Nauvoo on the Road

There's a great program here called Nauvoo on the Road. Four or five missionary couples are sent out with a van and a trailer to schools and community events. We set up 5 stations and teach about pioneer life and skills. At the schools we set up in their gym or lunch room and the kids are divided into groups and rotate through the stations. We teach them about baking in a bustle oven, candle making, rope making, brick making and pioneer games. When we're at the schools we don't wear our name tags and we call each other Mr. & Mrs. instead of Elder & Sister. The hope is that the kids will have such a great time that they'll bring their families to Nauvoo.

Friday and Saturday (April 24,25) we got to attend the "Battle of Pea Ridge" in Keokuk, Iowa. It's only about 1/2 hour away. Every year they reinact a couple of the Civil War battles. It's a big deal and they take it very seriously. On Friday we were in a big park with 15 other stations and we were spread out. We got to meet Abraham Lincoln and hear some great banjo music and some other neat stuff. On Saturday we were in our own area. Friday was school groups and we saw 898 kids. Saturday was more like a county fair with people wandering up to see what we had to tell them. 718 people visited our stations on Saturday. We met some very interesting people. It was a good day and even though the wind picked up a few times and we had to chase some of our props, it didn't rain hard until we were just loading up the last of our gear into the trailer.