Our Five Day Adventure Across the Country

The week of Thanksgiving we moved Jadi and the kids to Utah to stay with Jadi's parents while Geoff finishes up his clerkship in D.C. and continues to look for a new job. We didn't want to be apart but our landlord sold our townhouse and we felt this was the best option for us.

Jadi's parents were kind enough to fly out to Maryland to help us pack up and drive our car and moving truck back to Utah. The drive from Maryland to Indiana was very scenic and pretty. Sunday night we stayed at the Holiday Inn in Richmond, IN.

The kids had the hotel swimming pool all to themselves.

They had to get their wiggles out before getting back in the car and truck for another four days.

The next day we drove to Carthage Jail in Illinois. We watched a short video in the Visitor's Center and then took a guided tour of the jail.

Here are the kids in front of the Joseph and Hyrum Smith statues.

This is the room that Joseph, Hyrum, John Taylor and Willard Richards were in when the mob came.

This is a view from the window that Joseph fell out of.

After leaving Carthage Jail we stopped by Dairy Queen for a treat before heading to the Fairfield Inn in Keokuk, Iowa for the night.

We drove through Nauvoo on our way to Keokuk. The temple looked beautiful all lit up at night.

That night we stayed at the Fairfield Inn in Keokuk. The kids had the swimming pool all to themselves again and loved it!

The next morning we drove back to Nauvoo and spent half of the day there. Here are my parents and Kaylee in front of the Nauvoo Temple.

Here is another picture of the temple.

The Prophet's Last Ride monument is directly across from the temple. That is the Mississippi River behind it. Nauvoo is such a beautiful place.

We stopped by the Visitor's Center.

This is one of the sun stones from the first Nauvoo Temple.

We stopped by Joseph Smith's Red Brick Store.

This is one side of the store.

This is the other side.

This was Joseph Smith's desk.

This is the upstairs room that they held meetings and dances in.

We stopped by the Smith Family Cemetery.

Kaden is standing next to Jospeh, Hyrum, and Emma Smith's graves.

We saw the Mansion House. We also drove by Brigham Young's house and several other houses but I decided that posting all of the pictures would be too much for one blog post. :)

That night we stayed at the Holiday Inn Express in Grand Island, NE. The drive through Nebraska and Wyoming wasn't as scenic or pretty as the first half of the trip. The next day we drove to Laramie, Wy and stayed the night at the Hampton Inn.

I forgot how cold Wyoming gets. It was freezing. It said it felt like -22 with the wind chill. That night we drove the kids by our old house. We also ate dinner at Corona Village. This was our favorite restaurant when we lived in Laramie. The next morning we couldn't get the Penske truck to start due to the cold weather. We had to wait for a repair man to come out and replace a fuse. That set us back one hour but other then that the rest of the trip went pretty well.

We stopped at the Little America in Wyoming for our Thanksgiving dinner. It was delicious and I LOVED that I didn't have to prepare any food or clean it up. I think it was my favorite Thanksgiving ever.

We arrived at my parents home in Lehi Thanksgiving evening. My brother Kris and his wife had come by earlier to welcome us home by decorating with balloons and streamers. It was a nice surprise and it made us feel very loved.

The kids are adjusting to their new school and have been making lots of friends. We love being back in Utah and have especially loved spending time with family again. The hardest part has been being so far away from Geoff. We have really missed him and are counting down the days until we get to see him again.

We also miss our Maryland friends A LOT!! :)