Discoveries

We've made some wonderful discoveries about Dee's ancestors since we've been here.  He'd always been told that ancestor grandfathers on both his father's and his mother's side had worked on the Nauvoo temple.  But since being here we've discovered several lines that passed through Nauvoo, in fact all of his great great grandparents except for one line lived here or near here during the Nauvoo period.  On Sunday we went to the Land and Records office to check out more about the Ellison's and the Hobsons.  We found out that only Dee's great grandfather John Ellison left Hancock County with the Saints.  His parents and siblings all stayed and are buried just east of Nauvoo.  Then we found the site where another line had lived, also outside Nauvoo in Hancock County.  Since it was a sunny Sunday afternoon we decided to go exploring.

Not our kin, but
the village of Durham is in the background

Durham (Camp Creek) cemetery

Monument to the Ellison family

Matthew and Jane Ellison - parents who stayed 

The work week was not unusual.  We finished doing coleus cuttings.  Our new co-site director , Sister Rizley, joined us one morning.   They lived near Phoenix, and I mentioned that my college roommate had lived near Phoenix in Steven Spielburg's childhood home.  Sister Rizley, who is very animated and energetic, rose up out of her chair and exclaimed, "You know Mary Sanderson?  Mary Talmadge Sanderson!"  Their children had grown up together in the ward.  So I called Mary that afternoon and we did a lot of catching up.  We need to call more often and not talk so long.
Nauvoo is where people's paths cross.  Church members are very interconnected.
Sister Rizley loved her morning at FM so much that she redesigned her Wednesday night Site Training around what we do in FM.

We worked in the paint department one morning, sanding base molding for the Hunter home.  We had to move these boards three times.  They were heavy.

We had planned to go to Springfield to the Lincoln museum on Saturday, but the weather turned icy on us, so instead we did some packing - yes it is getting that close, and visited a quirky little museum we learned about at Untold Stories.  Don Black, a popular youth speaker in the 80s and 90s, has a hobby of collecting anything that has to do with Joseph Smith.  He collects things from the 1840s, and obtains copies of original items that people don't want to part with or are stored in the Church history department.  He even has a copy of a forgery by the infamous Mark Hoffman.  All of these items are displayed in a log cabin on Winchester Street.  I recommend that you visit it - but not on a cold day.  It was almost too cold to stay very long, but we endured and saw everything we could.  The items covered the walls from ceiling to floor, so somethings were too high and somethings were too low to see.  He needs a larger log cabin.

Saturday afternoon I took a walk.  The sky was filled with 5 or 6 flocks of geese, all honking and flying in different directions.  As they flew off, an eagle flew right in front of me just below the tree line.  I've never been that close to a flying eagle.  As I started up the hill, the full moon rose over the horizon.  I tried to take a picture, but my camera doesn't work in the cold.  When I finally warmed it up, I wasn't in a very picturesque spot to take a picture.  I will miss living in a rural park.

Snowdrops - first sign of spring.

My camera got cold so I had to wait until this view. 

I've mentioned before that Senior rules are a little different - well, a lot different - than young missionaries' rules. For example,  Saturday night we watched the most amazing and heart breaking game between Duke and Carolina.   The next time they play - in 4 weeks - we will be home to watch it.

Only 15 work days left.