Craziness

I got home from my trip in the wee hours of the morning Monday.  As soon as I woke up and said hello to the kids, my phone started blowing up about a death in the ward.  It was my first full week as RS President, and things were already crazy.  That whole Monday was a blur of trying to get life in order.  As Jake and I were pulling into the parking lot of the grocery store, we got word that Mike's step sister Katie had died.  We were floored.  She was born with a CHD (heart defect), and Barb had always said that she expected that Katie would die young.  She lived 42 years. 
Her funeral is planned for later on in the week.

The Home Stretch

We woke up Sunday morning and had breakfast with the Johnsons.  Steve and I went to Sacrament meeting at a ward nearby because Warren's ward didn't meet for a few more hours.

Steve tried unsuccessfully the whole time we were there to give Warren a hug.  He must have caught him off guard for this one.  Kim's dad happened to have the camera in his hand because he was going to take our picture, and he snapped a picture before Warren could break away.  :)

As we were posing for our goodbye pictures, Warren noticed that one of the tires on the boat trailer was really bald.  He didn't want us heading out like that, so he and Steve changed the tire real fast. 

It's way easier to change it out at Warren's shop than out on the road somewhere.  He has a great set up.

We got back on the road and then just a few hours from Denver when we noticed that the power steering was out.  We spent some time trying to trouble shoot and fix things if we could, but when it was evident that we couldn't fix it on our own, we just kept driving.  We pulled into Orem at 10.  I stayed long enough to say hello to mom and then was on the road home.
It was nice to get home and even better to have done it all safely with only one small problem with the vehicle. I had so much fun visiting with Steve.  We saw some beautiful countryside and had some really great conversations.  I love my family and I am so grateful I had the opportunity to do this with him.  Life is good. 

Another Day of Driving

We woke up in Independence Missouri.  There are some LDS church history sites that we wanted to see, so we got an early start and looked around on our own since most things were closed.

In the area of the Temple lot, there are several churches.  The Stone Church, the Church of the Temple Lot, The RLDS Church, the Church of Christ, there might have even been more than that.  There was a group of people out in the middle of the Temple Lot field who meet there every morning from 6-8 to pray.  They belong to several different faiths, but they all believe that a day will come when people will be united in Christ and we will all meet there.  We talked to them a bit and they prayed for us, and especially Steve as he goes off on his journey to South Korea.  They were really nice and completely committed to their religion.  They held a version of the Book of Mormon (one that I had never seen) in their hands and talked about us all being "restorationists".  They invited us to come and pray with them any time we were ever in the area again.  When they asked when we were planning to "gather", it was as if they were genuinely surprised that we didn't have an immediate plan.  Super nice people, but I'm not sure if I'll find myself "gathering" in Missouri any time soon.

We ended up visiting with those people and walking around long enough that the LDS Visitor's center opened up and we went in for a little while.  I remember touring this area when I was just out of high school.  We were guided through the RLDS temple by a woman who said she held the priesthood, and saw some of the things they had from Joseph Smith's family.  Then, we went across the street to the LDS Visitor's Center.  We heard a recording of scripture as we looked up at the statue of Christ, and I remember feeling the Spirit testify of the truthfulness of the things I was hearing.  It was a contrast of what I had just seen in the RLDS temple.  I remembered that experience still, so I looked forward to hearing that again.  The Patriarch that gave Steve and I our blessings has a deep and calming voice and he is the voice of many of the things that the church does.  His voice plays in this room, and we sat and looked at the Savior as we heard him speak.  The scripture at the end was John 13:34 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.
My dad always made us sing Love One Another at every FHE and gathering.  It became comical as we were kids, and then after he died it was really neat to see how many times that song was played at special events where we were missing Dad.  Steve and I both thought it was really neat to hear that scripture and then listen as the Sister missionary testified about families and the strength we can have as we work together.  We walked away feeling like we had a tender mercy from Heaven.  A reminder that both our Father in Heaven, and our dad were mindful of the things going on in our little Johnson family right now.  That they are pulling for us and want us to succeed and that they want us to stay united as a family and support and love each other.  It was really neat, and something I am grateful we got to experience together.

Our next stop was Liberty Jail.

The church bought the jail and then built a visitor center over it.  This has all been reconstructed, but it is built to scale and the stone floor is original.

Some really beautiful verses of scripture came from the time that Joseph was imprisoned in Liberty Jail.  It is a reminder that we grow more in trials than we do without them.
We hopped back in the car and continued on our drive.  Our brother Warren called and told us we could stay at his house in Colorado that night if we wanted to.  We were going to drive through Nebraska and Wyoming on a different route, but it seemed silly to be so close and not go to his house, so we changed our plans.  We drove through Kansas.  I wasn't quick enough on the draw and didn't get a picture of that state sign.
I enjoyed hearing Steve's dreams of building a place that looked like an old broken down farm on the outside, but inside it's new and modern with all sorts of cool gadgets.  It is complete with a place to hide his boat and a lake to ski on as often as he wants...all completely hidden from the unsuspecting world outside.  :)
We also started listening to Educated.  That book kept us entertained for hours.  We had all sorts of conversations as we listened and couldn't believe that something like that could happen in this modern world and somewhere so close to where I live.  It's a book to read for sure.

As we drove into Colorado, the skies began to darken.

We started to see people pulling over to the side of the road.  When we passed overpasses, there were cars huddled under them.  We started to worry that they might know something about this storm that we didn't know.

I wish the pictures could really convey what things looked like.  We called one of Steve's friends that lives in Kansas (just a few miles behind us), and he said they were probably pulling over for a tornado warning.  As we were on the phone with him, the rain was falling so hard it seemed like it would break the windshield. 
We drove right through the storm in a matter of 15 minutes or so and we began to see blue skies again.  It was nice to leave those dark clouds behind us.

We got to Warren's house safely and had fun catching up with the kiddos. We watched funny clips on youtube and had fun listening to music.  It seemed wrong being there without my kiddos to play with cousins. 
We went to sleep after another long day of driving miles and miles and using up gallons and gallons of gas.  :)

Drive, Drive, Drivey Drive Drive

A few months ago, my brother Steve called me and we talked about his upcoming move to South Korea.  He has been spending years and years in school for Dentistry, and then to be an Endodontist.  He did it all through the Army, and now it's time to pay back his time.  He has been in Georgia and knew that this move was coming up, so his wife had to move to LA with their little boys.  She's pregnant and had to leave Georgia before she was too far along in her pregnancy to safely fly.  

Steve has a boat and he wanted to keep it through the moves, so he had to make his way from Georgia to Utah to store it.  Then, after dropping off the boat, he could go on to California to spend time with his family before the baby came and his time to go to Korea came.  He asked if he could fly me out to Georgia so that I could help him and keep him company on his drive to Utah.  I couldn't think of anything cooler than that, so I jumped at the chance.  

I took my kids to my mom's house to stay for a few days and she drove me to the airport when I flew to Atlanta.  It was so nice to fly all by myself!  I thought I'd be scared because I am not a huge fan of flying, but I was brave.

I listened to books and caught up in my journal.

Steve picked me up under this super cool canopy thing...

It was so fun to see him pull up with our old family boat in tow.

I hopped in and we drove a few hours that first night.

We stayed at a hotel in Georgia somewhere and as I called Mike to check in, I couldn't believe how loud the bugs were.  Mike could hear them through the phone and it reminded him of his mission.  As I talked, I watched a spider in the parking lot wrap up a beetle to save for later.  My boys would have liked seeing that.  Allie, not so much.

The next day, we drove through the Smoky Mountains.  They really are smokey!  I kept singing the few lines that I knew of Smoky Mountain Rain  by Ronnie Milsap.  Steve is 8 years younger than me, so his memories of road trips when my dad was alive are completely different than mine.  He remembers my dad singing all those old country songs, but doesn't know the songs as well as me.  We did listen to a little Rhinestone Cowboy in honor of my dad.

That first real driving day we drove through the rest of Georgia to Tennesee, then Kentucky, and on to Illinois and stopped in Missouri for the night.

I loved seeing the sights of each State.

Steve's wife comes from a foodie family.  They like to look up the best places to eat and they plan their vacation stops around food.  So, Steve called his wife and asked him to find us a place to eat.  Smokin Chikin was the place.  It was really good...

I am a sucker for bridges.  I really do love them.  We were able to see a lot of beautiful bridges on this trip and I tried to photograph them as we drove.

We pulled into St. Louis and drove to see the arch.  Getting in to ride the elevator up the arch was all sold out, so we toured the visitor's center and went to find food.

Steve was cracking me up with all this theories about where missile launching pads are hidden.  He said this was a perfect place for one.  :)

We didn't expect the crowds in the city.  It was a game night and we were right by the stadium.  The game was for the Cardinals and the Cubs, so people were everywhere.  The restaurant that had great reviews, was totally packed, so we went to a sandwich shop.  The guy outside the shop was asking for money to buy food.  I told him I didn't have cash, so he told me I could just buy him a sandwich with my card.  He said he likes turkey.  As we were ordering our sandwiches, Steve ordered the guy a turkey sandwich and the employees started to laugh because I guess that guy gets someone to buy him a sandwich several times a day.  Steve's a good kid.

After dinner, we walked back to the car to head out. Steve and I joked about just launching the boat right there on the Mississippi.  It would have been fun!
It was full of all of Jenny's stuff when she cleared out her storage unit in Florida, so no room for us to get in and sit down.  We passed many places to go boating as we traveled...missed opportunities for sure.

I took this picture of the stadium as we were heading out because it has my cute Nate boy's name on it.

The traffic was super annoying for the game, but we were soon on our way again.

Like I said before, Steve's wife is pregnant and due any day, so we felt a sense of urgency to get home.  We didn't stop much, and I took most of my pictures from the window of our moving car.  It was really fun to see Angel Moroni sticking up through the trees as we left St. Louis.

We logged a lot of hours driving, filled up with tanks and tanks of gas, and went through some beautiful countryside.  Great day for sure.