Our "Quirky" trip to Nauvoo & Carthage

One Saturday we decided to be spontaneous. We just decided to hop in the car and drive the hour and a half to Nauvoo and then the extra half hour to Carthage. I've found that I'm not usually that spontaneous and so when Aaron suggests these crazy plans I have to make an effort to jump on board. I do my best to plan for what we'll need, but you know - it is last minute. I've discovered that if you are going to be a spur of the moment kinda family you gotta smile through all your adventures.

So to start off - I misread the map (rarely happens, seriously) so we'd burned 10 minutes before we got on the right track. We made it to Nauvoo and the temple is beautiful so is the awesome statue of Joseph and Hyrum on horses depicting their final ride from Nauvoo to Carthage.

We went to eat at the Zion's Mercantile and as I am ordering Parker is looking at the fridge that is filled with drinks. Just then one of the waitresses who was carrying a plate of sandwiches (of course) came around the corner and tripped over him! He's got a little shiner on his forehead as a little souvenir. She was sprawled on the ground (so was the sandwich) and Parker was screaming his head off and of course everyone trapped in the tiny restaurant was staring at us. Poor kid took a minute to calm down - I took him outside, but there were people eating outside too!

After we got our food things I thought things might be okay, but then Lanette must have been playing around with her chocolate milk because she somehow managed to spill half the bottle down the front of her white shirt. It was so soaking wet that she basically had a puddle of chocolate milk in her belly button! Since drama is Lanette's middle name I figured she'd start freaking out, but she has really been working on not crying all the time so she just had this really sad devasted look on her face. Of course, it would be pretty hard for all the people around us not to notice all the hoopla. Aaron took Lanette to the bath room to wash out her shirt and wrapped her up in one of Gracie's blankets (it was basically like a straight jacket and she couldn't even get her hands out). Since she was, um, tied up Aaron was trying to feed her, but apparently the food wasn't coming fast enough and she started complaining a little bit. Hightlight of the day - there was a couple sitting across from us in their church clothes (most likely they had just finished a temple session) and the man comes over and says to Lanette we've decided to buy you a new shirt so you don't have to starve to death. Then he brought a few shirts over and let her pick one (it says I love mormon boys on it)! It was so sweet! It fits her like a dress so she plans on wearing it as a night gown. She's got quite the little memory and I'm sure she'll remember the nice man who bought her a shirt for a long time - so will we!

Then we travelled along the Mississippi to Carthage (the drive was SO beautiful) and watched the video Impression of a Prophet. The kids would not sit still and the concept of a Jail was totally lost on, but it was really cool to hear the story about Joseph Smith giving a man his horse so he could pay his debt and buy his wife out of slavery - told from my ancestor William H. Walker's journal!

Oh and look at how blue Gracie's eyes are? Now if she would just get some hair!!