June 2024

While I was in Utah, I had the very special experience of attending the Taylorsville temple dedication! The 5 of us siblings got to go together and it was so memorable for all of us. When we were driving in the car, we were talking about how odd it felt to have the 5 of us in one car and wondered how long it had been! We got there super early so we could hopefully have our choice of seats in the celestial room. We got to sit right behind mom and dad and the look on mom's face when she walked in and saw us was priceless! Her and dad both gave fantastic talks and Elder Gong dedicated the temple. We were able to briefly chat with both him and his wife and they were both so kind. 

While I was at the temple dedication, Richard headed out with the girls to start our summer vacation. They stayed at a hotel in Pennsylvania that had a cool indoor water park and then went to Niagara Falls to meet up with Rob and his family and Sharon. They were there on a Sunday so they mostly just walked around and saw the falls and all the tourtisty stuff that has been built on the Canada side and then went swimming in the hotel.

I flew into Buffalo late that night and we all drove up to Palmyra to see the church sites there. The first day we did the Smith home and the Sacred Grove. Ingrid told me about her Grandpa who had gone to the Sacred Grove when he was 80 years old and decided to walk the trails barefoot as an analogy of the ancient prophets who would take off their shoes on sacred ground. I thought that was a really cool idea so I decided to try it. While my feet got cuts and scrapes and walked through mud in a few places, I really liked doing it because it made it feel special and different and connected me to the place even more. Definitely a unique experience!

The next day we went to do baptisms at the Palmyra temple and then went to the Hill Cumorah. While we were on top of the hill, I heard someone say, "Kelli?" and turned around and one of our old friends from Westborough was standing there! Such a crazy coincidence that we were both there at the same time. She lives in New York but is a couple hours away from Palmyra but came to do a session in the temple and then decided to climb the hill to do some scripture study. It was so fun to see her and catch up!

We started driving back to Ohio but stopped on the way in a city that Sharon had lived in as a teenager. We stopped by the house that she lived in and went to a big lake to take a picture on the same dock that she has a picture of. Then we continued on to Kirtland. 

We were excited to go to the Kirtland temple since this was a our first time back since the Church had taken ownership of it. We did get to go up to the 3rd floor, which was fun, but I was slightly disappointed in the rest. We had someone who obviously didn't speak great English who was mostly reading off of cards and so she was pretty monotone. I was hoping for more of a spiritual experience but I'm sure they will get better in time.

Then we headed over to do the rest of Historic Kirtland. We had also never been allowed inside the Joseph and Emma home there and that ended up being my favorite part! We also did the Whitney store and their home but at this point all of us were super tired and it was hard to sit through more presentations when we had been to so many. So we decided to take off and let Rob and his family finish the tour.

They spent the next two days going to Cedar Point while we recuperated at home. Then they drove down to spend a few days with us here in Columbus. We did baptisms in the Columbus temple, showed them fireflies, went on a "hike", took them to the famous pet store, went swimming at their hotel pool and had lots of fun playing and talking with them at our house.

I was the only one who had met Zion before, and he was a HUGE hit with my girls. They were constantly fighting over who got to hold him and could have been entertained by him all day. It was great to have them all come visit!

Richard and Kaylee had no time for rest and left the next day- Kaylee went to EFY a couple hours away and Richard headed to Scotland! Kaylee seemed to really love EFY. She roomed with a girl from our ward and met lots of good people and loved the classes she took. 

 Richard had the opportunity to go to Scotland for a Pebble Pad conference with a few other coworkers. He got to explore Edinburgh quite a bit, drive up to see Lake Ness, take a tour of spots that inspired names or places from Harry Potter, visit an old friend who moved to Scotland a few years ago, learn some Scottish dances, see some cute Scottish calves, visit old catacombs that are supposedly haunted and endure lots and lots of rain!

While Richard was gone, I took the girls to see Inside Out 2. It was actually really good! I was surprised how much I liked it since the 1st was just ok. 

Brooklyn also decided to do an acting camp through her new school program. The lady who ran it is one of the teachers at Arrow so it was really nice for Brooklyn to get to know her ahead of time.

McKenna also did a soccer camp again. Even though she is always really nervous on the first day, she seems to enjoy it and does really well playing.

Kaylee volunteered for the library again and has really enjoyed that as well. The ward offered opportunities for the youth to volunteer at the Special Olympics and Kaylee was the only one who ended up signing up! She got to help pass out medals when the athletes were done with their field events and it brought her so much joy to see how happy they were. I'm really glad she got to have that experience.