Family Vacation--Ohio

A little over a year ago, Jamie was supposed to go to France. Well, a volcano was wreaking havoc with air travel in Europe and so his trip was cancelled. Since he already had taken the time off of work, he decided to drive up to Ohio to see some church historic sites. When he came back, he told me how much he wanted to take our family to see the historic church sites in both Kirtland and Hiram. So, we started planning our trip.
We invited my parents to go along with us. Jamie found a really neat state park that was half way in between Hiram and Kirtland. It had a neat lodge that you could rent a room in or you could rent a cabin for a little bit more. We decided to rent a two bedroom cabin so that we could fix our own meals and spread out a little more. Mama and Daddy also got a cabin. The name of the park is Punderson State Park. It had two pools--one indoor and one outdoor. It was a beautiful park with lots to do. It had many trails, golf, tennis, etc. The lodge was gorgeous!

This is the back side of the lodge. It was just so beautiful right next to the lake.

This was our cabin. The kids loved it because it had a room with two sets of bunk beds. I was a little nervous, but they did good sleeping in the bunk beds. Of course, while we were there, we spent out evenings watching Carolina Baseball. It was very exciting to see them win back to back national championships! (Go Gamecocks!!!)
Anyways, we left after church on Sunday and drove to West Virginia. We spent the night there and left out early Monday morning and made it to Punderson State Park a little after 1:00pm. We went to Mama and Daddy's cabin and had sandwiches. While the older folk rested, I took Eli, Katie, and Ginny swimming. Jamie walked around with Laura Lynn and let her swing a little while.
After our rest, we headed down to Hiram, which was only about 15 minutes from us. We went to the Johnson Home. This is where Joseph and Emma Smith lived for a while. This house is where they were living when a mob came into the house, drug Joseph across the street out into a field, and tarred and feathered him. It was very humbling to see the steps he had stood on the next morning and preached after going through such a traumatic experience. The house had been restored to have even the same color walls and door frames as it had back when Joseph and Emma lived there.

Here we all are standing right where Joseph would have stood and preached the gospel.

Eli was pretending to be Joseph Smith.

The next morning, we woke up and Grandma cooked us grits and eggs. After a yummy breakfast, we headed about 15 minutes north to Kirtland, OH. The church has done an amazing job at restoring buildings that were there when Joseph lived in Kirtland. They have even moved the main road so that all of the buildings are together without cars driving through.

On the tour, we were able to watch a very humbling video that showed what life was like during the time that Joseph lived in Kirtland. It also showed the sacrifices the early Saints had to make to build the temple and then to leave it and move to Missouri.
One of the buildings we were able to tour was the Whitney Store. This was a store that was used as a general store during the time and Joseph and Emma lived upstairs. The store part was really cool because it looked so authentic.

In the upstairs room, there was a very sacred room. This room was the room that Joseph used to teach the men who were going out as missionaries. Many revelations that are in our scripture, The Doctrine and Covenants, were received in this room. It was neat to be in there and be able just to sit a a moment and ponder.

After visiting the sites that are owned by our church, we headed up the hill to see the Kirtland Temple. Our church does not own it anymore, but the church that does own it allows visitors. I couldn't take any pictures inside, but can say that it was beautiful. We were able to go all the way to the 3rd floor of the temple. This is where Joseph Smith had an office and he also taught the men about the gospel so that they could go on missions. We were able to sing "The Spirit of God" in the temple before we left. That song was written for the dedication of the Kirtland Temple. It was really cool to hear the Young Men that were on our tour sing this wonderful song. After being in this beautiful, sacred building, I can only imagine how hard it was for the saints to leave it after having worked so hard at building it.

After the temple, we went out to the Morley farm. We were able to go up a trail and learn a little more about the early Saints.

The kids enjoyed sitting on the stump stools.

On Wednesday morning, we ate a yummy breakfast with Grandma and Papa and then headed to the Amish country. We made a pit stop at a home of a family that Jamie knew from when he first joined the church. It was fun visiting with them.
Amish country was beautiful! I loved driving down the road and seeing the horse and wagons going along. It was fascinating to see horses pulling plows and hay balers. It really was a very peaceful place to be.

We spent Wednesday night in the Amish country and on Thursday morning we did a couple of fun things. First, we went to the Heine cheese factory to watch them make some cheese. We ate lots of sample of cheese and fudges. We then went to a farm that had a petting zoo. The kids loved it! They had a huge horse. He weighed 3,000 pounds. He was the biggest horse in the county.

There were goat, chickens, turkeys, dogs, horses, sheep, and cows that the kids could pet.

The goats really liked Eli.

All of the kids got to ride a pony or a horse. They loved it! Laura Lynn enjoyed it the most. She kept on talking about the "horsey."

Thursday afternoon, we started our drive back home. We drove to Virginia and spent the night and then woke up Friday morning and drove the final 4 hours home. We had such a great trip! I learned so much and definitely had my testimony strengthened of my Savior, Jesus Christ and of living prophets. I'm so glad that Jamie made the recommendation for us to go.