The Stephens: August 2013

This vacation was SUPER. After our short but amazing time with family in Utah we journeyed to the East coast. NYC! We went with Daniel's entire Family. ALL 31 of us. It was fabulous from start to finish. It's amazing to me how many people are in that city. Our mode of transportation in the city was the Subway. The blank stares and looks we got as all 31 one of us walked the streets of New York was priceless. It's as if they had never seen a family before....

I loved the city life but ~~I could never live there...~~ I guess I could for a couple years but only now or when my children were all grown up.

While we were there we saw --

Cinderella!! AMAZING. I am so happy I watched the movie Cinderella with Brandy and Whitney Houston so I could sing right along.

Enjoyed and relaxed at a Mets Game on the Fourth of July. We were true patriotics that day.

Dan and I snuck up on our hotel's roof to watch the amazing Fireworks.

Toured the 9/11 Memorial. The new Tower is 1776 ft tall and is called the Freedom Tower. Pretty cool.

Times Square was as happening as ever with it's random street characters. It poured quite a bit while we were there and got stuck in stores for quite some time. but at least it was the Lego store.

Next destination was the susquehanna river where the priesthood was restored and the gravesites. Becuase of the heavy rainstorms the path to the river was pretty muddy so we had 3 or 4 kids covered in mud. hehe.

It rained so hard that we to stop because we couldn't see anything, literally I couldnt see within a few inches of us

Next we stopped in Palmyra. I love this town. I could live there. I want to live there. It is so peaceful and absolutely Breathtaking beautiful. Upstate New York is absolutely gorgeous. I love the farm towns and how extremely green it is.
the toads and the funny tooting noise they made. Baptisms in the temple was special experience.

We saw Niagra Falls. Calvin kept asking to touch the water.

Thank goodness for cousins who adored and adored Calvin who helped make car rides much more bearable because of their entertaining him each time he started to cry.

Kirtland was our last stop and it was my favorite part of the whole trip. It brougt back memories when I was in High School when we went with my Family. I still remember the special spirtitual experiences I felt and received in those most sacred places. I again felt those same feelings but this time I paid even extra more attention to what the missionaries and our tour guide Karl Anderson said. I had a really neat opportunity and very spiritual expereince in the Kirtland Temple. I was having a hard time because Calvin was at his wits end. He had not slept all day and was in exhaustion mode and would not sit quietly. So i had to take him out quite a bit during our tours ( i also had help from others who I am so grateful and appreciative of their kindness). So many times I just wanted to bawl. While we were in the temple, since Karl gave us the tour he talked in depth about what happened here and the spirit was so Strong because he had the Spirit and was reading from teh scriptures and talked about the Savior as before the community of christ only gave a quick history. I didn't get to hear much of what was being said and I couldn't help but cry because calvin being hard and I so badly wanted to hear what was being said. It was then When we were closing up when I was asked if I would lead the music. He told me to stand next to the pulpit and lead the music as we Sang the Spirit of God as a family. I will never forget the feeling I felt! My heart was filled with gratitude to my Savior and Lord. Such a tender mercy for me.

The trip was great. It was very much needed in so many different ways. My testimony of the prophet and the gospel increased, my love for my family grew so much more and my love for others and the desire to bring others to Christ were leaps and bounds.

Here is our picture overload.