Week 6 Highlights

Yahoo! Only one electrical storm this week. Things are looking up. The weather changed on Friday. It became summer. Last night we finished at the temple and home at 8:00 and it was so nice, we went for a walk, returning home about 9:00. It was beautiful. We saw some streets we hadn’t been on before in the area that is owned by the Community of Christ Church, then on the way back some deer crossed the road ahead of us, then we saw several fields with lots of fireflies. Actually, the light production in fireflies is due to a chemical reaction that occurs in specialized light-emitting organs, usually on the lower abdomen. It was a beautiful evening.

The week started out great with a Memorial Day picnic that was held in our side yard for all of the Temple Missionaries. We arrived after our shift was over to find BBQ hamburgers with all the fixins and TONS of other food, all kinds of salads, fruit, chips and drinks. We sat and ate and talked. We’re getting very good at that. (Where's Waldo? - or maybe, Where's Granny?) This is only about half of the Temple Missionaries.

After we got home from the temple on Tuesday, we decided to do all of our house cleaning, washing and ironing so we could have our Thursday P-Day free.

Wednesday we went to “Sunset on the Mississippi”. It’s an outdoor production that stars many of the Senior Site Missionaries in addition to the Young Performing Missionaries (YPMs). It is a great show with singing, acting, dancing (yes, even including some clogging). It will run every night (except Sunday) from 8:15 until about 9:30 from now until August. It’s sort of a variety show somewhat as it might have been in the 1840s (sort of). The Senior Missionaries do a great job. The YPMs a group of young adults from BYU who are chosen through auditions to come for 3 months or so and do a LOT of performing around the city. Notice the photo of the brass band. They are all young women except the tuba player and the drummer. They sound excellent!

We spent Thursday doing our shopping for the next two weeks, and then took in some of the sites here in Nauvoo:

Scovil Bakery - This is a great tour that shows how a bakery was in the 1840’s. It was owned by Lucuis Scovil, who donated the land next door to his bakery as a place to build the Cultural Hall. (More about the Cultural Hall next week) It worked out very well for the baker because many of the functions that were hosted in the Cultural Hall needed food and refreshments provided and since his shop was so handy . . . (You may want to remember that everyone who visits the bakery gets a little gingerbread cookie.) (Yummy)

Lyon Drug - What an interesting place this is. It is a fully stocked drugstore that is actually more of a general or variety store wilt lots of 1840s things on display as if they were for sale. There are medicines and dry goods, purses and hats and bolts of cloth and all sorts of unusual and interesting things like a tooth-pulling tool a pill making machine. This store was owned by Brother Windsor and Sylvia Lyon for the entire time they lived in Nauvoo. There is even an herb garden in the side yard like the one Brother Lyon had to grow the ingredients for his medicines.

The Riser Boot Shop - This was one of Nauvoo’s shoemaker shops. It has been completely restored even to include all of the shoemaker’s machines and tools. In this shop we got to see exactly how different sizes of shoes were made and exactly what they looked like. In the 1840s, a finished pair of shoes cost $1.75 and a pair of boots were $5.00. Brother Riser owned a prosperous shoemaking business in Ohio, but when he learned about the church and gained a testimony, he sold his business and moved the 500 miles to Nauvoo. There is a lot more to the Brother Riser story. You’ll have to come to Nauvoo to hear about it.

The temple is getting busier each week and we get to see more and more people coming all the time. (I don’t know if you remember them, but in HB5th ward, there was a family with the last name of Coffey – they moved to Missouri about 10 years ago.) Anyway, on Saturday I was at the front desk when a group from St. Charles Missouri came in and one of the young men handed me his recommend. I looked at it and then at him and said, “Brother Coffey, I used to be your Bishop in Huntington Beach”. He, of course had been too young to remember me, but he was actually excited and introduced me to his younger sister and to his adopted sister and brother. It is always neat to run across people you know in the temple.

We have decided that each Fast Sunday we will take turns having dinner with us, the Whites and the Cottles, our two apartment neighbors. Today we had dinner at the Cottles, who live directly below us. It’s always fun to get together. Again, we ate and talked and laughed.

Well, that ends another great week here in Nauvoo. We miss all of you and we are having a great time. Thanks again for all of your mail and for watching over our homestead. Until next week. . . .

All is well.

We love you all,
Mom & Dad / Granny & Grandpa