Memorial Day in July

Having lived most of my pre-married life in Utah, I grew up with the word, "Pioneer." I instinctively knew what pioneers were as the term was used quite frequently and in everyday conversations. In fact, sometimes I grew tired of so much focus on pioneers. I may have understood the definition, but it hasn't been until later in my life, with some maturation in thought and experience, that I have truly come to understand what the Mormon Pioneers have done for my life.

My children know nothing about pioneers. A few weeks ago we had a FHE lesson on pioneers. I was shocked to find out that this was their first known exposure to the definition. There is a whole new world for them to discover. This made me so grateful that our plans had allowed us to be in Utah for Pioneer Days. My whole goal for this trip is to help expose the importance and understanding of pioneers to my children (that and have a lot of fun).

As written in my last post, we had a lot of fun on Pioneer Day. The kids now know that it is something to celebrate and can be a lot of fun. We also drilled them on the definition. (Halle always answers with a verbatim answer).

Another goal I had for our trip to Utah was to go to the Provo cemetery with my grandparents. My grandparents are now 87 and starting to fail in health. I don't know how much longer they have. My grandpa is a great story teller. We used to travel with them quite a bit when I was younger. He was always telling and showing us stuff - like a walking encyclopedia.

So we took the kids to see the headstones of their ancestors and tell them stories about who they were. They found out that their great, great, great grandmas and grandpas were pioneers and were told the stories about where they came from and how they joined the church. They are still young, but I hope they remember their great-grandpa telling them stories and that our ancestors are important. They will remember searching for headstones with pioneer plaques attached to them - that they really enjoyed.

They learned about Christen Valdimir Hansen, who sailed on a ship from Denmark and then walked to Utah when his family joined the church. They learned that they are related (by marriage) to Philo Taylor Farnsworth, the guy who invented television. They also learned they are related to the famous BYU football coach, LaVell Edwards (one of my selling points to get Chris to marry me).

A new story for me was about my great, great grandparents from my grandma's side. I learned that they had been in Nauvoo with Brigham Young. They had closed the temple down and were getting ready to move out of Nauvoo. My grandparents refused to move from the temple steps until they had received their endowments, as they hadn't had the chance to do that yet. Brigham Young finally reopened the temple and many more saints along with my grandparents were able to receive their endowments from the Nauvoo temple.

I wished I could have stayed longer and heard more stories and written down more facts. But, that was as much as my children could handle, and it started to be closing time for the cemetery. I am so grateful for the opportunity I had to do this! I am so thankful for my dedicated and determined ancestors that were full of faith. I hope I can make them all proud and never take the gospel and its many blessing for granted.