Saturday, August 5, 2017 – John Deere Worldwide HQ’s Exhibit, Moline IL, Pavilion, YSSM’s from 2016

This morning we headed 100 miles north to Moline, ILL for a P-day outing. We traveled with Elder & Sis. Van Horn and Elder & Sis. Witbeck. We visited the Worldwide Headquarters of the John Deere Company. We visited two John Deere Museums/Exhibits in Moline, one at the company HQ’s and the other in down town Moline called “The John Deere Pavilion.” 

 

In 1836 the company founder, John Deere, was a blacksmith and realized that local farmers couldn’t plow very well with their old poorly designed iron plows. John Deere invented a plow made out of highly polished steel and a correctly shaped moldboard, “the self-scouring steel plow.” And the rest, as they say, is history; with over 2500 patents, hundreds of thousands of employees in 65 countries around the world the John Deere Company is a major producer of farm equipment around the globe. All because a blacksmith saw a need and invented a plow that opened the fertile plains of the great Midwest to agriculture to fed a nation and is now feeding the world.

After visiting the “John Deere Pavilion” we walked across the street to eat lunch at a local establishment, “The River House Grill.” We had a wonderful lunch of good food with good friends. Everyone really liked their meal and even though I am still on a soft food only diet, my chicken noodle “Soup of the day” and a side of cottage cheese was really good too. 

This evening at our “Sunset by the Mississippi” show we had another one of those sweet surprises. Six of the young single Sister Missionaries (YSSM’s) that served with Sis. Johnson and I last year (mostly in Carthage) have returned to visit Nauvoo this year.  We have many fond memories of working and serving with these young ladies last year when they wore missionary name tags.

Friday, August 04, 2017 – Jordan’s Hedge, Orson Hyde & Lyon Drug, “Thank You” Pizza Luncheon, British Pageant

Again today Sis. Johnson worked in the greenhouses and propagation room all day while Elder Kyle Johnson, Elder Cantwell and I worked out in the sites. We started at the home of FM Director Jordan Bodily then went to the Women’s Garden. The rest of the day we worked at the Lyon Drug weeding and cleaning. It was a very pleasant day outdoors with a nice strong wind and cool temperatures. Quite a change from the past month of heat and humidity. 

At noon the grounds managers treated all of the grounds staff, employees and missionaries to a “Thank You” pizza luncheon. They brought in tons of pizza and there was plenty for everyone. What a feast.

 

Thursday, August 3, 2017 – Visitor’s Center, Women’s Garden, Cultural Hall, Family Living Center, Coleus Cuttings, Orson Hyde’s home.

Another day of cleaning and weeding. We started at the Visitor’s Center and the Women’s Garden. Next we were off to the Cultural Hall, then The Family Living Center and we finished our day at the historic home of Orson Hyde. Not much to report, just a lot of hard work all day.

While I worked with the grounds crew, Sis. Johnson stayed back at FM in the propagation room trimming the Coleus plants and making rooted cuttings.

Wednesday, August 02, 2017 – Pioneer Pastimes Cedar Chips, Clean & Weed Sites on Main St., Sarah Granger Kimball

Yesterday the tree removal crew took out a cedar tree at the home of FM’s director, Jordan Bodily. The Cedar tree, like all of the trees that are removed, was put through the wood chipping machine. FM uses the wood chips as ground cover around the trees, in public areas that are not paved, down the trail of Hope, etc.  But this Cedar tree is different from the other hardwoods like the Oak, Maple and Walnut that are removed and chipped. The Cedar chips smell wonderful! So, it was decided that the aromatic Cedar chips be put on the ground in another heavily used public area, “Pioneer Pastimes.” Early this morning we got to enjoy the heavenly scent of Cedar wood as we spread Cedar chips on the ground at the “Pioneer Pastimes” site. It was a very pleasant assignment.

We had another full day of work and we got a lot done. Unless our boss, Richard Hancock has something special for us to do like spreading Cedar chips, we weed and clean the historic sites all day, every day. Today we started at the north end of Old Main Street and weeded and cleaned every historic site of the West side of the street. While Elder Kyle Johnson and I spread Cedar chips at the Pioneer Pastimes site, Sis. Johnson and the ladies on our grounds keeping crew cleaned and weeded the Cultural hall and the Scovil Bakery. Elder Kyle Johnson and I joined the rest of the crew and we continued on down to the Tinsmith Shop, the Post Office, the home of John Taylor and the Printing Shop. 

Next we finished cleaning and weeding the historic home of Sarah Granger Kimball. We got a good start on the site yesterday and we finished the rest of it today. Another busy day and we got a lot done.

Tuesday, August 01, 2017 – Weeded the “Village Inn,” Sarah Granger Kimball, Oral Surgery

We started our day at an apartment complex where missionaries live called “The Village Inn.” No one knows why it’s named that but it is right across the street from the State Park in Nauvoo and the country side there is very picturesque. However the landscaping has been neglected lately and the flowerbeds were full, I mean REALLY full of weeds. 

This apartment complex isn’t on our list of responsibilities so we were completely unaware that there was a problem.  It took us a couple of hours to clean the main flowerbed in the parking lot. It took so long because we had to dig out the trees and bushes roots and all. We couldn’t just cut them down and poison the trunk. When we finished, the flowerbed looked much better.

Our next stop was to clean the flowerbeds at the historic home of Sarah Granger Kimball. It was here, in this home that the original idea of a Women’s Society was conceived by Sarah Granger Kimball 175 years ago. The Prophet Joseph Smith took the idea to the Lord and through divine inspiration the Female Relief Society of the Church was established in 1842.

We had to leave work early today because I had an appointment with the oral surgeon to have a tooth extracted. The root was cracked and it has been bothering me for a while. The doctor we were referred to is in Burlington Iowa, only 30 miles to the north so it wasn’t a long drive to get there. However our trip was delayed about 20 minutes as the barge traffic on the Mississippi River at Fort Madison had the “swinging truss bridge” closed while two barges went by in opposite directions.  It was an impressive sight though.

The Oral Surgeon’s name I went to in Burlington was Dr. Jason Thompson DDS. I was surprised to find out that he attends the Burlington Ward and he is on the Nauvoo Stake High Council! Before the operation I enjoyed talking to the doctor and getting to know him. Our boss, Richard Hancock, is also on the Nauvoo Stake High Council. 

The tooth extraction went very well and was completely successful without any problems. After we left the Dentist office we drove a few block to the Super Walmart store and had my prescriptions for antibiotics, mouth rinse and pain medication filled. While we waited for the Rx to be filled Sis. Johnson and I did some shopping for my all liquid/soft food diet I’ll be on for two weeks.