12 Year Old Trip With Gwen DL

I saw a Hasidic Jew in New York on the street and I thought of you 😂 Those curly sideburns would be you if you grew them out! We also watched tons of Seinfeld, ate soup at the Original Soup Kitchen (Gwen got Lobster Bisque and thought it tasted fishy…she didn’t realize Lobster came in the bisque 😂) and talked about you a ton! Gwen told me that you are the brother who she feels the closest to and the one she’d turn to in times of need. I asked her why and she told me that she feels like you actually care when you ask her how she's doing and you tell her that you love her in a normal, non pedophile way. So, thank you. She needs that sibling support! The trip….it was so fun! I absolutely LOVED every second of being with Gwen and touring New York City and the church history sites together. The 12 year old trip is such a different trip. I just did the 16 year old trip with Henry six months ago and those 4 years make such a difference. I’m glad that Dad switched it up for the girls. The 12 year old trip is fun because you get the innocence mixed with the silly/awkwardness of that age while the 16 year old trip you just build on the friendship foundation. It’s fun to watch Gwen figure out who she is. There were times she fell into the silliness that she does with her friends. It’s fun to see her like that. But sometimes it goes on and on…hah. We ate great food, stayed up too late and walked our legs off! We left on Wednesday afternoon. It was a sprint out the door for me, as usual. So much to get settled before I leave. And the school district decided for some strange reason to give 6 remote learning days to the students because the teachers are overwhelmed with keeping up. So, Friday turned out to be what they call “remote learning” which means “no school/play day” and that made leaving a little trickier because Jane would be home and Dad would be trying to work. But I think everything worked out ok. McKay and Henry pitched in and helped. We arrived around 8ish and made it to our hotel in time square. It was chilly!!! We were starving and started our trip out right with a slice of NY pizza. By the time dinner was over, it was late and Gwen was tired, so we explored a little on our way back to our hotel, watched the soup Nazi Seinfeld to prepare for our next day and went to bed. It’s tricky getting a tween girl going in the morning, and we started a little later than I’d hoped. After a solid dunkin donut breakfast, we hopped on a big red bus tour since we only had one day in NYC and there was so much Gwen wanted to see! We jumped off in SOHO and shopped and shopped, ate Thai for lunch and finished up the bus tour. After we dropped all our bags off at the hotel, we ran up to the Museum of Natural History - the museum from Night at the Museum - and saw all the fun highlights from the movie. It was lots of fun. Then over to the Original Soup Kitchen for soup and then to see Wicked!!! It was awesome. It did NOT disappoint! There were lots of hoops to jump through with Covid and I had to show my vaccination card and Gwen’s negative test literally everywhere we went, but it was totally worth it. Friday morning we were thrashed from our big day. We walked over 20,000 steps and the morning came fast. We missed our car rental appointment and got upgraded to a HUGE Ford Expedition to drive out of the city. Luckily I’m used to huge cars and we got on our way toward Harmony Pennsylvania to the priesthood restoration site, which is so well done. You didn’t get the opportunity to see the updated site that we saw, but I was impressed. I’ve never been to any of the church sites we saw except the sacred grove, so I was literally glued the entire time. It’s a tricky trip for the 12 year olds. Sometimes you feel a little like you’re dragging them but I explained to Gwen so many times on our trip how lucky she was to have the opportunity to see these sites at her age because I’m 46 and just seeing these places for the first time. And that someday she will look back on the trip with fond memories and be grateful for this experience. Don’t get me wrong, she was great. But I could tell it was a little long at times and she had a hard time being as glue as me 😂 I was blown away by the beauty and simplicity of these places. At one of the sites the sister missionary quoted President Kimball as saying “The lord loves humble beginnings” and that’s so true when you think of some of the most remarkable places that life changing events happened….a manger, harmony Pennsylvania, the sacred grove, etc. I reflected often during our trip about how simple the gospel is and how our human tendency is to look beyond the mark and expect grand answers to prayers. The gospel is simple and I want to celebrate that in our complex world! We stayed in Binghamton New York on Friday night and felt happy that we had some time in the car to rest our tired legs from our busy Thursday. Saturday morning we got going…a little late as usual…and made our way to the Witmore log home. Again, I was glued to the tour. The sister missionary was so fabulous. She told the story of Mary Witmore seeing the plates and I was touched by her testimony. I was feeling the clock ticking and knew we needed to get going and then found out that as of November 1st all the closing times for the NY church history sites had changed from 7pm to 5pm 😳😬 So, I was worried we would make all our stops. Gwen was starving, so we went to this awesome Amish market called Saunder’s Store and got the most delicious lunch for pennies! And it was huge. I only wished he had more time to explore the awesome market attached to it. Plus, the cute Amish girls running it with their accents and plural youS “thank youS” and “would that be all for youS” It was so fun. We went straight to the Smith farm. Again, I loved the tour. This was the first tour that was just Gwen and me. The other tours had like 10 people on each. We also had a male missionary, who was great. All the missionaries were senior couples, and I added “NY church history sites” to my list of missions I’d love to serve with Dad. One of the most spectacular views (and we had so many) was the way the palmyra temple overlooks the smith family farm. The temple was closed because of renovations, so we couldn’t get up close and personal or do baptisms, like I’d hoped, but it was amazing to see the placement with everything that happened in that sacred place. We decided to come back to the sacred grove, since it didn’t close and ran into town to see the Grandin Building. That was one of our very favorite tours! My expectations were low, Dad gave it the “if you have to kiss something, you could miss this site” but it was really a spiritual one. I loved this sister missionary. She was so attentive to Gwen, who had a bit of a headache. She was so kind and bore such pure testimony if the Book of Mormon. We were also the only two on this tour and I loved seeing how the Lord brought one of His greatest works to pass. After the Grandin Building, we went back to the sacred grove. At this point, the Advil was working on Gwen’s headache and she was feeling much better. We walked into the sacred grove and I was blown away by the peaceful feeling. You would be crazy not to feel that something sacred happened there. We found a bench and listened to “My Own Sacred Grove” - have you heard this song? So powerful. It was amazing to sit there and listen to this song with Gwen. I bore my testimony and encouraged her to find her own sacred grove and to remember how she felt right then and that it was because God the Father and Jesus Christ came to Joseph Smith because he prayed in faith with a question. It was a sweet experience and I’m thankful I had that opportunity to be there with Gwen. After the sacred grove, we hit our last stop…the hill Cumorah. It was a great ending. It was at this site that my favorite comment was made to us. The sister missionary said “I’ve seen so many father son combos come to these sites but I’ve never seen a mother daughter!” And I told her how much I have lived studying D & C this year and how much I have seen Emma as a huge part of the restoration. I also told her that even though women are not ordained to the priesthood, I’ve been understanding how important the women are to the priesthood and how we can call upon the power of the priesthood without being ordained. I feel a real power that the women are just barely beginning to understand as the restoration continues in our day and I feel really badly for women who feel like they don’t belong because they don’t hold the priesthood. More than anything, I want to empower young girls like Gwen to know there is a very important place for them in the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and to speak up and take your place! No longer should women feel like they are the ones to bring “treats” when their husband teaches the Sunday lesson. I hope Gwen can be confident in her testimony and stand strong in sharing it all her days. I know my mission really helped me feel that confidence and I am so grateful for my knowledge and testimony! We finished up our trip by eating at a steak restaurant for the second night in a row on Saturday night. This morning, we thoroughly enjoyed the much needed extra hour of sleep before we got on our way to the airport at 7:30am. Everything went smoothly with the car drop off and check in for our flight. Right now we are in the air as I type my message to you. I’m grateful for the opportunity to put down my thoughts and feelings into words. This is a trip I don’t want to forget. I hope as you read it, it brought back memories to you of your trip with Dad all those years ago. And one day you’ll be doing the trip with your own kids. Well, I’m so looking forward to our visit tonight. It’s such a highlight of my week. I pray that your week was fantastic and that the baptism went well. I can’t wait to hear about the baptism day fiascos. There’s always one or two on those sacred days. It’s all the forces set against you for that special ordinance not to happen. But the Lord is good and He usually wins those battles. I love and miss you tons. Keep up the great work you are doing. I loved the video clip that Vlad sent me this week. Made me smile for so many reasons...one of the being that Vlad found it and texted me. The guitar picking was amazing. Just know how loved you are and that a little family in Draper is praying for you EVERYDAY!!! Love you tons! Mom PICS...totally out of sequence, but hope you enjoy!