How Could I Forget?

My last post was getting so long that I just zipped right thru and forgot one of my most favorite parts of the trip to Manassa.  Attending sacrament meeting.

The getting there was the hard part.  I forgot to tell all my children and my husband of my plans to attend sacrament meeting there.  Only the girls had clothes.  I told Ethan 2 or 3 times to grab his, but he decided to wait for Nate to get home and help him, but when Nate got home we loaded up and headed out, so - no clothes for him or the other 2 boys.

If we would have gotten up early and left, we could have made it home for our 1pm church, but I was hiding.  It was youth conference here and people kept wanting me to do stuff for it and we went to CO instead.  I felt like I couldn't show up for church on Sunday and not get the stink eye :0)

It was decided that the 3 girls would attend sacrament meeting while the boys stayed at the RV after they dropped us off.....that reminds me.....I gave a reading assignment to my 2 boys that they were supposed to report on.  I'll have to follow up on that.

We headed off to the below ward

Emma and I loved how the chapel looked like it was Noah's ark.  It was all wood, including the walls and the ceiling looked like the bottom of a ship.  It was really cool.  It was a little interesting seeing that the stand started at ground level instead of being elevated.   I'm guessing that's why the bishopric and speakers sat on the top row - so we could see them.

One of the coolest things was that my visiting teacher's (and great friend) husband has a ton of family that lives there.  That Sunday happened to be her nephews "mission farewell" - although they aren't called that anymore and he only had 5 minutes to talk at the end.  It was so cool to have that connection and he rocked his talk.  

I also got to see props in a talk.  The ward mission leader gave a talk about pioneers and missionary work and he used props.  It's not everyday you see someone start pulling stuff out of their pockets and place it on the stand.  It was enjoyable.  

Now, for my absolute favorite part.  It was the closing song.  Now, this hymn isn't found in the hymn book - oh no - it's a special hymn - just for "the valley."  Who else has their own song?  Our boring ward doesn't!  We knew that there would be a special hymn before we got there.  I was hoping for a program but I don't think they were expecting so many people because the greeters were being stingy with them, so I didn't get one.  The suspense was building as I knew the time for the song was getting closer and closer.  

Lucky for us the people sitting in front of us were only there to see the nephew going on a mission, so when they jetted outta there, they handed me their program.  Thank goodness, how else would I have been able to belt out the song like it was my proud heritage?  

When we got out in the truck after the meeting, Emma and I sang the song for the boys so they didn't have to miss out.  I'm pretty sure some ears were bleeding - because of our voices and bad rendition - but it was enjoyable.

Once a year this song gets pulled out and sung for the closing hymn to cap off their pioneer days -that started out as "mormon pioneer days" but several years ago they changed the name to build more unity in the community and share the love with the catholics.....which is what the pioneer spirit is all about :0)