This month is Cody's vacation month from school (AWESOME!) so we decided to take advantage of our free time and go see some things we haven't seen before. We wanted to go to Gettysburg because its only a few hours away (and because I'm a total history dork and really really wanted to go). On the way we made a pit stop in Hershey, because I mean really who doesn't go to Hershey Park for a potty break?!?
We went on the Chocolate World tour which is super cool, especially because its FREE! And we walked around and said "Hi" to the giant kiss and of course ate a candy bar.
Then we jumped back in the car and finished the drive. We started with a tour of the National Cemetery where President Lincoln gave his famous Gettysburg Address (you know the "Four score and seven years ago...").
Then we drove up to the visitors center and did the cyclorama, which is a super cool picture that wraps all the way around a round room and there are lights and sounds to make it feel like you are watching the battle. They even have things on the floor leading up to the picture that make it look 3d. Its really neat especially because it was painted in the 1800's right after the war. Then you go into the museum and its really cool too.
It has uniforms and letters from soldiers and furniture from the leaders camps. The part I thought was really cool was this wall with tons and tons of pictures of the soldiers who fought on both sides.
Pretty sure I found 2 relatives (Clark's from Mississippi - can you guess which side they fought on??) Then we loaded back in the car and drove around all of the battlefields. It was really cool to see all the cannons
and the Flame and Eternal Hope
and we even climbed up a few look out towers.
I called my mom while we were driving around and she started reading me all of the information that my grandpa had given her about our family that fought in the war so that made it even cooler. Oh and in case you were wondering what side my ancestors were on, there is a street named after them.
After seeing all the sites we jumped back on the road and headed towards home. After spending so much time in the car you would think we were done but oh no! Oh Thursday, Cody and I made a trip over to NYC to take Ashlee to the airport. It took us 10 hours to drive to JFK and back. Definitely made us both realize that we never want to drive into Manhattan ever again! The kids luckily got to spend the day with Cassidy so they had a blast! We were planning on going to Palmyra for the pageant but after out stint in NYC we decided to take a break from driving and go to Palmyra on Saturday. So on Friday Rilyn did some farming and found that our carrots are coming along nicely.
Isn't that the cutest little carrot you've ever seen?!? We made Rilyn eat it for pulling it.
She isn't a huge fan of vegetables but I think because she grew it she was ok with nibbling on it. Rilyn also got a hold of my camera and I found some beautiful pictures of her room and some self portraits.
She is such a nut! On Saturday we headed out toward Palmyra. We stopped at the Priesthood Restoration Site to eat lunch and check it out.
After lunch we finished the drive to Palmyra. Since we went last summer we decided to just hit the places we didn't get to see or spend a lot of time in last time. We went to the printing house where the first Books of Mormon were published.
It was cool to see all of the old equipment. From there we went to Joseph Smith's home and walked around the Smith farm. We made it into the Sacred Grove as well. Its always so neat to be around all of these places. And I took advantage of the awesome backgrounds and took the kids pictures.
After we went to the Hill Cumorah to find seats for the pageant and eat dinner. Oh and of course to roll down the Hill Cumorah because who doesn't do that?!?
We went and checked out some of the costumes from previous performances. The kids loved them.
However when the people wearing the consumes walked by my kids turned into chickens!
We had some friends from our ward in Erie performing in the pageant this year (but didn't get to meet up with them, bummer) and my friend Joseph from high school was in it. We did run into Joseph, who is playing Laman. Casen was ok with him as long as he was playing.
As soon as they had to smile for a picture he wasn't too sure.
Did you know that this is the pageants 75th year running? It was so amazing to watch!
We are so glad that we went to go see the pageant. Casen slept through it but Rilyn watched most of it. Its really cool to watch the scriptures that we read come to life. Cody's parents come to town this next week and we are excited to do some more sight seeing with them too. This is going to be a very busy, very fun summer!
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