Nauvoo in June

Still flooding

On Water Street

After a couple of weeks of roaming the countryside, we decided to stay home and see what was new in Nauvoo.  June is a good time to visit Nauvoo.  It isn't hot yet, and the Young Performing Missionaries are in town for the summer.  They sing, dance, act, and they recreate the band that was here in 1840s Nauvoo

I haven't said much about our Mission Trainings that we have each week, but I should.  This week Aaron West from the history department gave us a lecture on how important  gathering is to our Heavenly Father.  We gather so that we can build temples.  Only in temples can we be endowed with the blessings we need for salvation. Nauvoo was a place of gathering in the 1840s and it is still a place of gathering today.  On Saturday a man stopped me to ask some questions about Nauvoo.  As we talked he told me that he was here with some people who weren't that familiar with the church.  He said they were amazed how he kept meeting people that he knew. Nauvoo is a place where members of the church meet.  For a church of 16 million, we really network very well.

I had a couple of interactions with visitors this week.  The dogwood tree is in bloom at Scovil Bakery.  While we were cleaning up the yard a visitor exclaimed over the tree.  Dogwoods don't grow out west.  I told her it was a dogwood, and asked her if she knew the symbolism of the flower.  She didn't, so I gave a 1 minute "dogwood" tour, how the blossom represents the Savior's sacrifice for us.

 Friday and Saturday we had visitors from Canada, Kelley's friends, the Lowes.  They gave me a reason to visit Pioneer Pasttimes. They took some photos of our Sunset on the Mississippi cast.

For 6 weeks every summer Dig Nauvoo comes to town.  Anyone can volunteer to help with the excavating.  Monday, after work, I actually had some energy left, so I went to dig.  It was a lot of fun.  We were mostly trying to get deeper, but we did find a little piece of pottery, and some glass - probably both from the 1970s. 

Pioneer Pastime

We had a great time with the Lowe's.  They came to dinner Friday and Saturday night, because it is hard to find a good, affordable place to eat in Nauvoo for dinner.  The first night we served bar-b-que chicken, which the kids didn't care for too much, but the tater tots were a big hit. 

The next night we had lasagna, and little 3 year old Maddie went into a monologue over how much she loved this food.  I told her she could come eat with us anytime. 

Pioneer play house

Blocks

The Band played for us and took the children on a parade. 

The Mary Garner Fields cabin and the Patty Sessions Cabin are open in the summer.  No one is there to tell you stories, but I just stepped in and took a picture. I meet so many descendants of Patty Sessions.  Even my son-in-law is descended from her.