Tuesday, November 22, 2016 – Riser Boot plus 8 more Sites Cleaned, Limbs & Branches, 70’s Hall, Soybean Harvest, FM’s Christmas Tree

Today we did a lot of flowerbed cleaning, hedges trimmed, poison ivy and rogue trees killed and hauled off again. We started at the Riser Boot Shop then the John Taylor home, the Blacksmiths, 70’s Hall, Trail of Hope, the Exodus Memorial, Hwy 96 Information Kiosk, and three missionary residences. Wow, we were busy but we were fast too. Some of the location only required fifteen to twenty minutes to clean but other took an hour. And once again we had to take two loads to the burn pile. We completely filled our trailer full of limbs, branches, debris, hedge trimmings, frozen plants and leaves.

While we drove around we always look for limbs and branches that have fallen from the trees. There are thousands of  trees in Old Nauvoo and many of them have dead limbs waiting to fall. When the wind is strong like today and yesterday, we find limbs all over the grounds. This morning as we drove to our first site to clean, our trailer was already half full of limbs and branches we’d picked up.

 

There is a farmer that leases a large piece of farmland from the church here in Old Nauvoo. The land sits west of Old Nauvoo and we pass it every time we drive to the FM maintenance compound. Last spring the famer planted corn and soybeans like all of the other farmers. His crops matured and ripened just like all of the other farmers in the area but he didn’t harvest his crop like they did. In fact all of the other neighboring farms were harvested a month or more ago.

 

I don’t know why it has taken him so long. Maybe there is a good reason to wait a month longer than all of the other farmers but today, finally, the soybeans were harvested. His corn crop still hasn’t been, but maybe soon.

This morning we dumped our first load at the burn pile and stopped at the FM break room. We noticed a newly decorated Christmas tree up front. It caught our eye because of the unique ornaments and trimmings on the tree. It was very well planned and decorated with hardware items that you might expect to find at a well stocked “Facilities Maintenance” warehouse. 

Right away Sis. Johnson notice the garland around the tree was “Caution Tape.” The first thing that caught my eye was the beautiful star on top, it was made of “Duct Tape.” Sis. Johnson and I really liked this well thought out Christmas tree.