The Work and The Glory

Our Bishop, Erick Hicks (a very good Bishop), challenged us to read the Doctrine and Covenants by June 30 and the Book of Mormon by December 31.

I decided to take the challange and, in fact, read the D&C cover-to-cover finishing a few days ahead of the deadline. Incidentally, I decided to read the Pearl of great Price during July (fairly easy) and I have now gotten underway with the rest of the challenge.

What made the reading of the Doctrine and Covenants much more interesting was re-reading the series "The Work and The Glory" by Gerald N. Lund. I bought the nine volumes and read them as they originally were published and saved them. Following the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in novel form while simultaneously reading the Doctrine and Covenants made both much more interesting.

What was kind of fun though was finishing the last volume of W&G (volume nine), which concludes with the arrival of the Mormon Pioneers to the Valley of the Great Salt Lake, on the morning of July 24, 2009, 162 years (if my math is correct) after Brigham Young arrived in the valley saying, "This is the right place. Drive on."

It is interesting to note that Brother Lund, who I believe has been released as a member of the second Quorum of Seventy, has a new book due out on August 5. It is titled "The Undaunted, the miracle of the hole-in-the-rock pioneers." Should be a very interesting read.

Deer in the "'Hood"

One of the unique changes in our lives since moving here is the frequent sighting of wildlife. Usually I don't have my camera handy but today the doe was so accommodating that I had time to fetch it and take a few snapshots.

These start in the area behind our home and then as I tried to get closer, she took off and went between the houses toward our street a few houses up from ours. The last shot is her going up the driveway across the street from us.





We have seen deer many times and lately there has been a doe with two fawns that hang out behind our home in the large meadow area.

First Independance Day in Kentucky - Wet One

Independance Day is HUGE in Prospect and in Kentucky in general. Did I mention that Kentucky is seen as the fifteenth state and joined the union in 1792 during George Washington's first presidency?

The day started (at 5:00 PM) with a parade down Westover Drive which is the main thoroughfare through the Hunting Creek part of Prospect and about fifty yards from our front door - a good thing.


It rained all day but many - mostly the children - refused to have their spirits broken. so the parade proceeded swimingly (sort of).


A real Kentucky thing is the lawn mowers. we really like it but there seems to be something in the air or water that causes men and women throughout Kentucky to want to mow in relatively open green area and turn it into lawn. The shoulders of many of the highways are mowed for miles. Anyway, here is another use for one of the mid-sized home mowers here in Prospect... pull a float with it in the parade.


These kast two pictures are of two little girls who were actually driving their battery powered toy car. The guy holding the umbrella we guessed was their dad.

We knew that there was supposed to be a fireworks show somewhere over the Hunting Creek CC Golf course and that it might be visible from our back porch, but little did we know that it would be so close and so viewable. These last four pictures were taken from the top of the stairs going up to our screened-in porch. You can see the corner of our roof in some of them.

The pictures are very poor because either the camera or the photographer were not able to take them properly. But it was a top drawer fireworks show and we viewed it while seated comfortably on our back porch. Some friends from our ward stopped by. Cathy made root beer floats and a grand time was had by all. It even stopped raining! Happy birthday America.

Senior Missionary Retreat

On June 19th and 20th 2009, we had a Senior Missionary Retreat in the Great Kentucky Louisville Mission (GKLM).

On Friday evening we all went to the Mission Home and had a very nice dinner followed by a testimony meeting. The highlight of the evening for me was finding out what all of the missionaries do. One couple works at Ft. Knox as military liaisons to the personnel posted there. Another couple actually spends all of their time photographing old court records in the various towns, cities and burgs of Indiana. Three copies are made of each record. One goes in the mountain vault, one goes on line and one goes back to the State of Indiana.

Two or three of the couples are stationed in the smaller branches and just help out with branch callings while also engaging in missionary labors.

Then there are those of us who serve in the office as Media, referral, Housing, Medical, Vehicle, Financial Coordinators and the Mission secretary who holds it all together.

On Saturday we boarded the Belle of Louisville steam powered stern wheeler for a lunch cruise up the Ohio River.




Sister Partridge actually was a little fascinated with the steam engine that is over a hundred years old.






The food was pretty good and the over all cruise was really quite enjoyable.