Contemplation

Contemplating what you ask - well the first day we were here , Saturday, Dallas and I stopped to eat lunch before heading to Mt. Rushmore. As we were eating Dallas was telling me that she had read some really negative remarks about Sister Becks talk last September about Woman who Know. She was surprised that woman in the church would say such things about a leader of the church. I and most of my sisters and some other friends had talked about that same subject and how sad we thought it was. I am not saying that she wasn't blunt or forthright but that is what we need in todays world of confusion and strife. I was glad that she outlined for us again what hte church sees as the role of woman in the church.
We decided that like the scriptures say, that the wicked taketh the truth to be hard - before anyone gets the wrong idea I am not saying that they are wicked but there seems to be evidence that they are not fully following the teachings of the church because what she said was not new nor different than what has been said for generations. It taught me that if I am having a problem with something that a servant of God is saying than it is me that needs to change, pray to understand and at least at first follow in obedience until I gain a testimony of it.
Dallas was talking about how she thinks it is one of the ways that we are seeing the wheat and tares parable in modern day living.
That night when I opened my scriptures to read there the answers were. I was in 2 Nephi 31. In verse three it says "For my soul delighteth in plainness; for after this manner doth the Lord God work among the children of men. For the Lord God giveth light unto the understanding; for he speaketh unto men according to their language, unto their understanding. " That seems pretty straightforward.
In verse 13 it says " Wherefore, my beloved brethern, I know that if ye shall follow the son, with full purpose of heart, acting no hypocrisy and no deception before God, but with real intent, repenting of your sins, witnessing unto the Father that we are willing to take upon you the name of Christ, by baptism--yea, by following your Lord and your Savior down into the water, according to his word, behold, then shall ye receive the Holy Ghost; yes, then cometh the baptism by fire of the Holy Ghost; and then can ye speak with the tongue of angels, and shout praises unto the holy One of Israel." I was thinking that as members of the church we have done this and now need to be willing to whatever is asked of us.
That is also the chapter that talks about the straight and narrow gate and being steadfast and immovable in the gospel. It was nice to be talking about this and then having hte answer just right in front of us as we read the scriptures. I love when that happens.
I pray that I will be able to always follow the words of the servants of the Lord and stand fast and strong in the gospel.

Day 2 - Jewel Cave National Park

After seeing Crazy Horse we headed South and went to Jewel Cave National Park. It is the second longest known cave in the world, the first is in Kentucky. These caves are all underground which makes them unique. We paid our $8 per person and went on a 1.5 hour tour underground. We got into a elevator with big heavy doors design to keep the air pressure in the caves as normal as possible. The caves were amazing, we walked 723 stairs and looped around a 1/2 mile underground. They have been exploring the caves since 1908, so for 100 years! The temperature is always 49 degrees winter, spring, summer or fall. I of course had shorts and a t-shirt on and neither of us had a sweat shirt but we were fine - the handrails on the stairs were cold though. They think that have found about 5% of the caves (based on wind volume and air pressure) and it is 193 miles long at this point. It is pretty amazing, I will upload some some pictures later - blogger doesn't seem to like the wireless much.

Day 2 - Crazy Horse

Well, this was a fun but long day. Dallas is doing all the driving and she is doing great will all the skinny roads and windiness of the roads. Anyone that knows me well and has traveled with me knows that after I started driving that I get "sea sick" in the car if I am not the driver. I was very proud of my body I didn't feel sick until 10 hours into the day on the most curvy road to that point. It was about 6:50 and we hadn't eaten dinner yet so my body said it was done, but we made it.

The day was packed with fun. We started at Crazy Horse Memorial - wow - that memorial is huge, it has also taken forever to carve and they are still carving. To give you an idea of how large it really is here are some stats (look at the pictures below) the head is 87.5 feet tall or 9 stories high, where the feathers will be (behind the head) is 44 ft long, the whole thing is 563 ft high, the arm is 263 feet long, the horses head is 219 feet . Hundreds of thousands of pounds of granite have been blown off (with dynamite) or carved away from the hillside. It is pretty impressive. The Lakota Chiefs asked a sculptor by the name of Korczak Ziolkowski to take on the project and he dedicated his life to it. 7 of his 10 children still work on the project and so do his grandchildren. There has never been federal money used to crave the granite only donations of time, money, equipment and gifts (to sell in the gift shop). There is also a museum of Native Americans, a self guided tour of the sculptors home and studio, a area where they teach about Native American crafts, a restaurant and more. It is pretty impressive. I know that Mama had mentioned that it wasn't all that much but there has been a lot more accomplished since she was here 36 years ago. Crazy Horse was a war chief that was killed while under the white flag of a truce. The Lakota people wanted to honor him and all Native American by making the memorial. Someday will will be done - probably not in my lifetime is my guess.

This is the model that was used to figure out exact measurements for the actual memorial, the sculptor's take the dimension from the model and multiple it by 12 to give what needed to be done up on the hillside. K.Z. first worked alone by hand and then eventually received donations that allowed him more equipment and laborers.

This is inside the museum, there is a bronze statue of what the finished product will look like in front of the actual craved hillside.

Mount Rushmore National Memorial

After we settled in and took a well deserved nap - we had both left home at about 4:50am that morning, we went and ate and then took a shuttle from the KOA to Mount Rushmore at 7:00. The Memorial does a night presentation every night so we went to watch that, see the video, the monument itself and walk around the grounds there. We highly recommend the night show - it was cool. We got there and took some pictures, look through the museum and so forth and then settled in for the show

The four presidents on the monument are Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt,and Lincoln.

Washington is known as the father of the nation.

Jefferson is known as the father of expansion because of the Louisiana Purchase.

Roosevelt is known as the father of development because of his conservation efforts of the natural wonders/parks in the US.

Lincoln is known as the father of preservation because of his role in keeping the union together during the Civil War.

The night show was nice. We sang the National Anthem together, did some president trivia (the four on the monument), watched a video about the making of Mount Rushmore, and then there was a lighting ceremony where it is lit up and patriotic music plays. At the they ask all the military or retired military to come up and we applauded them and they took down the flag in a flag ceremony. I tried to get Dallas to go but we were sitting on the balcony and it would have taken a long time to get there, so she didn't. It was really nice and helped me remember again how blessed we are to have this great nation, the freedoms we have and the opportunities that are afforded us.

Here are some of the photos.

This is the entrance.

This is called the Avenue of Flags - there is a flag from each state.

This picture I thought was cool - as we drove around the corner toward the campsite we saw this and had to take a picture - it is surreal to be so close and for them to be so large. Each head is 60 feet in length and it took 17 years to complete it.

We are Here - SD that is!

Well Dallas and I met up in Denver and rode together to Rapid City in this tiny plane - it wasn't too terrible - just cozy!

This is our little plane - 2 seats on each side - Dallas and i got to sit next to each other and work on my grant - what fun for her! Thanks Dallas!

We then got our cute little car and made our way to Mt. Rushmore or Rt. Mushmore as Dallas kept calling it. Along the way we saw a storm approaching and stopped to take pictures of it and the beauty that surrounds us. We both had people wondering why we were going to SD - well it certainly hasn't disappointed either of us! We have been blessed because we have been told that it is usually brown by this time but because of all of the rain this year it is green and lush. It is what I always thought it would be like - I still haven't figured out what people do for a living here but it is beautiful.

These two are of the approaching storm as we drove to the first campsite.

When we got to the site we checked in and unpacked. Here is our little cabin - no bathroom or A/C but it has been cool enough that we haven't missed the A/C.

This is the view we had from our cabin - isn't it amazing!

On My Way

I am on my way to SD, it is 6:03am and I am waiting at the Kansas City Airport for the plane to board so that I can get to Denver and meet up with Dallas. We are sitting next to each other on that leg of the flight, which we orchestrated over the phone while we bought our tickets - I love that we can be in different states and through the internet we can be looking at the same things.

Today we will be going to Mt. Rushmore or at least that area. We have our first stop in Hill City, SD which is just south of Rapid City. I am very excited - I was looking through sites trying to decide what we should do while we were there and came across a company that has made the National Treasure tour - not completely sure how that will work - are they discovering new caves that lead to a buried treasure? Anyway, just thought it was funny and sad at commercial our world is. I just want to see the beauty there and no we are not going to pay the $60 to go on the tour of a lifetime! So, wish me luck. I will try and blog as much as possible just don't know how often I will have a signal to post.

On My Way to the Black Hills

Some of you know how much I love the movie The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band by Disney - it is old and then set in an even older time period, during the presidential race between Cleveland and Harrison, when the Dakotas were not yet States. Well, I love the movie and the beauty of the Dakotas and have always wanted to see the Black Hills so, we are going to go and we are staying dead smack in the middle of the Black Hills, I am sure that you are thinking that I am silly and crazy and that the movie probably wasn't even made there but I still want to see it.
Dallas and I are flying into Rapid City, SD and then we are going strait down to Mt. Rushmore and the national parks there. We are staying in KOA cabins and so we will be camping without the tent in essence. We are really excited so I will take lots of pictures and post them when I get home.

I am still waiting on the answers to my questions about the focus groups - I know people have read them so please, please help me! :0