20 Years

On a warm summer day, June 16th 1990, I was married to my sweetheart Dave. Wowee! 20 wonderful years!

In celebration we headed back East to take in some of our church history. We started off in Kirtland, OH.
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It was so beautiful with all the green green grass, trees and flowers.

The missionaries at all the sites were great. This was one of my favorites, Sis. Gray from Enoch, UT, and was in my ward growing up, so was Elder and Sister Whipple (in Palmyra). Then there was Elder and Sister Hanks who are in Dave's parents ward, small world.

This is the Kirtland Temple. I have always been inspired by the faith and devotion of the early saints who gave so much for their beliefs, such as when the sisters who didn't have much gave their beautiful china dishes to be crushed and used for the outside temple walls to make them sparkle. I was sad not to see the sparkle but grateful to see the 1st temple built by the early church members.

I loved this home, the John Johnson home in Hyrum. This was the original home and paint colors. Notice the bright colors, which meant it was a happy home :o)

This was the porch where the prophet Joseph Smith stood and taught about Forgiveness the morning after he was tarred and feathered. -John Johnson home

We drove east for about 3 hours to Niagra Falls. We stayed in a bed and breakfast there with Joe and Virginia. They were great, very nice and very talkative -loved their New York accent (Joe reminded me of Mandelbaum from Seinfeld). I think we gained 5 lbs there, she didn't stop feeding us.

The amazing falls

We took this picture when we went on the Maid of the Mist.

Our favorite activity while we were there was the Cave of the Winds. Notice that top deck, it's called the Hurricane Deck. It was so cool. Also, notice the sign No Smoking :o)

About an hour and a half east was beautiful Palmyra where we spent the last 3 days.

We enjoyed a session at the Palmyra Temple.

This was at the Hill Cumorah. It was a huge monument with the Angel Moroni on top.

This is the set for the the Hill Cumorah Pageant. It was incredible.

This is an awesome family, the Mitchells. They used to live just around the corner from us 5 years ago. TJ was our 1st babysitter when we first moved to Henderson, and Sidney, in light blue, was one of Ali's good kindergarten friends. We just happened to run into these guys who obviously are performers in the pageant and did super duper!

That was an incredible experience to see 800 people gathered to share their testimony and sacrifice over 2 weeks of their time and means to perform for us. We went twice.

This was the Erie Canal. Isn't the green so fantastic.

This was the highlight of our trip, The Sacred Grove.

There were a lot of people in Palmyra because of the pageant, but we pretty much avoided them. We went to the Sacred Grove in the evening after the tours were done and most of the people were gone, then we went back first thing the next morning to take the tour with just a few others. When we got done there was a line to the parking lot.
We loved this place because of the wonderful feeling that permeated the whole area. This was where Joseph Smith saw God the Father and his son Jesus Christ, and the feeling there was undeniable.

This was a magnificent trip. I loved being with my terrific companion of 20 years, holding his hand, talking, being together, doing whatever whenever we wanted, and sharing this experience with Dave. I love him!