Dark Hallow Falls

Well, it's official. We're Virginians! We have new vehicle plates, licenses, voter cards, paid our 1st utility bill for the house we are renting AND visited Shenandoah National Park.

Before we get to all the pictures, I have to tell you all that the copy machine at the school is AMAZING!  I would LOVE to have one at home.  But since it costs thousands of dollars it would just be a waste of money. (It seems they said it cost $30,000 or $70,000-big difference I know....) So, some of the cool features: it can take a piece of paper that has been printed on both sides already and split it into two separate copies. It can hole punch your copies AND staple them.  Say you have six pieces of paper that you want on three pieces of paper, then stapled and hole punched--25 copies of them.  As you can imagine the printer will make them into booklets, stapled and hole punched.  It of course even sorts them and staples them in the right order! (Given you feed the paper in the order you want.)

I have been volunteering at the school three times a week.  I love it!  It's also great because the teachers REALLY appreciate it--which makes it even more rewarding. And of course, I get to play with this AWESOME copy machine!!!

Okay, back to the park.  My sister Lois knows when the National Parks have free days.  She told us that there would be one on the 24th and we decided to go.  After we cleaned the church and had lunch we headed off to the park.  We're pretty lucky as the entrance is only seven miles from our house. 

We hiked to Dark Hollow Falls.  Of course they loved the ditch/canal that ran under the length of the road.  


Yay, the Christmas photo is done!


Shanna picked out the outfit all on her own. When we go to certain places I am the mean mom and put my foot down on what she wears sometime.  Lately I haven't cared as much.  I thought it was very creative!






So pretty. Before we know it Lee will be the proud dad on the girls' wedding day.


Elden was determined to walk the entire way. The hike wasn't long--about 1.2 miles.  He practically walked the entire way--at least a 3/4 of a mile!  The only times he didn't walk were when he wouldn't come with us and was stopping or wandering of, or at the very end when we had to go fast and he was going slow.  It sure was nice that we only had to carry him here and there!






Cute running picture.


Yep, those cheeks are so fun to kiss!  And they get kissed A LOT.  Elden knows how to give kisses now and I love it!


Dark Hallow Falls...so pretty!














Along Skyline Drive there were some gorgeous lookouts. Come and visit.  They look even better in real life.


That evening I headed down to the Stake Center for dinner and the Relief Society Broadcast.  It was a great night.  I met another lady in the ward and the new sister missionaries.  There were Elders here just a week or so ago, but now we have sister missionaries!  They seem great and it will be fun to work with them.

It was great being together with other sisters in the stake.  I met a few new people and saw my old roommate from Ricks, Alicia, which was really fun. The talks were really good, and of course Elder Uchtdorf's was superb.  He talked about the blue forget-me-not flower. The flower has five points, and he gave us five points to remember.

1. First, forget not to be patient with yourself.
2. Second, forget not the difference between a good sacrifice and a foolish sacrifice.
3. Third, forget not to be happy now.
4. Fourth, forget not the “why” of the gospel.
5. Fifth, forget not that the Lord loves you.

Read his address here: Forget Me Not, by Elder Uchtdorf.

I am really excited about conference tomorrow!  Lois and her family are coming down. Lois and I are going to go shopping around town before the first session and I am looking forwards to that.  It's going to be a great weekend!  I hope you all enjoy General Conference!  You can watch it at www.lds.org.  It's a blessing to have a living Prophet, Thomas S. Monson, and hear what message God has for us today!