K & K Meador (+2)

Since Kevin is the Stake Young Men's President, we went as a Ma and Pa again for the Priest/Laurel Nauvoo trip. Ir was an amazing experience last time (2 years ago), so I was looking forward to it again. Although, there was a lot of prep work getting ready to leave my kids for 4 days! My parents were coming to watch them, which was a huge relief :)

The weekend before the trip, Kevin and I spent time going through our old notebook and discussing things we wanted to do the same/different with our family. We had a pretty good game plan, but we still hadn't received a list of our kids. At 9:30 (the night before we left for Nauvoo), when I was trying to get Colby to sleep, I received a text from a friend in my ward whose son was going on the trip. He had heard from a few friends that his two closest friends were in the same Nauvoo family, but he wasn't in that group. He wasn't sure whose family he was in, but he was worried about it. She expressed concern because he always just went with the flow, but she could tell that he was worried about not knowing people in his family. I was immediately frustrated because I didn't even now my family. and the kids that was telling people information was the son of another Ma and Pa.

I fell asleep by Colby, but when I came downstairs around 11 I told Kevin about the texts. He checked his email again, and he actually had received an email at noon with the family lists. We looked over the lists and they were totally out of balance. Most of the strongest youth (testimony wise) were in the same family, and the YM whose Mom texted me (Charlie) wasn't with anyone from our ward. Kevin and I were both pretty frustrated, especially since the strong family also included the daughter of the Stake leaders who made the families :/ (It could have been a coincidence, but it didn't seem that way.)

Kevin emailed the member of the Stake who created the list, and expressed our concern. He commented that he felt like he divided them even;y, but then texted 15 minutes later that he put Charlie in our family. That wasn't the point, haha. We weren't requesting Charlie, just a better distribution of kids. (Although, we were happy about getting Charlie because he's a great kid.) About 11:45 we received another text that a kid named Ezra would also be in our family. I had heard great things about him, so I was happy to have him in our family. And I was hoping that this meant that they were shuffling the families a bit.

By the time we got that all squared away, it was after midnight and I still wasn't completely packed. I think we went to bed close to 1 AM, and we had to wake up at 4:45 to be at the Stake center by 5:45. I was SUPER tried the morning we left, haha.

But here's our family!! These kids did great on the 13 hour drive to Nauvoo, and it was fun getting to know them better.

When we were 3 miles from the temple and our hotel, we turned off the movie we were watching so the kids would be watching as we turned the corner and saw the temple up on the hill. We were on the two-lane narrow road that runs alongside the Mississippi River, when all of a sudden, out of the woods, jumps a deer. Straight to the front of our 15 passenger van! It shook the car and startled us all. Kevin quickly pulled over because smoke was coming from under the hood. We could see the huge deer dead on the road, and Kevin got out to investigate. Deer fur was stuck to the license plate (yuck!), and it looked as though the grill was cracked and that the radiator was leaking fluid. I am SO glad that I wasn't driving because I am sure that I would have swerved or lost control of the car. Kevin handled it like a champ, but I could tell that he was super frustrated.

The kids kept asking me "Is Pa okay?" while Kevin paced on the phone outside the van. I told them that he was fine, just frustrated. He determined that it wasn't safe to drive, so we had to call one of the other families to come and get us. Luckily, we were so close to the hotel so it wasn't a big deal, but the big deal came when we realized that we wouldn't be able to rent another 15 passenger van. We couldn't even find any mini vans to rent. It seemed as though we were going to have to dissolve our family and split them up amongst the other 3 vans, but that made us really disappointed. We didn't come all this way to then have to dissolve our family!

Kevin and I brainstormed that night about possible solutions, and we decided to try to rent two sedans, and just rely on the Stake Presidency member (Brother Munoz) and his wife to help us get our family where we needed to go each day. Him and his wife were happy to help, but we knew it was going to be complicated to split our family among three different vehicles.

That night, as we had our family devotional, Kevin talked to the kids about his frustrations with the whole deer incident. (Side note: the kids named the deer Dave, and he was the topic of lots of funny comments among our family group chat.) While it was really frustrating that this happened when we were ALMOST to our destination, it was such a blessing that we were close to our destination so that another family could easily help us. We had to look for the silver linings in the whole situation!

Well, the next morning, the whole group was scheduled to go to Carthage Jail, so we made assignments for our kids to go in different vehicles and two of our girls came with Kevin and I in President Munoz's car. The whole experience at Carthage was just as spiritual as it was last time. The video presentation by Elder Holland before you enter the jail was amazing and I felt the Spirit so strongly. While inside the upper room of the jail, the guide was testifying of the events that occurred there. He asked a kid from our home ward to read the words of "A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief" and the Spirit was palpable. I was sitting next to the kid reading, and I had tears streaming down my face. After we left the jail, the guide was talking to another Pa in our group, who later told us that the guide expressed to him that he was in his third year of volunteering at the jail, and he had never had such a strong spiritual experience as he did with our group. It really was amazing to be in that room with such amazing youth whose testimonies allowed us to have that experience!

Our family next to the statue of Joseph and Hyrum Smith.

It was humbling and very somber to be outside the window where the Prophet Joseph Smith was martyred.

We were heading back to the vans, when we saw a group of missionaries gathering to began singing. We quickly corralled our group back to this spot, and I am SO glad that we did. I had never heard the songs that they sang, but again, the Spirit showed up. I was literally crying my eyes out. Several of the other youth felt it strongly too, and I tried to talk to one of the YM afterwards about it. He was embarrassed because he was having a hard time controlling his emotions, which I could relate with since I'm a crier, haha. When the missionaries were done, they came right over and began mingling with our youth. They were asking just casual questions, but also questions about how they felt and what they experienced in the jail. I loved that our youth were having this experience with the missionaries who were so full of light!

Poor Kevin missed the whole musical portion because he was off trying to coordinate the rental cars. He spent nearly 45 minutes on the phone, but finally was able to secure two sedans that were about an hour away. He dropped me off with the kids to look at a few sites before lunch, but then came back to let me know that I needed to come as well to drive one of the cars back. Sister Munoz stayed with our family while her husband drove Kevin and I an hour away to get the cars. (See how complicated it all was?) We arrived at the rental center, and once they realized that we would be returning them on Thursday morning, they allowed us to rent two minivans that were booked starting Friday. This was amazing news since we could just split our kids among the two vans and not worry about involving Brother and Sister Munoz!

We were back by early afternoon, and met back up with our family to tour Old Nauvoo.

I took a few pictures of things that I knew Brooke would love, like these cute sheep and the baby rocking bench :)

That afternoon, we went to the Visitor's Center and saw the beautiful Christus statue.

After dinner, we headed to the Sunset on the Mississippi show, which was lots of singing and dancing.

Kevin was being a nut about taking a picture, so this is the best one I got, haha.

After the show, we headed over to the British Pageant. As we drove there, I told the kids in my van about the people from other churches that MIGHT be standing outside the Pageant. They pass out anti-mormon newspapers, and sometimes get noisy. For this reason, the church has bagpipe players nears the entrance of the Pageant to drown our the nonsense. I'm so glad I warned them because one man was standing outside shouting things like, "Mormons are Bigots, you don't believe that the blacks are as good as you." One of our older missionaries offered him a bottle of water, which made him irate. He was in the guys' face yelling, "I don't want your water. What a hypocrite! You're gonna need that water where you are going!" The kids were totally confused, and I quickly realized that Kevin had forgotten to warn his kids, haha. They thought the guy was an actor for the church. Oops!! One of my girls, who I had warned, was so confused. She made a comment about how many hispanic kids were in our family, so clearly we weren't bigots. I encouraged her to not worry about it, and just move along.

We played a few pioneer games before getting settled in our seats, which our cook had secured earlier in the day for us. (Thanks, Carlos!!)

The Pageant was amazing!

The next morning was when we spent time inside the temple. The youth had a great experience doing baptisms for the dead, and I loved seeing all the YM being able to baptize one another.

We were in the earlier group with the Ram family, so we spent time taking pictures outside while Kevin helped inside the temple with the second group. Larissa Ram became a good friend when we worked closely together last year for Trek :)

After the temple, we went to the Living Center where we learned about how the Saints lived during their time in Nauvoo. We watched how they made rugs, candles, bread, rope, etc. Then it was time to head back for lunch and get changed. We had tickets for a performance (The Promise) at 2 PM in the Visitor's Center, so we headed over. I enjoyed it, but I also enjoyed a tiny nap on Kevin's shoulder, haha. I was SO exhausted after only sleeping 4-6 hours for multiple nights in a row, haha. Near the end of the show, the lights flickered a few times and they lost audio. I figured they were having technical problems, so didn't think much of it. Plus, it was amazing to see the cast just carry on and sing their last two numbers a cappella. I literally had goosebumps during their last song!

Well, when the show was over, someone announced that we were having severe weather outside, so we were welcome to stay inside the Visitor's Center and join them for their next show. We walked out of the auditorium and it was crazy dark outside!! You could hear rolling thunder and pounding rains. We waited 10 minutes or so, then decided to just move on. Kevin ran (in the rain) to get his van, picked me up and drove me to my van, and then we picked the kids up at the front doors. Since nobody was outside, we figured we should go see some more of Old Nauvoo. They had lost power during the storm, but we still had great visits to the print shop, the gunsmith, the brick yard, and the Lucy Mack Smith home.

We were supposed to walk the Trail of Hope that afternoon, but we weren't sure it was going to be possible because of all the rain. There were fallen trees all over due to the 60 mph winds that occurred while we were unaware in the Visitor's Center, haha. But the skies cleared, and we had a beautiful experience walking the trail. The rain lowered temperatures at least 15 degrees, which was amazing!

As a family, we read each sign and felt the Spirit of Nauvoo. I cant imagine how hard it would have been to leave after building a beautiful temple and life there in Nauvoo, but I also can't imagine living through the hate and violence they suffered through.

At the end of the trail, we reached another statue and Kevin asked me to read it. He definitely knew better, because I was so emotional at the end! But I think the kids felt it, too. As I finished, Ezra (one of my new favorite kids) said, "Ma, should we take a picture here?" Yes, yes we should :)

There we were, at the end of the trail and looking out at the Mississipp river. It was so wide, and I couldn't imagine crossing it with ALL of my belongings AND a wagon! This replica was right there at the river, which meant that we didn't have to guess how they made it all possible.

One last family picture at the Mississippi river. The evening couldn't have been more perfect! The weather was ideal, and we really had the whole place to ourselves since the storm scared everyone away.

We were supposed to have our testimony meeting at the river, but since everything was wet, President Munoz wanted to have it back at the Stake Center we had reserved for our meals that day. It was a good back-up, but as we were there at the river, it seemed so silly to leave and head somewhere else. I didn't want to leave the feeling we all had there, and it seemed natural to stay put and share what we were all feeling. I made the comment to another Pa, and he was gonna say something to President Munoz but then didn't. I just spoke up because I didn't want to miss out on this opportunity. President Munoz thought about it, then asked what some of the other leaders thought. We were all in agreement, so we stayed right there and gathered around on a platform. President Munoz started the meeting, then asked Kevin to share his testimony. He did an amazing job and I loved hearing his testimony. I don't feel like Kevin is an emotional person, but for some reason, on these youth trips, he has so many spiritual experience and gets choked up talking about them. There is something so unique about spending time with the youth and feeling of their strength. It gives Kevin an opportunity to bear testimony to them, and it makes his testimony grow as well.

A few of the boys in our family also bore strong testimonies, which was amazing to hear! Charlie was one of those boys, which was really cool. His dad has been inactive for 13 years, and although his mom is SUPER strong in the gospel, I know that's hard on the kids. He bore a powerful testimony of the Prophet Joseph Smith, and I am so grateful that he received that witness on this trip since that's on of the things his dad struggles with.

As we walked back up the trail, Ezra sort of apologized to me for not bearing his testimony. I told him that it was fine, but that if he wanted to share it with our family that night, we would love to hear it. We hurried back to our hotel to get changed and ready for the Nauvoo Pageant. We barely made it in time, so we didn't get to spend time doing Pioneer games. The kids were disappointed about that, but not as disappointed as when we found out that someone had removed our reserved seats at the Pageant! I couldn't believe that other members would do that, but I guess once it gets close to the starting time, they just open up all the seating. We were literally behind a pole, so it was hard to see part of the stage, and it was also freezing, haha! I wasn't expecting that at all, but because of the storm, the wind was cold and I didn't have a sweater or anything. And to top it off, the kids sitting behind us were being loud and rude, and I couldn't drop it. I gave them multiple looks, but Kevin tried to tell me to forget about it. I really tried, but it was frustrating and annoying. It was still good, but I didn't enjoy it nearly as much as the British Pageant the night before!

And that was our trip in a nutshell! The next morning we were supposed to head to Liberty Jail, but since we had to drive an hour in the wrong direction to return our vans (We couldn't take them out of the state!), we wouldn't make it back in time to meet up with the rest o the group. The two girls in the Munoz's car with us were also gonna miss Liberty Jail, but that was just the reality of our situation :(

Although we were all split up on the drive home, we kept our group chat alive which allowed us to stay connected to our kids :) One of the girls in the back seat took this pic and sent it to the group chat with some comment about how Ma and Pa were adorable :)

I loved this experience with Kevin and the way we were both able to grow spiritually! He did an amazing job leading our family, and since I struggle not getting emotional, I prefer him to take the lead on things like this. But he gave me several great opportunities to testify to the kids, and for that, I am grateful.

We were anxious to get home to our babies, but we weren't able to see them that night :( We were the first ones back to the Stake Center, with an arrival around 9 PM, but unfortunately the trailer with all the luggage didn't arrive until nearly midnight, which made for another late night for us!

We were all sleepy the morning of the fourth, but we made it to the Arlington Independence Day Parade! The theme this year was, "Happy Birthday, America." In years past, we always arrived late and only stayed for a portion of the parade. This year, we were a bit more strategic about where we would park, and we were able to watch the whole thing. There were lots of cool floats, but our favorites remained the marching bands and the middle-aged Elvis look-alikes doing stunts on miniature motorcycles.

We brought our camp chairs, but ended up sitting on a stone wall near an outdoor pavilion. It was a perfect spot because we were in the shade, and we didn't have to get there early to stake our claim. Eventually, Colby and Brooke put their chairs up on top of the wall to "be super comfortable."

I loved watching their little faces as they watched the parade go by. And of course, Brooke brought her baby again. She doesn't want that baby to miss ANYTHING!

Baby Violet (I don't think I've mentioned her name yet) even gets strapped in on car rides. Safety first, right?

Once we made it home, we all cuddled up on the couch and watched the new Dumbo movie together. It was nice to rest and just relax after lots of busy/fun activities. We eventually made it out to the lake to enjoy an evening on the water. We weren't on the boat for more than 10 minutes when Colby started asking for a treat, haha. That's what happens when he sees me pack the bag and he knows I have a fun new treat inside!

He wanted to know EVERY flavor of Mike and Ike, but eventually started closing his eyes "so it would be a surprise." I seriously love this kid. So much joy in one box of candy, haha.

The kids tubed together, surfed with Daddy, and jumped a hundred times off the bow of the boat. As the sun was setting, we made the impromptu decision to stay out past dark to see if we could see any firework shows. We did, indeed, see 5 or 6 smaller shows, but they were all pretty far away or right along the tree line.