The Tangrens

We planned to be in Nauvoo on our 10^th anniversary and it was an equally wonderful day. The boys started the day at the pool as they weren’t able to go last night. Then we got ready and headed down to the visitors center to get wagon ride tickets. By the time we got there the first tickets were for 11:30 and they said that it might not go if it was too hot.  It was supposed to be 102 degrees with a 40% chance of rain. Which if you have spent any time in the east you know that doesn’t mean that it will be cooling down…it means humidity. We decided to take the opportunity to go up to the temple to take pictures and we walked up the big hill in front of it to get there and took pictures along the way.

Do you see my sweet little boys walking single file towards the temple ? LOVE!

Like when we were at Mt Rushmore I found myself thinking. “I wonder how many pictures I’m going to take of this same stone.”


This stone has much more significance than even Mt Rushmore though, of course.  We took pictures of the boys and asked Hyrum to take a picture of us. 

I love that he didn't even wait for Derek to get his arm completely around me before he took it. J A very nice group of people leaving the temple agreed to take a picture of our family on the steps of the temple.

Perfect! We went to go take more pictures around the temple and with every picture the boys got sweatier.

Soon they were done but Derek wasn’t so he took some more pictures

The benches behind the temple where we sat the night before we were sealed and dreamed of our life together.

On the other side of that dome shaped window is the Celestial Room where we waited to become an eternal family.

Just about the same time we were sealed 10 years ago today!

The boys and I decided to go over to the Temple arrival center. I had no idea what that was but figured it was air conditioned and walked in. As it turned out it was kind of a waiting and preparation area for families and people coming to go through the temple. There was a missionary couple at a desk when we walked in. I apologized and asked if it was ok if we stepped in a second to cool off a bit. They assured us that we were more than ok to stay in there to cool off (I’m sure they saw the red faces and sweat drenched hair of my boys and took pity on us. They showed us the closet full of toys for the boys to play with and the ice cold drinking fountains. When I needed to feed Elijah they showed me to a room complete with a glider a chair and a crib. On the way back to my boys I saw a little kitchenette. A little Shangri-La.  Derek and Hyrum ran down the hill to the car and drove it up to get us and we were off to the wagon ride.

It was now 100 degrees and they said that our ride would be the last because it was just getting too hot.  It was nice to be moving and feeling the air move as we rolled along.

"The Big Muddy" Mississippi River with it's beautiful American Lotus!

We went by a house owned by a Simeon Dunn who walked to Nauvoo from Michigan.

This isn't the house. Just another one along the way. I wish I'd taken a picture.

This is interesting because I have deep roots in Michigan and there are Dunns in my family.  Makes me want to do a little research.  After the wagon ride we headed over to the brickyard.

I definitely wanted to go by the brickyard because my grandpa worked in the brickyard when they were on a mission there and when we had girls camp there he made bricks with the date and  “Grand Rapids Stake Girls Camp” embossed on them. I thought the boys would be excited about getting a brick. We decided to cool down in the car for a while before going to the brickyard. As it turned out these days its  air conditioned though.  That was nice.

Then we went to the Blacksmith shop. We should have done that first. It is the only site that isn’t air conditioned. The boys didn’t mind much though.

They had fans

At the blacksmith shop they tell the story about the prairie diamond and then they give everyone one to take home.  Derek was sure to get one for me.

Yes we are cheesy, but it is our 10 year anniversary! I totally made him do it again so I could get a picture. Derek was able to get the horseshoe too that they make in the blacksmith shop.

He got his first one the day before we got married. All in all a good trip to the blacksmith shop. J

Since it was now 102 degrees we decided to get something to eat so we went up to Mulholland to grab something to eat. We stopped a few places to check them out but the boys wanted nothing of what they were offering. But I saw an area behind the businesses of Mulholland Rd that I think had been used as a set in the church history videos where Derek and I had an olden time picture taken when we came to the open house for the temple.

Kind of a random little area.

We got lunch at a little greasy spoon and then while Derek and the boys mailed our postcards I set off for some souvenir shopping. By then it was 104 degrees so we decided to head out of town.

We weren’t going to go to Carthage this time around since the boys are so young and didn’t sit through any other missionary presentations at any of the other sites so why would they sit through this and if they did it’s a pretty somber sad event . But when we looked at the map, the route we figured we’d go on would take us right past it so we decided to make it a photo opportunity. And both boys had fallen asleep and needed a reason to wake up.

They were not happy to wake up but I promised them the faster they posed for pictures the faster we’d leave so they dutifully sat and sort of smiled.

Then we were off to St Louis.

So as we’ve been traveling across the country we’ve of course been seeing acres upon acres of corn (mostly sad and dying corn with the drought) but we also saw acres upon acres of some kind of bean. It made sense to me because legumes correct the nitrogen in the soil and corn really depletes the soil of nitrogen. As we passed them I began to wonder what kind it was. I couldn’t imagine there was that much demand for green beans. As we traveled the back roads to St Louis curiosity got the best of me and I asked Derek to stop along the side of the road so I could go look at some up close

The flowers were purple and the fruit (they were really small) was fuzzy.

Still didn’t know what it was. I wondered if it was some kind of Edamame or soy bean but didn’t know, since I’ve never grown it.

(It turns out that it was soybean.  Apparently soybean is a pretty common crop to grow. You’d think I would have known that spending my days and nights in the agricultural wing of the life science and agriculture building while in college, I can only imagine what a farmer would have thought seeing me taking pictures of soybeans.  To him it would probably be the same as getting out to take a picture of a stalk of corn up close.)