Westover Visit Part 1: Palmyra

So last Wednesday night, Brian's parents flew into town for a week long visit. It was so great having family in town. We really miss you all.

They brought with them various goodies one of which was Brian's diploma!!! We had it mailed to their address because we weren't sure where we were going to be once the school mailed it out and we didn't want it to get lost in the mail. (We've worked far too hard to have that happen) We were both a little nervous when he was opening it up because we were fairly certain it was a diploma, but you never know. It could have been a letter saying, "Just kidding, you're not done yet". However, it turned out to be the real deal. So it is now official...Brian is a graduate of BYU-Idaho with a Bachelor of Science in Communications. Yay!!!

I was able to go to the Manhattan temple with Layne and Kris on Thursday. It was a great experience as always. On Friday, Brian was able to leave work at around one o'clock and we hailed a taxi and headed to the airport to pick up a rental car. We drove all the way to East Rochester, near Palmyra, that night and spent the night in the Fairfield Inn Marriott hotel (which was very nice).

So happy to be getting out of the city.

We got up early the next day and had a yummy breakfast at the hotel which included bacon. (We haven't had bacon since coming here because it is so expensive! Five dollars for a normal sized package...ouch!)

We headed out to Palmyra which took us about half an hour to get there. We crossed the Erie Canal (very cool) on the way and made our first stop at the David Whitmer Farm and Visitors Center. I was able to go to Palmyra last fall when my family came to visit. Read about it here. But we did everything in one day and had to skip tours at a few places. This time we were able to tour each site.

We had a short tour in the visitor's center led by Sister Missionaries who were very nice. The tour talked about the Three Witnesses to the Book of Mormon, the history of the gospel and Church's organization from the beginning with Adam. Very interesting stuff. They have a sculpture of Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery receiving the Priesthood from Peter, James and John which was very cool. It sits on top of a time capsule that will be opened on the Church's 200 year anniversary.

They had a beautiful painting of Christ in the Visitors Center. You could definitely feel the Spirit there as the Sisters bore their testimonies about the Savior and the restoration of His Church.

The Sisters then took us out to the Whitmer Cabin. It is a replica of the home where the Church was organized on April 6, 1830. The spirit there was so great.

View of the main room on the first floor. Very small, humble beginnings.

A view of a bedroom on the second floor.

From the Peter Whitmer site we went to the Hill Cumorah Visitors Center. We first walked up to the top of Hill Cumorah to see the statue. It is a very steep hill, and once on top it is cool to see how high you are. It is much higher than everything else in the area. It clearly would have been a landmark that Joseph Smith was familiar with.

This time beautiful daffodils were blooming around the monument. In the fall they had brightly colored mums.

Inside the Vistors Center we got to go into the room with the Christus. There was an artist there repainting the background. You can see the difference from the old painting on the right and the new painting on the left.

Outside in the hallway there was a display of pictures taken by the Hubble Telescope of different galaxies, nebulae and stars. They were gorgeous pictures. By each photo was a caption about where it was taken and a scripture from the Doctrine and Covenants. My favorite picture was the one below. "He comprehendeth all things, and all things are before him, and all things are round about him..." D&C 88:41. It was very inspiring. God is in charge of these beautiful and mighty works and yet He still knows me personally and is aware of my struggles, hopes and dreams. This definitely strengthened my testimony that He is all powerful and can help me with anything if I am faithful and ask.

I love the Prophet Joseph Smith, and getting to see these sights has been such a wonderful experience.

Next, we went to the Joseph Smith farm which is just a few miles up the road from the Hill Cumorah. This is out front of the Smith's log cabin, which was their first home on the farm.

Inside the cabin on the ground floor.

An upstairs bedroom. There were two bedrooms upstairs, one for the six boys and the other for the two oldest girls. There were two beds in the boys room, and each bed held three boys. It is interesting to think about how the Angel Moroni appeared to Joseph multiple times during the entire night in the same room where his brothers were sleeping. I grew up in a very small home with six kids and we knew everything about one another. There was no privacy. So it is interesting to think about how it occurred without the other kids being disturbed.

We walked down the path to the frame home next. This is where the Smith family was living when Joseph retrieved the plates.

Here is a view of the main living room. The box on the dresser is a replica of the box that Joseph stored the plates in after retrieving them.

This is a replica of the fireplace. At one time Joseph hid the plates under the bricks. I always imagined it to be bigger for some reason.

This is a picture of Lucy Mack Smith's kitchen. It was very spacious and nice for the time.

Lucy had a soapstone sink that the missionaries said was her pride and joy. The hole could be stopped and water poured into it. When the stop was taken out, the water would drain through the wall of the house to the ground outside.

After the house we were able to go and walk through the Sacred Grove. It was so nice. Very peaceful and quiet with birds singing. It is such a contrast from New York City. I'm so glad we got to go. We were able to go back the next day, on Easter Sunday. It was such a special experience to be able to sit in the Sacred Grove where Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ appeared to Joseph Smith and commenced the restoration of the gospel on the day that we celebrate Jesus' Resurrection.