesome!
On the front steps of the Nauvoo Temple. It is the most beautiful temple inside and out!!

For years I have wanted to take our children to see the church history sites. We were so blessed to be able to take this trip this year. It was one of the best trips that our family has ever been on. There was lots of driving and many long days on the road, but our kids did fantastic. I was so impressed with how well they traveled. Even Brinley and Quincy did great! We went with Grandpa Tom and Grandma Barb and Sam. Kylee and Emilee were so excited to have Sam along. We got 2 hotel rooms everywhere we went and those three silly girls all slept in the same bed every night. We were gone 11 days and 10 nights. A long trip, but we needed every minute to get in everything that we were able to see.

I am going to make a photo book of our trip so I wont include every detail or many pictures, but I wanted it documented.

We left the day after school got out...June 3rd and returned June 13th. We traveled through Nebraska to Kansas City where we were able to stay with Uncle John and Aunt Cindy. That was a great opportunity and we got to know them much better. Quincy made great friends with their dog Sophie. We traveled on to Nauvoo and then home through Iowa and stopped in Wyoming at Martins Cove and Sixth Crossing.

These are the sites that we were able to visit:

Liberty Jail
Independence

Farr West

Nauvoo (for 4 days)
Carthage Jail

The Nauvoo Temple - (we did baptisms and an endowment session)

Winter Quarters

Mt. Pisgah
Garden Grove
The Gurnsey Ruts (so cool, the wagon wheel ruts were 5 feet deep)
Register Cliff

Martins Cove

Sixth Crossing

My favorite part of the trip was the spirit that can be felt at each of these sites. It was amazing. The church does such a wonderful job making everything so nice and having missionaries at every site to give tours and answer questions. There is nothing like the spirit in Nauvoo and Martins Cove. I know that my children were able to feel of the spirit and I know their testimony of Joseph Smith was strengthened. My favorite part, and something I did not expect, was how neat it was to follow the trail all the way home. We left Nauvoo just as the pioneers did and traveled alongside where they would have gone all the way to Salt Lake City. We could better understand what it must have been like and how hard it was to leave their beautifil city and expecially their beautiful temple behind. For me, our trip exceeded every expectation that I had and I am so grateful that we were able to go and take our kids before Kylee graduates and goes on to college.

A trip every family should take!!! We absolutely loved it!