Nauvoo or Bust

So we had to be to the Stake Center by 5:30 in the morning Monday 11 May 2009!! It was nutso! We were supposed to leave at 6:00. I don't remember what time we actually left. I think we were fairly close to that time, but we stood/sat around in the cultural hall for a while. We were all lookin ready to try to be comfy during a 10 hour (ended up being closer to 12 if I recall correctly) bus ride--and to try to sleep.

This post is mostly is pictures, I took about 300 pictures throughout the trip, and a few videos that were pretty great. So I rifled through, and chose I think about 40--haha, couldn't resist too many of them--for this post. So I'll just kinda explain/caption each picture and that'll be how you will all experience the Nauvoo trip with us. ;)

So Diane out of all of us was prolly the most used to being up this early, teaching Seminary and all... (don't worry, she definitely got some sleep on the bus, hah)

Sean of course picks up Alessandra on a relatively regular basis...I mean who can resist the absolutely adorable wee one?! ;) Love her!

Do Chelsea and I look excited or what?!

And of course Alessandra can hardly contain her exhilaration at the prospect of being on a bus for 30+ hours with all of us! Oh and Bryn was trying to show off his tongue?!

Alessandra all ready to try to sleep...isn't she just the cutest ever?!

I attempted to sleep (was almost never successful), and Michella actually did fall asleep, even though it doesn't look like it in this picture--haha

Bryn and Tanner were 'so far' back there for that whole first day (well until they wandered everywhere on the bus), oh and Ryan who constantly looked like he was asleep but also almost never was...

Another attempt at falling asleep. Bryn and Tanner yelled for me to put my feet down, of course all I did then was wiggle my toes at them, I was surprisingly comfy!

At this rest stop it advertised a look out, so we hiked up it (aka walked up the stairs) to check it out, it really was thrilling as you can tell from Ryan and Tanner's faces displaying the excitement at the view...

We had to take a picture at the state sign of course...not sure why The Megan decided to stand over there on her own, but it cracks me up everytime I look at it!

Duh, had to take a picture with the buffalo!

Another rest stop, Bryn tried to give me a piggy back ride, but his lack of hips prevented this from occuring, but we got a couple of funny pictures from the attempts.

Ryan was 'charging' Tanner in a field (a Loaded Questions reference), then Sean jumped in and picked Tanner up by his legs, it was really funny. In this picture it looks like Ryan's trying to whack them with his hand, I just thought it was a pretty awkward picture.

Tanner is crazy as everyone knows! He prolly spent a couple hour or two on the floor in the aisle, someone gave his this neck pillow, and this is one of the many ridiculous pictures taken while he was on the floor.

I have no idea who took this picture (yes on my camera), nor am I entirely sure what I was doing here, but I thought it was SO funny! It really almost looks like I have no teeth--Hah!

Yay, now we were in Nauvoo, one of our very favorite stops was the Schoolhouse! It was way fun. Look at us playing school, Ryan made good stern teacher faces, and Tanner was a pretty good dunce on the dunce stool, I think I got in trouble because I wasn't turning and looking at the camera.

A Sanra size rocker! (hah, k, so prolly actually even too small for Sanra)

Kristin and I never stayed in the same hotel room so we never could've planned on matching, though Megan and Alessandra can't say the same. However it happened, of course we had to take a picture of the two sets of twins! Hehe.

There were Sanra-size ponies randomly!! We made her climb the fence so we could take pictures of her with them. It was the cutest thing ever, I almost wanted to cry!

We were so tired (of course), we almost did fall asleep like this in our rather large hotel room suite thingy (where 10 of us girls stayed, fun fun).

She just looked SO cute with her umbrella sitting there eating under it! (It had sprinkled a little on us when we were eating, one night it poured for a fair amount of time.)

While we were walking Bryn picked this nut shell thingy and called it a pig's nose fossil, he was WAY funny about it, he kept playing with it...that boy was really just constantly cracking us all up of course.

Ryan said we needed to take a picture on the "happy bridge" so of course we have a few.

Bryn put his backpack on completely backwards, it was pretty amazing. We gave him a hard enough time he ended up fixing it shortly after this was taken.

There were so many dandelions mostly Tanner and I kept picking them and making wishes. Then we all did it.

After eating lunch at Carthage jail. We wanted to take another when Tanner was around, but he'd gone off talking to someone and we forgot to do it again. So this is the only one we have like this. These pictures of heads all close together were always my favorite growing up.

Sanra piggy back ride

All of us at Carthage Jail. This picture turned out pretty well, can see everyone fairly decently, and hello, Carthage Jail right behind! Good job Elder.

This sign was in the Red Brick Store and I thought it especially combined with Bryn's brilliant face in this picture was so funny!

Had to stop at my 4th-Great Grandfather's home.

We went to see the Joseph Smith movie, nice face Megan! ;)

Nice face Ryan, don't look too excited to see the movie.

We were having a 'staring contest' and it took forEVER because we kept laughing. I think I was actually the best at keeping a straight face, which is nuts. Too bad we don't have a bajillion pictures of our attempts, they would've been funny, oh well.

Tanner really wanted to do stick pulling, but the sticks were put away, so he found this huge branch and it was hilarious as he tried to break it into something smaller, and then as he and Ryan attempted to stick pull with it. The video is practically priceless.

My feet resting on Alessandra in my almost most successful attempt at sleeping, draped across the aisle. The problem mostly arose from having to move my legs for people passing by. So sad, I got MAYbe tops one hour of sleep during the 30+ hours on that bus...

Some of our creepy eyes staring at Tanner and Ryan, hah. (I'm pretty sure Ryan was 'asleep' while Tanner took this picture.)

A road trip would not be complete without a picture of Bryn brushing his teeth!! I'm pretty sure this was taken as we were driving into Greeley.

Ryan's bag was so big we had a joke that Alessandra would fit inside. So when we got back, Saturday 16 May, of course we'd gone over to Ryan's to watch some Alias, so Ryan emptied it out so we could try. Clearly Alessandra fit, so this is her breaking out of it. So great!

So this is just a sampling (a big one albeit) of the pictures from the trip, and still only a sampling of the stories. We had tons of fun, definitely didn't get enough sleep, as I'd known, and had some great experiences. I got to do an endowment session in Nauvoo and Winter Quarters! Amazing. It's perhaps mildly unexpected that we could have a spiritual experience on such little sleep and a whirlwind or a trip. But it's great how the Spirit works on you when you may not expect it. It was a great opportunity none of us will ever have again and I think I can look back and honestly say that I loved every minute of it! Okay, maybe not running down main st in Nauvoo to try to catch the bus, but that's just because I'm weak and I can't run. Hah. But even that is way funny to look back on. Yep, it was all fantastic, LOVED it!!