Belated White Christmas

I was a little disappointed when I woke up on Christmas morning to see that it was raining. A gray Christmas instead of a white Christmas? But then that afternoon it started to snow, and it has been snowy and icy ever since. In fact, they even canceled church today because of the snow/ice. My drive home from work last night was horrible. It took me about an hour to get home, and I couldn't see because of all the blowing snow. But luckily I only fish tailed once. That's what I get for wishing for a white Christmas! :-)

Christmas morning started for us at 1:15 a.m.--not because we got up really early to open presents--but because someone died, and Greg had to go pick them up. He didn't get back home until 4:00 a.m., and then he had to go meet with the deceased man's family later on Christmas morning. So Christmas didn't really start for us until 1:00 in the afternoon, but it's better late than never. We received a lot of fun, nice gifts. Thank you everyone! One of my favorite presents was the Abraham Lincoln Jim Shore statue from Mom and Dad. Richard also sent us some cool Lincoln stamps and portfolio.

Greg gave me a lot of nice gifts, including this signed Jason Heyward baseball jersey! Jason Heyward played for the Myrtle Beach Pelicans, the minor league team in the division just below my Mississippi Braves. He even played for the Mississippi Braves last year, and will play the 2010 season with the Atlanta Braves. He was the 2009 minor league player of the year.

Tiger Lily thought that unwrapping Christmas presents was great fun. "I is de favowite Christmas pwesent?" she asked as she posed for this photo.

And then there was the ferocious Little Spike who is seen here guarding his new blue flamingo toy from Big Spike. Greg's parents sent some fun presents to the animals. The funniest gift was a laser pointer, which is meant for cats, but Big Spike likes it just as much--if not more--than Lily. It is so funny to watch him chasing the elusive red light around the house. He paws at it and tries to bite it. It is so funny to watch! That evening we went over to our friends David and Teal's house for a delicious dinner. Since we couldn't be with family for the holiday, it was nice to be with friends. So we had a fun Christmas here and hope that all of you had a Merry Christmas as well! We've been busy trying to get things packed up here and finish getting the condo ready to move in. Hopefully we can do most of the moving this coming week.

Meowy Christmas from Tiger Lily

Drinkin' with Lincoln

'Tis the season for holiday parties--and when you work at the Lincoln Home, those parties include none other than Abraham Lincoln! Greg and I attended the Lincoln Home Christmas party last Friday night at Mariah's, one of my new favorite Springfield restaurants. We had a really great time, and the food was delicious. Abraham Lincoln even made a cameo appearance to present our superintendent with a "Presidential Pink Slip"--since the superintendent is retiring at the end of the month. Unfortunately the pink slips that the superintendent hands out--of which there have been many lately--are no joke! But anyway, it was funny that Abraham Lincoln came to the party and put on a crazy Santa hat. Santa was also at the party. It was actually just Jim (one of the rangers), but he looks exactly like Santa--beard and all. Greg and I did not take advantage of the cash bar offerings, but many of my coworkers did, so everyone was pretty funny by the end of the evening. Even Lincoln's cheeks were getting a little rosy :-)

On Saturday night we had Greg's work Christmas party. Everyone at the Lincoln Home kept asking me if a funeral home Christmas party involves Santa in a casket. No, there were no caskets--just a lot of nice people and some delicious food. Speaking of funeral people, Greg and I were listening to Conservative talk radio yesterday evening, and the guy filling in for Mark Levin said that Harry Reid looks like a funeral director. Greg was offended :-)

Things are coming along with our condo. Today, probably as I am typing, the carpet is being installed! It will seem like a totally new house. We are done with the painting--except for in the bathrooms--so we're pretty close to being ready to move in. We won't make it by Christmas, but hopefully we can be in by the end of the year.

The Look of Lincoln Home

Since all of our staff here at the Lincoln Home is getting fired, I am now the official webmaster for the park. I have had web experience, and I helped create the website for Natchez National Historical Park, so it's not a totally crazy thing--but our other web guy Matt was awesome. So I can't take credit for the awesomeness of the website, although I have added a few little things to enhance the image of the Lincoln Home. If you'd like to check it out, you can visit the Lincoln Home website at: http://www.nps.gov/liho/index.htm. Thanks to Matt, it is one of the coolest NPS websites I've ever seen.

On a more important note, December is birthday month! Happy Birthday today to Sidney, and Happy Birthday on Sunday to Mom and Mary Lincoln!!! December is truly a month of happy celebrations. I hope Mom had a wonderful birthday and that Sidney has a great day today.

Ice is Not Nice

Even though it is not yet officially winter according to the calendar, I think most people across the country would contend that winter has officially arrived. It is SO COLD outside!! My drive to work this morning was the worst ever. It was snowing a little when I left the house, but it didn't seem too bad on the roads. I left a little earlier than usual and drove a little slower than usual just in case there was ice on the roads. You couldn't see any ice, but I figured that since it had been snowing through the night and it was below freezing, chances were good that ice could have formed. Everything was good until I was driving up the hill past Oak Ridge Cemetery. I was driving in the left lane when I saw the guy in a Ford Explorer next to me hit a patch of black ice. He started to spin out and then slammed on his breaks--which caused him to spin 180 degrees. I immediately started tapping on my breaks--because I could feel that there was ice under my car too--but there were cars behind the Explorer in the right lane, so I couldn't swerve out of the way. He started to slide head-on towards me, and I knew I was going to get hit. At that point I totally freaked out and basically gave up driving so I could brace myself for impact. The only way I can explain what happened next is that someone was watching out for me and took over driving at that point. One moment the Explorer is coming right at me, then I felt my car swerve, and the next minute I was untouched and safely past the Explorer. The Explorer guy hit the median, and it looked like he was going to flip over, but he just bounced up onto the median and stopped. It was totally crazy and I was shaking for the next 30 minutes. That was one close call, and I am grateful to have gotten to work unscathed.

When I arrived at work, an Illinois State Policeman was there for our monthly safety meeting. The topic of the meeting was . . . defensive driving. :-) Someone asked the policeman what to do about black ice. He said, "Well, the first thing is, don't panic." Ooops! That's the first thing I did.

Julmarknad

Hooray for a three-day weekend! Since I am transitioning to my new work schedule (Tuesday-Saturday), I got an extra day off this weekend--which was especially helpful because Greg and I were able to get a lot done at the condo. We still have a lot left to do, but we're making good progress. The place will look awesome when we're done.

Over the long weekend I was also able to go on a fun outing with my friend Crystal (a fellow ranger). One day she and I discovered that we both have Swedish ancestors (mine is Great-Grandpa Gustave Fredrickson). So, in celebration of our Swedish heritage, we took a trip up to Bishop Hill, Illinois, which was founded by Swedish immigrants in the late 1840s. My last trip to Bishop Hill was with my friend Linda when I was her intern at the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency. That was a rather sad trip because we were going up there to help the people at the Bishop Hill State Historic Site prepare to close (due to budget cuts). But the site was reopened earlier this year, and life has returned to Bishop Hill. Crystal and I went there for Julmarknad--the annual Christmas Market. It was so much fun! All of the shops were decorated for Christmas, and we had some amazing Swedish meatballs (and pie!) at the cutest restaurant: The Red Oak.

There were also some traditional Swedish Christmas characters running around town. Our favorite was the Julbock or "Yule Goat." He was so funny. We learned that the Julbock runs around bringing presents to kids. He was walking around Bishop Hill ringing a bell and making sheep noises. He also liked to hide behind trees and jump out to startle unsuspecting visitors. He was followed around by two little "tomtes." A tomte is a little elderly man who has a long beard and also brings Christmas presents to kids. The Bishop Hill tomtes, however, were little kids with fake beards. They were really funny too. Crystal and I had a great time celebrating both our Swedish heritage and the Christmas season!

Tennessee and Turkey

Well, I have quite a bit to catch up on! It has been very busy here with trips, holidays, and house buying. It is true--Greg and I are now officially home owners! Yesterday afternoon we closed on our cute condo. We even went and bought paint and scheduled the carpet guy to come measure for carpet tomorrow, so things are under way. It will take a bit of work to get the condo into tip-top shape, but it will look great when we are finished. Last night when we dropped the paint off at the condo, we were walking around and couldn't believe that it is actually ours! It's a little scary--but very exciting--to take the house-buying plunge. So that is the latest news, but here is some catch-up on the fun holiday week we had:

On Friday, November 20, Greg and I got all packed for our fun Tennessee/Utah Thanksgiving trip. Greg took the dogs to the doggy hotel in Petersburg, but Lily was going to be staying at our house by herself (with Greg's boss coming over to check on her). I felt bad that Lily was going to be home alone, so I got her a pirate ship. She absolutely loves it. It was funny to watch her with it that night. She liked pulling it onto its side using the little pirate hat toy, then she would drag the entire ship around the house. It seems to have kept her entertained during the time we were gone, and she still loves to run in and out of it. Tonight she even pulled the dogs' snowman toy aboard. So Lily and the dogs did great while we were gone.

On Saturday, November 21, Greg and I took off to meet Sarah, Joel, and Eliza in Tennessee. We decided that Tennessee is a good middle point between Illinois and South Carolina, and the Agates discovered a cool Civil War town near Nashville, so we wanted to check it out. On our way, before meeting the Agates in Franklin, Tennessee, Greg and I stopped at a cool Civil War fort in Nashville. As you can see, the fort is literally located in downtown Nashville.

Nashville was the first Confederate state capitol to fall into Union hands (1861). After capturing Nashville, Union troops built Fort Negley to secure the city and provide a stronghold from which to coordinate military operations in the area. It was a really cool place to visit.

Then we went down to Franklin and met Sarah, Joel, and Eliza at the beautiful Carnton Plantation. It was so fun to see them! Carnton was used as a hospital during the Battle of Franklin on November 30, 1864, when Confederate troops were trying to make their way up to take back Nashville. The bestselling book Widow of the South is based on Carnton and the lady of the house, Carrie McGavock, who took it upon herself to see that 1,481 hastily-buried soldiers be re-buried on Carnton property. Meticulous records were kept, and Carnton currently claims the largest privately-owned Confederate cemetery in the country. While Sarah, Joel, and Eliza explored the cemetery, Greg and I went on a tour of the house (the Agates had seen the home before). It was a very interesting tour, and it was so neat to be at the home at the same time of the year and during the same time of day as when the battle took place. At this Thanksgiving time of year, it made me especially grateful for all of the men and women on both sides--north and south--who sacrificed their means, their homes, and their lives to make America a more free and unified nation.

The next morning we went out exploring in Franklin. Eliza loved checking out cemeteries and hiking up to the lookout point from which Confederate generals scoped out the field of battle. She loved being with "Uncle Greggy." That evening we watch the Real Salt Lake soccer team win the MLS championship--becoming the first professional sports team from Utah to win a championship!

On Monday we went to the Carter House in Franklin. It was such a neat place. There weren't very many homes in Franklin at the time of the battle, and the Carter House got caught right in the middle of everything. The Carter's son Todd (a Confederate soldier) was shot near his home and was brought back to the house where he died the next day. The Carter family had to hide with some of their neighbors in the basement of the home during the battle. It is hard to imagine how terrible that must have been.

Eliza is quite the Civil War history buff. She loved posing for pictures out in front of one of the Carter's outbuildings. She is so cute and sweet. It was very fun to see the Agates. We were sad when we had to leave on Monday afternoon, but we were grateful for the time we had to spend with them. The Agates headed back to South Carolina, and Greg and I took off for St. Louis.

On the way up to St. Louis, we stopped to see Superman in Metropolis, Illinois. He is very large. Once we got up to St. Louis we checked into the Crowne Plaza St. Louis Airport hotel which was awesome! We got a sweet deal on the room, and we even got to park there for free while we were in Utah. Our room had a balcony overlooking the pool and the waterfall/river that went through the lobby of the hotel. It was a great place to stay.

Early on Tuesday, November 24, we took the shuttle to the airport and flew to Utah. It was so fun to be home!!! Mom picked us up at the airport, and we had a delicious brunch at one of our favorite restaurants: Left Fork Grill. We went up to BYU to visit Dad that afternoon and enjoyed some delicious BYU Creamery ice cream. That evening some of our favorite friends, Emily and Nick, came over for a pizza party. I thought that I had a great idea: for dessert we would eat Greg's and my anniversary wedding cake (since we were in Illinois for our anniversary, and the cake was in Mom and Dad's freezer). The cake looked good, smelled good, and the frosting even tasted good, but . . . when we bit into the cake, it was horrible! It tasted exactly like Chloraseptic throat spray. So much for my good idea. But luckily Mom and Dad had some tasty ice cream as a backup, and thankfully we discovered that the cake tasted terrible before Emily and Nick had a chance to try it :-) Despite the cake disaster, we had a great evening playing games and catching up on everything. On Wednesday Greg and I ran a few errands and baked some pies with Mom, then we all (including Dad and Rich) were able to go visit Grandpa Taylor and Grandma Cathy. It was wonderful to see them! Then we went and had a delicious dinner at our favorite place: La Casita.

Thursday was Thanksgiving Day! The Barretts came over, and the girls prepared some cool candy boats to put around the table. Mom and Lindy made so much delicious food. My contribution was the corn pudding. The table was full of turkey, stuffing, yams, potatoes, gravy, rolls, and many yummy pies. It was heavenly--but the best part was being there with my family. After out Thanksgiving feast we went over to the park to play. It was an absolutely beautiful afternoon!

On Friday we had a nice relaxing day. While Greg went to spend time with his family (his parents came up from Arizona), I did some shopping with Mom. Then in the evening the Barrett girls came over (looking very festive) and we had a fun pizza/movie night together. Saturday was another great day--it was the BYU/Utah football game! That morning Greg and I had pictures with his family, then we took our parents to breakfast and had a great time together. That afternoon we went over to the Barretts' for a football party. It turned out to be quite an exciting game, and in the end BYU was victorious (it even went to overtime)! On Sunday morning Greg and I had to fly back to St. Louis. Mom and Dad took us to the airport and, as always, it was sad to leave. But we were very grateful for the fun trips we'd had and for the time we were able to spend with our family and friends. We have so much to be thankful for.

Fall at the Lincoln Home

Inquisitive Minds

You never know what you're going to see at the Lincoln Home. A typical hour-long shift as the ranger stationed at the visitor center information desk usually consists of counting people who come through the door, scheduling tours of the home, and issuing tickets to cute little families. On a normal day, the visitor center shift provides a nice break from the craziness of trying to keep 8th graders from stepping off of the blue carpet inside the house, thus setting off a series of alarms. Today, however, my visitor center shift proved to be a bit more eventful than usual.

At about 3:25 this afternoon, I was standing behind the visitor center desk with one of our volunteers, Paula. Paula is a sweet older lady who comes to the park once a week to help us manage visitor center traffic by providing directions to visitors. We were chatting about something when two black guys came storming into the visitor center. One of them said very forcefully, "Hey, we wanna file a complaint." I asked them what their complaint was about, and they said that they had just been kicked off of a Lincoln Home tour by their ranger guide. I tried to get a clear story from them (and quickly realized they were drunk), but all they kept saying was, "That ranger should be fired! We wanna see him fired right now!" After about a minute of talking in circles with them, I finally just asked, "Why did he kick you off of the tour?" They both stopped talking, looked at me, and one of them said, "Because we're black. We was the only black guys on that tour, and we was the only ones who got kicked out." I guess I looked skeptical because then the other one said, "Come on, man. We're just two guys from outta town wantin' to learn 'bout Lincoln. We was just askin' questions in there. We have got in-quis-i-tive minds, you know?" He seriously emphasised "inquisitive minds."

Strike one for them: they said they were from out of town, but I recognized them as guys who walk through the neighborhood on a regular basis. Strike two for them: they were really beginning to appear to be very drunk. One of them especially was starting to look very uncomfortable. Anyway, I told them that I would pass on their complaint to my supervisor. But they said, "No, man. We wanna get that guy fired right now. We want this in writin'." I then told them that I would call my supervisor and they could give the complaint directly to him. By this time both Paula and I were getting pretty uncomfortable. I called Jason and told him that we needed him at the front desk pronto. He came over and talked to the guys, but they started really tearing into him. Jason looked over at me and mouthed the words: "CALL DAVID" to me (David was the law enforcement ranger on duty this afternoon). One of the men saw Jason mouth something to me, and then the guy really started to freak out. He yelled, "Whoa, what's goin' on? What did you just say to her? Are you guys turnin' on me here?" We assured him that nothing was going on while I discreetly called David and gave him the code word to come to the visitor center immediately.

I think the guys could tell that something was up because they started to make their way to the door. But it was too late for them--David, who loves a good adventure--was already on his way. David stopped them just outside the visitor center and asked them what was going on. They started acting really strange and would not cooperate with him. He called in backup from the Springfield PD, and when the Springfield Police pulled up, the guys decided to act like they were going to cooperate. One of the guys gave David a name, but David looked up the name and found that it was not a real person. So David started pressing the guy about who he really was.

Meanwhile, the other guy walked over to the Springfield Police car and proceeded to urinate on the car. Bad idea--especially when there is a group of 7th grade kids standing right there. Before anyone could even blink, the urinator was on the ground in handcuffs and was promptly thrown into the back of the police car. Back to the fake name guy: after seeing his buddy get taken down, he gave David a different name. At least this time it was a real person, but it wasn't him. It was his cousin's name. When David finally got the guy's real name, it turned out there there was a warrant out for his arrest. So, he got to go into the back of another police car. And, they both went off to jail.

Wow--it was crazy. How did they even get tickets to see the house in the first place is what I want to know. So now I have to send a report of the incident to the police and might have to testify at a future court case. At least justice was carried out, and tonight there are two fewer creeps out on the streets of Springfield. Oh, and why did they really get thrown off of their tour? It was because they started making the other people on the tour uncomfortable by arguing with the ranger about Lincoln owning slaves. They were absolutely convinced that Abraham Lincoln owned slaves. Hmmmmm, have they ever read the Emancipation Proclamation or the Thirteenth Amendment? With such inquisitive minds you think they would know stuff like that.

Happy Hollaween

The other night at the Lincoln Home we had a string of Halloween lights hanging on the fence in front of the home. Nobody noticed until later in the evening, but instead of "Halloween," the lights said "Hollaween." :-) But anyway, we hope everyone had a Happy Halloween. We had a fun Halloween here in Illinois. Our friends David and Teal came up to Athens, then we all went on a ghost hunting adventure! David and Teal have a cool infrared camera specifically designed for taking photos of paranormal things. David also has a metal detector, so we wanted to find a place to go where we could use both instruments. I did some research and found out about the Old Union Cemetery located in The Middle of Nowhere, Illinois. It is a really remote cemetery which is supposedly very haunted. And, supposedly an old church foundation was located near the cemetery--a good spot for metal detecting. I was afraid that we wouldn't be able to find the cemetery, but we did! The headstone pictured above sits next to where Amos Ferris is buried. I found an old article about him that said he killed himself because his girlfriend didn't want to marry him. Nobody found his body for four months--yikes. So we thought that this would be a likely-haunted spot, but we didn't pick up anything abnormal with the cameras.

And this headstone belongs to the founder of the church that once stood near the cemetery. His name was Hughes BOWLES! The cemetery was full of Bowles, but we don't know if we're related to any of them. There wer a lot of old, broken headstones in the cemetery. I read that the last burial in the cemetery was in 1924, but we found a headstone from 1947, so that was kind of weird.

It was a very spooky cemetery--especially with the Halloween moon. We searched and searched around the outskirts of the cemetery but couldn't find the rumored church foundation. We still had fun using the metal detector outside the cemetery and found a number of vintage beer cans and shotgun shells.

We also didn't find anything really noticeable in the pictures. In fact, all I captured with my camera was this one orb (which you can see a little better in the negative version of the photo). We haven't seen David and Teal's photos yet, but they said they didn't capture anything on the infrared camera either. It was still a very fun and Halloweenish evening though. We all had a yummy dinner at the Boar's Nest before going to Greg's funeral home to try once again at some ghostly photos. David and Teal did get one interesting photo there, but we decided that the anomaly in the photo might have been caused by light reflecting off of the lens. It was a very fun ghost hunting evening!

Trick-or-Treatin' With Lincoln

What began as a dreary, gray, rainy day turned into a perfect fall evening--which was good because tonight was the fourth annual "Safe Trick-or-Treat Event" for children ages 12 and under in the Lincoln neighborhood. It was so much fun! We literally had hundreds of kids come through the neighborhood. The event was a great success.

My costume (THE 1970s) was a BIG hit. Thank you for hooking me up with the sweet clothes, Mom! Here I am with Susan (the park curator), Donna (Ranger Gary's wife), and Ranger Melissa.












And here I am with both the real Abraham Lincoln and the creepy Lincoln figure we had in the visitor center window. The kids absolutely loved trick-or-treating at Abraham Lincoln's house with Lincoln there (except for a few who were really scared of him). The Lincoln we wanted to have thought the event was tomorrow, so he was stuck in Wisconsin and we had to find a backup. Our backup was pretty good--but he was a little too short and his hair was too curly. He was wearing a pretty awesome vest though.

All-in-all it was a great evening. The neighborhood looked so festive! That was probably one of the most fun things I've gotten to do at the Lincoln Home. Greg also came to join in on the fun. He wasn't in a costume, but we just told everyone he was dressed as the undertaker--which he was :-) After the trick-or-treat event, we had a potluck dinner with all of the staff and volunteers who helped this evening. There was some great food there, and my white chocolate bread pudding (complete with Greg's white chocolate glaze) was a huge hit. What a great way to spend Halloween Eve!

The Great Pumpkin Patch

Greg and I had a wonderful fall adventure today! We went to the Great Pumpkin Patch in Arthur, Illinois. Mom and I discovered the Great Pumpkin Patch in 2007 while I was at EIU. We thought it was one of the most fun fall places we had ever visited, and today it was just as fun as I had remembered it. Arthur is a little Amish community in central Illinois--and the Great Pumpkin Patch has been an annual event since 2006. We began our morning at the Homestead Bakery, where we found some delicious pumpkin bread and apple butter.

When we entered the pumpkin patch, we found some very fun and cute animals. They even had a "Three Little Pigs" pig pen, complete with piggy houses constructed of straw, sticks, and bricks.

What a pretty fall setting! Even though it was very cold in Arthur, I had to have a hand-dipped pumpkin ice cream cone. By the time I finished the ice cream cone, my mouth, face, and hands were frozen, but I was happy.

The Great Pumpkin Patch is full of fun pumpkin/squash/cucumber displays, including Noah's Ark, pumpkin trees, and funny animals and giant gingerbread man looking things made of hay bales.

There were also some displays which included scarecrows featuring the faces of several well-known figures . . . including Hillary Clinton :-) How perfect is that? Stick that in your field, and you won't have to worry about anything--crows, bugs, worms, deer, robbers--a Clinton scarecrow would scare absolutely everything away. Greg and I should have put one of those in our garden this spring to scare the bunnies away. Below is a funny video of one of the pumpkin patch roosters who sounded really silly. Though he was the smallest rooster, he thought he was pretty cool, and whenever one of the other roosters would crow, he had to try to outdo them.

After visiting the Great Pumpkin Patch, Greg and I went over to Tuscola to eat lunch at our favorite place: Flesor's Candy Kitchen, home of the most wonderful Reuben sandwich in the world.

After our fall adventure, Greg and I went to see the condo we are thinking to buy. It is so cute!!! The price is right, location is right, and it has a fireplace so we could stay warm this winter without spending millions of dollars on utility bills. It would need some new paint and carpet, but other than that it is in really good shape. It has three bedrooms and two-and-a-half bathrooms and is located in a really nice condo complex on the north side of Springfield. What do you all think? We would be happy to hear your input on the matter. Later this evening we went to a fun cookout at the Hennings' (Greg's boss) house. You could call today a perfect fall day.

One Year!

Today is Greg's and my ONE YEAR anniversary!!! We can't believe it's already been a whole year. It was a beautiful fall day here in Illinois--just like the beautiful day in Utah when we were married, and Mom said that it was the same type of perfect day there today. That was such a wonderful, happy day that we spent with our family and friends last year. Much has happened since we got married--I no longer have a gallbladder, and Greg is back in school--but it has been a fun adventure so far. Greg and I are looking forward to many more anniversaries in the future!

To celebrate our anniversary, Greg and I spent the weekend in beautiful Nauvoo. On Friday afternoon we drove over there, with a stop at Greg's nice cousin Scott's house in Hamilton (he and his wife Amy have the cute twins), then we checked into our hotel room and enjoyed a delicious dinner at the Hotel Nauvoo buffet. When we woke up on Saturday morning, it was gorgeous outside. Here is a picture of the temple with the pretty changing leaves.

Here is the neat hotel we stayed at: the Woodruff Hotel on Mullholland Street. It is an old building that was converted into a hotel. Mom, Dad, and I actually stayed in the same building a few years ago, but at that time the accommodations were quite rustic. :-) It has been updated a lot, and we enjoyed our stay there--especially the yummy breakfast basket they brought to us.

Then we had a wonderful time at the Nauvoo Temple that morning. It was so nice to attend the temple and be reminded of the eternal blessings we can enjoy through our marriage. I especially enjoy being at the Nauvoo Temple and reflecting on our ancestors who helped build and attended the original temple there.

After going to the temple, Greg and I had fun going around Nauvoo for a while. We had lunch at one of our other favorite places: Grandpa John's Cafe, and enjoyed the nice fall weather.

What a beautiful setting! After our fun day in Nauvoo, we drove down to Quincy where we were going to pay homage to Abraham Lincoln at the Lincoln-Douglas debate site, but the downtown area was all closed off for a parade. It was okay though, because we found a cool sports card shop to see while we were there. Then we headed home.

Today, on our actual anniversary, we spent a nice day together. Unfortunately we couldn't go to church--because I had to go give my Civil War presentation at the Lincoln Home--but we made the most of it, and had a nice time with each other. There was an unusually big crowd at my presentation today. I wasn't expecting many, but I guess there were a lot of people there at the park enjoying the nice, sunny day (it had been cold and rainy all week). Our animal children have been extra cuddly today too. The three of them definitely make our lives more interesting :-) I am so happy to be married to Greg!