How do you relax after a big fundraiser?

The fundraiser was wonderful, so to celebrate our hard work and sleepless nights we packed our car, our 5 kids, and ourselves and headed down the road with the Jenks family. A quick honk goodbye to a certain "special someone" on Dodson road and we were on our way!! We went to Missoula, Montana the first night and got there a little after midnight. When Heather went to check us into the hotel she came out laughing because our first hotel clerk on the first night of our trip was Phil Sprague who used to live in Royal City. Then the next morning we discovered the Spaldings from Royal City were in that hotel too---for such a small town we seem to be always bumping into people from Royal when we leave town!

Getting their tweezers and buckets of gravel--I mean jewels!

                             Kristi is all smiles~despite the fact we took her out in sub-zero weather!

Learning to search for Sapphires. 

We took the kids to Sapphire mountain the next morning and everyone found some "little Sapphires" Kai hit the biggest "rock" of the day---but Justin is claiming he saw it first, look for them on an upcoming episode of Peoples Court (is it still on the air?). Then we mixed children all up between the two cars and headed out for a pleasant 14 hours of driving with 10 kids and 2 men (Heather and I are fully willing to commit ourselves to any mental instatution that well take our medical insurance).

The hall of flags....all states and Districts represented.

                                          The Noftle family---still liking each other, pretty much.

The Jenks family---Hadley is valiantly hiding her disappointment!

The second night we stayed in Rapid City, South Dakota so that Mt. Rushmore would be within reach the next morning. It was another late night....I am seeing a theme here! The morning comes even after the shortest nights and Mt. Rushmore welcomed most of us---Hadley was disappointed at how "small" it was. Michael kept trying to convince her it wasn't small but he never had her completely sold! After Rushmore we drove, and drove, and drove to get to Nauvoo, Illinois where a rental house was awaiting us. Let's just say we hit Nauvoo at 1:30 am and found our Rental House at 3:00 am and finally fell into bed at 3:30 am. It is possible that I deleted the directions off Michael's phone. Possible---not for sure---its also possible no other i-phone apps could find the house address---also possible the rental company wouldn't answer there after hours phone line---also possible I woke my Mom and Holly up in the middle of the night to drive to me house, get on my computer and find us directions....but how can you assign blame in such a complicated situation? When we finally fell into bed after getting the kids settled I asked Michael if he thought Justin and Heather would hate us forever, his reply? "I hate us forever--night"! Comforting. I thought we would be slowing down once we hit the pioneer pace of Nauvoo, but since we had been assured we could see everything in two days that is all we planned, plus being the ambitious "watch us go" type group we also through in an adult temple session and youth baptism session. We never got back to our rental before 10:30 pm either night and we didn't see every dwelling that was open to the public. We did catch all the plays and musicals, including the BYU ballroom dance team that was visiting Nauvoo--they were a hit with all of us.

 

Wagon riders...and future models.  Typical training of future models is to see how steady their smiles are when being photographed on a wagon ride---in case you didn't know.

    The bakery--inside the Sister Missionary asked where we were from, one of the kids told her--she said "Do you know Lisa Christensen?"  Ummm yes please, we answered---"Her Dad is my husbands cousin"...ahhh home, it's never too far away!

Rope makers, finally- Michael can quit working 16 hour days and let these guys support the family.  What a relief.

More aspiring models on a wagon ride.

Waiting for "Just plain Anna Amanda" to start.

Teenagers are very happy to wait for "Anna Amanda"  especially if it means they get to stop walking a sit down for a bit! 

Sammi was insisting they all look serious--she swears pioneers did not smile in pictures--Kai and Kale are now awaiting their day in court.  (Carter is close to being charged we are looking for more evidence to really claim that his "goofy face" is actually a "smirky grin")

    They HAD to smile--you see the laundry tub is empty---how often can a woman claim the laundry is ALL done?

                              ZOE!!  Go fetch some water from the creek, barefoot, uphill, both ways.

 Sierra, the pioneer, is sporting rimless glasses, quite common in the 1800's (made popular by Pioneer Sarah Palin I believe).  Hadley, the pioneer, is sporting a baby made popular by Seila and Sammi's photo.

Way to tend the sheep, Kai.  You take your work seriously.  Way to photo bomb Sierra, you are quite the sneek.

Stick pulling---two manly men, playing a manly game---soon after this picture was taken Carter went flying with a not so manly squeal.

The upstairs in the Red Brick Store.

The Nauvoo temple---and the Jenks' family---and the dirt in Kale's eye.

                  The Nauvoo temple, and the random lady walking through our picture, oh and us.

To Be Continued.....(you've been warned!)