We spent Saturday in Woodstock. It was Wassail Weekend, with a winter parade. It was the most beautiful parade we had ever seen. Down the street came the most magnificent horses decked out in Christmas holly, bells, & ribbons, etc. with riders & carolers in period costume.

We also went to the Home Tour of several historic homes, beautifully decorated with holiday decor. We had a really fun day ending with a good meal at Bentley's.

Due to a bad ice storm, our power was out for two days last weekend. The worse thing was, we could not take a shower or use the toilet, because we have a pump for water. Our apt. got kind of cool and had to go to bed early. We where so glad when it finally came back on! There are still several thousand homes without power in nearby towns.

We had the privilege of helping at new member lesson for a newly baptized couple, the Olado's. The former bishop of the Ward & his wife, the Cass's invited us to a nice dinner, with the lesson after. The Olado's have a wonderful spirit and will be a great addition to the Ward. We are excited for them.

Another fun experience we have had recently, is going to the Fennie's for their annual missionary dinner (Vorwaller's, Mckinnon's, Sanford's & us) . Every year for the last 8 years, or so, they have had a nice dinner for the senior missionaries around the Christmas season. Sister Fennie has had 2 serious surgeries in the past few months, because of a brain aneurysm. She is truly a great inspiration for us all, and has a beautiful singing voice! They have 3 great kids @ 7, 11 & 12.

May the spirit of Christmas stay with us all year round!
We are so grateful for this time of the year. Grateful for the birth of our Savior, and His atonement for each of us. Grateful for loving family and great friends. Thankful the joy of life and living at this time, and in this country. We are truly blessed!

Joseph Smith Birthplace Memorial Christmas 2008

Nephi, as the innkeeper in white robe, at the live Nativity. Elder Vorwaller took these 3 photos. Night pictures are very difficult. We all tryed to get one of the actual Nativity wtih baby Jesus, but none turned out.

This is a shot is of the front gate.

Bridge all made out of pipe and lights.

This a a shot of the new Star that Elder Lamb made just as you come up the lane to the Memorial.

Photoof the Memorial with the visitor center on the right and the residence where the director lives on the left. Our landlord and his wife walked up to the memorial and took these pictures of the lights that we were privileged to put up this year. In all there are some 100,000 lights and it took us almost a month to put them all up. We rented a man lift and so at times were 60 feet in the air putting lights in the tops of tree. Not sure how I was able to be that high as heights are not my thing. They really turn out great. Thanks Stewart for the pictures.

Ruby's new friends

It's the day after Thanksgiving and the animals have arrived for the live Nativity. Each year at the Memorial, there is a special lighting ceremony. Friday and Saturday after Thanksgiving day, it includes a live Nativity with a donkey and two sheep, inn keeper, towns people, Mary and Joseph, Shepard's, angels, etc. and the three Wise Men. Everything went off perfectly and the lights even came on without throwing a breaker. On the second night I played the Inn Keeper. Ruby greeted and handed out pass-along-cards about the Memorial to the visitors. The first night we had 300 people and the second night about 175. The weather was cold but no wind or snow. I will post pictures of the many lights later. Our camera will not take night photos well.

Ruby is making new friend and enjoyed the two sheep. They were special guests for two days and a big hit with all the visitors.

Ruby was especially fond of Forest the donkey. I think she would have enjoyed many different pets. Forest was really good with the children as he was very friendly and enjoyed all the attention ... especially from the pretty ladies.

Sock and T-shirt sale

This weekend we went to the famous "sock sale" in Northfield with another missionary couple, the Vorwallers'. Also checked out the t-shirt sale and had a beautiful ride in the snow to Roxbury to buy a couple of sweatshirts. Great fun! We have been busy, so haven't had time to update our blog. Two weeks ago, we where pleased to have a visit from our daughter & 2 of our grandkids.
While driving them back to the airport it snowed a little, the kids being from Georgia, wanted to play in the snow...but no time.

We did a little painting. Jared painted an airplane, of course, Melissa painted an abstract for her room and Heather wanted a purple leaf?

Heather, Melissa & Jared came to visit! The weather was cold, but we still managed to see a few of the Vermont sites. Enjoyed a day at the ECHO Lake Champlain Aquarium & Science Center. Even did a little Christmas shopping.

Grandma needed a hug!!

Fun with the kids in Vermont!

Before they left, on Monday, Grant got to see Grandpa at work first hand. We are putting up 100,ooo Christmas lights around the Memorial grounds. They say, it will take most of November to get them all up before the lighting ceremony, Nov. 28th.

Cassie sent her dad a "birthday party in a bag" complete with balloons, party hats, cake & candle & plates for two. We waited to celebrate his 60th while Kristie & her little family came to visit. As mentioned before, the girls sent him a GPS...it is great fun!

We visited Billings Farm, Woodstock, Tunbridge (saw some covered bridges), Ben & Jerry's ice cream factory, toured the JS Memorial and went to church in the short weekend they where here.
It was great to see them and especially enjoyed Grant & Leah...Hugs and kisses...and Leah even let me hold and play with her all during church...it was sure fun!

Trip to Bennington, VT

We Drove to Bennington and visited the oldest Church in Vermont. Buried in the cemetery is Robert Frost, who in 1920, came to live in Shaftsbury, Vt., the next town north of Bennington on Historic Rte 7A. He said, “I mean to plant a new Garden of Eden with a thousand apple trees of some unforbidden variety.”
Frost lived with his family in Shaftsbury during the height of his career as a poet until 1938, when his wife Elinor suddenly died. We able to visit his home also.

We visited the The Bennington Battle Monument, dedicated to the famous Battle of Bennington that took place during the Revolutionary war in 1777. It is a 306' stone obelisk which opened to the public in 1891. It been said that this was a turning point of the war to defeat the British.

Family Visit

Several members of my family were able to visit at the same time. During the month of October. They scheduled there trip to see the New England fall colors. The locals here call them "leaf peepers". Anyway, from left to right my brother Ray and his wife Charlotte, Norman and his wife Bonnie just in front, Nephi and Ruby and my stepmom Teresa and her husband Jack Leavitt. We had a great time but had to travel south to see some color. This picture was taken at Hildene, the Lincoln Family Home. Robert Todd Lincoln, the only surviving son of President Lincoln built his home here after becoming a successful business man and Chairman of the largest manufacturing corporation in America, the Pullman Coach Company. We visited many other sites and had a great time showing them around the beautiful state of Vermont. We spent two days at the Shelburne Museum, and learned a lot of Vermont history. We also drove around the historic barn at Shelburne Farms.

This is the chapel in So. Royalton where we attend church. Tomorrow is the last Sunday we will meeting there for about 300 days, while it is being remodeled and added on to.

It is an unusal L.D.S. Chapel, more New England looking. We are hoping it will keep its distictive look after the remodel.

The beautiful fall colors were captured from the next ridge on McIntosh Pond Rd. where we live.


Tomorrow is Nephi's 60th birthday...Happy Birthday!!! Wow, how time has flown...I thought we were still 39.

Our 4 daughters sent him a GPS system for the car. He is so excited not to have me as navigatonor anymore...And so am I!!

The Vermont Country Store @ Weston, VT

Nephi's brother Greg and his wife Donna were in Vermont last week. We had a nice visit and had fun shopping at the Vermont County Store.

Fall foliage has arrived and almost gone in about 3 weeks, it has been so beautiful! This will be our only autumn in New England, so we have been taking a lot of pictures.

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Three of the other missionaries and I entered some things in the Tunbridge Worlds Fair. I entered 2 photos and 4 paintngs. Tunbridge is about 15 min. away and is a very picturesque village, we love it.

I was pleasantly surprised when this painting received the Peoples Choice award & all 6 recieved blue ribbons. The Village Store in Tunbridge has allowed me to display some of my stuff on consignment in their store. It would be great if something would sell.

Seems like the month of September flew by. My birthday and anniversary came and went. Didn't do anything exciting, but go for a ride and take photos. We are trying to be conservative, out here on our mission. And with the economy in a noise dive, we pretty much a just spend money on our apartment, gas and food.

We walked up Patriarch Hill last week to pick wild blackberries. It is quite a hick up a steep hill which is near the foundations of Joseph Smith's grandparents home. After lots of scratched arms and tasty samples of berries, we gathered a nice size bucket full. Nephi decided he wanted to bake his very first pie, homemade crust and all. We had enough blackberries for two pies and some for the freezer. He shared one pie with the other missionaries. It turned out quite well even though wild berries are a bit seedy.

(P.S. Did I say I supervised?)

I have learned to take my camera with me everyday as we go to the Monument to work on the grounds. Early in the morning when the fog is thick and the sun is breaking through, you can get the most wonderful pictures!

Elder Jensen has been on a ladder most this week scraping and painting the visitors center. I, with the 2 other sisters, have been planting the fall mums. We are planting them early this year because we have had sooo much rain some of the plants are not looking their best. Traditionally, the mums are planted in mid to late Sept., all other annual flowers are pulled out and the perennials are cut down. Just mums and some kale, I personally did not like the looks of it, as did another one of the sisters. So we are trying an experiment this year, of course we had to get permission. Hope it works out well!!

Driving down our favorite dirt road (Dairy Hill Rd.) one day, & an older gentlemen was selling a bunch of neat stuff for a $1.00 each. So we got this old rocker. Nephi put it all back together after fixing it and I painted the back and stained & vanished and made a cushion. It is a granny rocker, but very comfy!

The road less traveled!!
Our favorite activity here is driving around on dirt roads looking at the beautiful scenery and taking photos of covered bridges, old churches and barns. We are getting quite a collection. Sometimes we even stop at a yard sale and pick up a treasure to bring home. Soon we will need a trailer to get it all back. Oh, well, it is fun. The roads in Vermont & New Hampshire are so different from out west. As you turn off the main roads, you go about half mile or less and the road turns to dirt. It can be quite a muddy mess after a good rain (which we have lots of). The other strange thing is they don't believe in road signs, so we get lost a lot~and no GPS to help us. A favorite saying in Vermont is, "You can't get there from here". I have been spending a lot of time painting after we finish serving at the memorial. I have done several pictures and Nephi has been making frames for them. We are able to use some of the equipment at the church's shop to cut wood, etc. We have lots more time away from the usual hurried life we have led in the past. Plus we don't have TV!

Traveled last week to Franklin, NH (1 & 1/2 hours journey) where we worked at the Chapel there. We packed up the church pickup and with another missionary couple, the Lambs, spent the day cleaning the building and weeding. On the way home, saw this beautiful covered bridge.

All 6 of the sister missionaries serving at the Memorial were able to attend our Relief Society summer social last Friday. It was held, atop a moutain, at one of the ward members farm (the Kill's) in Bethel, about 10 miles away. It was beautiful and nice to get away from the usual work to spend lunch time with the other ladies.

Old pictures of Joseph Smith Birthplace Memorial

The granite monument and cottage were built in 1905 to commemorate Joseph Smiths 100th birthday.

Some early pictures of the Joseph Smith Birthplace Memorial were shared with us and as you can see it has changed over the past years. These photos were taken some time after dedication of the memorial. The Memorial Cottage was built on or very near the site of the home Joseph Smith was born in. The cottage was tore down in the mid 50's. It looks like a neat place, but of course, Ruby and I like old houses. There was even a reflective pond at the bottom of the hill.

First Edition Book Of Mormon

We had the great experience of holding and and turning the pages of a first edition printing (1830) of the Book Of Mormon. We went with my sister and her husband Tom and Rosie Bell to Dartmouth College to their special collections library and they will let you hold, read and turn the pages yourself. To think who might have handled this Book, one of only 5000 printed in 1830.

The book is in remarkable condition. While we were looking at it, one of the assistant librarians came over and asked if we were LDS. She was one of 4-8 LDS students attending Dartmouth, with some of them still on vacation or on leave to serve missions. She told us an interesting bit of information. She was at a party when they were having a triva quiz game. One of the questions was; Which book in the Collections Library was the most often requested to view? It was the First Edition of the Book of Mormon. We have been told that a first edition copy had been donated to the Joseph Smith Birthplace Memorial, but when Salt Lake heard about it, they requested the book be sent to them so it could be placed in a control environment and under better security conditions. So off it went to be preserved and protected. To actually hold one and turn the pages was a real treat.

More pictures of Maine

Two Lights Light house Maine , We could not see the other light house as the fog was moving in and out two fast and we could not see it to take a picture.

This is Old Orchard Beach in Maine. What a great beach with thousands of people. It was the best day that we had seen this week and there was no rain. I'll bet people thought we were strange to be fully dressed and walking on the beach ...

Travels through Vermont and Maine

Portland Head Light ... Light house Maine

Okay ... It's been a while since we last posted ... but have been very busy with work and celebration of the 24th of July. We have been working so hard that our FM managers gave us both Thursday and Friday off so we could celebrate the 24th of July and have an extra day to see the area. On Thursday we decided to travel to Rutland with the Slades to see the Norman Rockwell Museum, the Vermont Marble Museum and the New England Maple Museum all are within a few miles of each other. This was there normal day off but we had not had a Thursday off before so it was great that it worked out for us to spend some time traveling and visiting with them.

Norman Rockwell's main museum is in Mass. but he lived near Rutland for several years so has one there also. I was really impressed with his works and did not realize that he had drawn so many illustrations. The next stop was the Marble Museum and it was interesting to note that several of our nations monuments in DC are built from Vermont Marble ... it was an interesting visit. We came back to the JSM Visitors Center that evening to have dinner with all the other missionaries. Played a game after and had a really great time.

The next day we traveled with the Sanford's to the coast of Maine which was still in our our Mission. The Sanford's are from Maine so they wanted to see the coast again and eat some seafood. So we were lucky to have a guided tour of a small part of Maine. We travelled first to Old Orchard Beach. Beautful white sands and thousands of people. We walked the beach and enjoyed the ocean for a couple of hours then travelled to Two Lights light house and to Portland Head lights light house. Portland head light is the most photographed light house in Maine and it was a great place. We did a little shopping at a place called Mardins, which is only in Maine, and they sell things at wholesale. Then we drive home. Long day but now we have been to Maine.

Silver Lake, VT

Royalton, VT

Yeah, missing all the grand kids!

It was a misty morning when we were driving up the lane to work at the memorial and we saw this incredible photo opportunity. I was so glad we had our camera with us!!

We drove to Woodstock, Sat. Went to a couple art galleries and checked out some B&B there. On the way home, we drove past Silver Lake in Barnard. It was very nice. Took some nice photos of lovely New England churches and found another covered bridge. I have been working on a couple paintings, just started one of a covered bridge. Nephi has been working on a rocking chair we got last weekend for a dollar from an old farmer who lives on one of the country roads near us.

It has been raining lots for about 2 days now. We spent 2 days last week doing inventory at a chapel in the Stowe area. We are scheduled to inventory the Essex chapel this week. We never know what or where we will be going and doing from one day to the next. But, mostly we are at the Memorial. It is truely a beautiful spot, and we can feel the wonderful spirit here!