Weekend in Elko

Well, I was right!

Jamie was complaining in church on Sunday that her neck was super sore.

Church ended up being pretty interesting. My parents ward was having Ward Conference, so the Stake President spoke. He had 4 points to ponder for the for the upcoming year:

1. Pay an honest tithe.

2. Give a generous fast offering. He suggested not only giving the value of two meals, but if we were able to do so we should give more, as much as 10-15 times more.

3. Put together a Humanitarian aid kit, or a hygiene kit, or make a blanket for the Church’s Humanitarian efforts once a month for Family Home Evening.

4. Read Preach My Gospel cover to cover this year, and then ponder what we should do about the things we had read.

He stressed that he was not looking for more contributions to the church. The Stake had been more than self sufficient for many years, and that by offering our substance the windows of Heaven would be opened and blessings would be poured out more than we could receive.

Then in Sunday School the Primary President came in and asked Jamie if she would substitute in Primary, because one of the teachers didn’t show up. Jamie dragged me along too, and the next thing I knew we were teaching a class room of 11y ear olds about the Good Samaritan. The lesson tied in Well with the Stake President's talk and I was surprised how many of the kids had paid attention in Sacrament Meeting, and then, on their own, were able to see how the Good Samaritan loved his neighbor, and understood that the Stake President had given us 3 ways to help our neighbors. When we went to Sharing Time we completed the trifecta, because my Mom was subbing for the primary Chorister. Primary was filled with Nortons!

Jamie also invited the English Missionaries to dinner that night, and they were great fun. (When is a dinner with the missionaries ever a downer?) We told all kinds of jokes and stories, and then after dinner they sang a few hymns for us. They were great, and even harmonized!

After the missionaries left it was time for a game of And it Came to Pass! I got my dad hooked on the game at Thanksgiving, and I think we played until after 10:30.

I left Elko on Monday, and Drove back through Winnemucca. Winnemucca isn’t exactly on the way to Las Vegas, but I wanted to stop and check in on a friend who is a little down on her luck. We ate lunch, and then I hit the road.

I was actually kind of excited to make the trip back to Las Vegas from this direction, because I had never driven much on the West side of the state. I thought it would be cool to see some of the other small towns in Nevada. I forgot to take my camera out until I was almost to Hawthorne, so I didn’t get any pictures of Lovelock, or Fallon, which both had preserved their downtown areas. Fallon even had a little waterfall in the middle of the Street.

I was just about to Hawthorne, When I came up on Walker Lake. It was pretty cool to look out across the lake and see the snow covered mountains and all the clouds. I decided to find my camera and take a few pictures.

Then I got to Hawthorne. Hawthorne is an old Army base that stores munitions. All these little huts contain bombs and shells.

The town of Hawthorne seems to be proud of their association with the Army and had these cool pinwheels made out of bombs, and several streets were lined with bombs sticking up out of the ground, as though they had fallen out of an airplane.

Then I got to a little town called Mina, which had this really interesting looking seafood restaurant

And this little old house

The town sat at the base of this mountain And by the Time I made it to Tonopah (which I was really interested in seeing) it was pitch dark, and I couldn’t see hardly anything. I’ve been thinking about making a trip over to Death Valley in a few weeks, so maybe I’ll see if I can work Tonopah into the trip.

By the Time I got home I was completely exhausted. I turns out that this little detour adds about three hours to the drive, so I don’t think I’ll be making this little side trip too soon. Seven is plenty long as it is!

Well, that was my fun weekend. I think I’m just about ready for a week of boring normalcy. It will be nice to get some chores that have been neglected this weekend, and then just relax!