Susquehanna River

On Monday, April 14th, we were privileged to drive into Pennsylvania to see the site where the Aaronic Priesthood was restored.  Every month our CES Director plans a "Cultural Day" for us.  Those of us working for CES get to decide where to go for these excursions.  Brother Bean, our CES Director, made arrangements with three other directors and they met up with us at the Aaronic Priesthood Restoration Site.

Brother Craig Done, CES Director for Penn State (and formerly from Tucson) is an authority on the early happenings of this area and he led the tour.  He and his family have lived in Pennsylvania now for 13 years and he has devoted much time in studying this era in Church history.

Bro. Done is a former Seminary teacher of our daughter, Laura and a ward member with our son, John and Cherece.

The missionaries serving in the Manhattan Temple were invited to join with us for this experience, so, we ended up having quite a group.

This area used to be called Harmony, Pennsylvania.  It is now called Oakland, Pennsylvania.  When the Hales lived in Harmony, they and the McKune's were both well known families.  Adjacent to the Restoration Site is the McKune Cemetery.  We found the headstones for Issac and Elizabeth Hales as well as the headstone for Alvin Smith, the first born son of Joseph and Emma who only lived a few hours after his birth.

View from the cemetery and on down the road

The Smith's small three room home, where most of the Book of Mormon translation was done, is also at this site.  The Church has given permission to rebuild the home and have a visitor's center and new church building built here in the future.

Standing on location of Smith Home

The Susquehanna River lies just a 100 or so yards south of the Smith home.  It is believed that between the home and the river is where John the Baptist appeared and conferred the keys of the Aaronic Priesthood to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery.

As we were instructed by Brother Done down near the Susquehanna River, I enjoyed the serenity of this place.

Standing in front of the place believed where Joseph and Oliver were baptized

Matt Baker is the CES Director from Syracuse, New York.  We met him last summer when we went to Palmyra with my sister, Janell and her husband, Stan.  Matt is a cousin to Stan.

Matt Baker and Reed

This last week we started teaching our Institute classes.  We are setting up Institute for those who speak Spanish and they haven't had Institute classes for them for the past year.  Numbers are few right now, but we are enjoying getting to know those we've met.  We expect our classes to grow as leaders remember to make our announcement in their meetings and the word gets out.  The young missionaries are helping to find students for us too.

We are also enjoying getting to know wonderful young missionaries serving here.  We are amazed at the numbers of missionaries here, but, they are all needed!  In our stake (13 units) alone there are 64 young missionaries plus us four CES missionaries.  Some units have eight missionaries assigned there.  The wards and branches have large boundaries and there are lots of people in New Jersey!

Visit to Temple and Princeton

We are getting acquainted with lots of great Young Single Adults and have been contacting Bishops and Branch Presidents and plan to start Spanish Institute classes this week.  We plan to teach four classes a week.  We will travel about an hour to teach two of those classes. This last week we have followed some Senior Sisters that are teaching English Institute classes. They have been great examples for us to follow.

This past week has been filled with some first time adventures!  Our CES Director, Brother Bean, and his secretary, took some of us CES missionaries to the Manhattan Temple.  Like I expected, life moves quickly in downtown New York City.  But, once inside the temple, all is calm.

Can you see us standing outside the temple?  This is a very busy intersection.  Just to the right of the temple (or the left as you are looking at it) is the ABC Studio where the "Morning Show" is broadcast.  Across the street from the temple is the Julliard School of Music and the Lincoln Center.

Here, now you can see us!

We got this shot of the New York City skyline from the car.

Just since we have been here, it has gone from cold to actually warm!  Everything was brown when we arrived and now there is green all around.  Many of the trees have not leafed out yet and the locals say that everything is about a month late.  We are enjoying watching the colors come to life right before our eyes.

On Saturday we were invited to attend a concert that one of the Princeton single adults was to perform in.  Sheryl attended with the CES Sisters.  This was wonderful cultural experience!!!

Princeton University was founded in 1746, before the American Revolution.  It is the fourth oldest college in the United States.  There are only about 5,000 undergraduate students, but lots of graduate students.  This is an Ivy League School and Sheryl was impressed at the dress of the students . . . even on a Saturday.  The girls were dressed nicely, some even in dresses and skirts.  Here are some pictures.

The Princeton Library

The Princeton Chapel

      Notice the buds on the trees just ready to pop!
     

Just inside the Chapel

Stained glass windows all around

Notice the trumpet organ pipes connected to the organ at the other end of the chapel.

 

Sheryl and Sister Horning at Princeton

When we arrived in New Jersey less than two weeks ago, everything was brown.  Now, we are enjoying seeing more and more green everyday and lots of different colors in blossoms.  Over the weekend, we discovered the tulip tree.  This is our favorite so far.

The blossoms of the tulip tree up close.

We're here!

After some long days on the road and some interesting stops along the way, we finally made it to New Jersey.  We've always wanted to travel across country and enjoyed seeing what each state was like.  Had it been a month later, it would have been a much prettier drive, but that was OK.  In Kansas we stopped in Abilene and went through the boyhood home of Eisenhower.  Before we left Kansas we witnessed a prairie fire that went on for miles.  We enjoyed the rolling hills that accompanied us through eastern Illinois, Indiana, and Pennsylvania.  We stopped in Hersey, PA to see the sights there and buy some fresh chocolate to take to the mission office staff.  Everything in Hersey revolves around chocolate.  The street lights were made to look like Hersey Kisses.  The streets are named "Cocoa Avenue" and "Chocolate Avenue". Even the bathrooms there looked like chocolate.

 In Hersey, Pennsylvania:

 Getting closer . . .

 As we came into New Jersey we saw this water run off on a hill next to the road.  It looked natural enough, except it was frozen!

 This is the traffic that greeted us.

The night that we arrived, we met up with our CES Director and he took us over to the the Red Mill to take our picture then took us out to a diner for dinner.

We arrived here just in time to attend a bi-monthly inservice meeting with all those working in CES. The meeting is to help prepare us for our upcoming Institute lessons.  As this meeting began at 10am, everyone got a plate and helped themselves to a wonderful luncheon.

A few days later on Saturday, the Senior Sisters that we will be working with, invited us over for a nice lunch between the sessions of conference.

On Conference Sunday, the Branch President's Family over the Young Single Adults, invited us to come watch conference with them and the YSA, and then again between the sessions a feast was served.

It is very evident that CES doesn't stand so much for "Cooking Every Second" as it does "Constantly Eating Something"!!!