So that you don't think the mission has been so hard on us that it turned my hair gray, I need to explain that I decided before we left to let my hair be it's natural color whatever that may be. It only took two hair cuts once I got here to be the "REAL" me. I rather like it though it was a shock at first.

These are two wonderful men that have taken us under their wings and almost adopted us two homeless waifs. They both work in the temple with us and live here in New York. They have been kind enough to take us on some outings around the area. On the left is Ed and the right is John. They both lost their wives in the last year or so. They are angels in disguise for us. Not even a very good disguise at that!

They took us to Fort Niagara which was very interesting. Going from left to right is Phil, Napolean AKA Ed, and John. We had a wonderful day exploring together!

Here are some actual cannons and cannon balls just inside the fort.

This is the main buidling where the sleeping , eating and main quarters were.

Inside the box are rifles.

Sleeping quarters for the men.

Sleeping quarters for the Captain. A slightly nicer set up, I'd say.

Here is Phil and his French cousin Charles. Actually, this man came out and gave us a musket demonstration that was fascinating.

Now we are at Niagara Falls. We stayed on the American side because we didn't all have passports.

This is not too far up river from the falls.

We are getting closer to the falls.

Almost there! I couldn't help but think how scary this would be if you were on the river and had no idea what was up ahead.

Thar she blows!!!!

It was so amazing to me. I had been there before but this time it seemed even more spectacular than before. Maybe it was the company I was in, but it was an incredible day!

The majesty and power was stunning!

WOW!

Ok, I didn't really take this picture. I was trying to get away with making it look like mine but I did not see the words on the bottom right corner when I took it.

This is another outing with Ed and John. Everytime we are with them we have so much fun. They are both scientests that worked two floors apart at Eastman Kodak in Rochester for many years although they didn't know each other there. They met recently at the temple and only found out their career connection last week. This day we stayed in Rochester which is only 30 miles west of Palmyra. Phil and I had driven through but not seen anything of what we saw with them.

This is called High Falls and is right in the middle of downtown. In the summer they have laiser light shows on the wall next to the falls. Ed and John promised to bring us back for that.

We spent the majority of our time this day at the Eastman House. George started Eastman Kodak and his house is amazing. It has been turned into a museam of how he lived and his work.

This is just the front view and the whole house is about three times bigger than what you see.

Beautiful front stair way.

At one end of the house is a room with the different camers he is responsible for inventing. He is the one that replaced glass photography with film. I remember these cameras.

Here is just a small sampling of the many, many cameras we saw.

This was an early movie camera and is as big as a person.

This is where he came in the mornings to eat his breakfast. There was an organ in this room and his paid organist would play mellow music as he came down the stairs each morning. As soon as he entered into the room, the organist would decide by looking at George's expression what kind of mood he was in that day and play music to fit the mood. Now THAT's mood music!

The parlor where he did a lot of his entertaining.

This is another view of where he ate his breafast. The elephant's head is on the left wall but not showing in this picture. The organ is the wood you see center back. I wonder if I would have liked that job?

Formal dining room.


This was our Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful time with three other missionary couples and John. Thanks to a missionary couple who left us their china when they went home, we actually were able to have quite a formal setting. Our apartment is so big that it was easy to set up two folding tables.

We are so thankful to be here. We have many, many blessings and you are all part of them. We hope you also had a wonderful Thanksgiving and appreciate you following our blog.

On weekends we have been assigned to go to Ogdensburg to not only be part of the little branch there, but also try to help build it up. We stay in a home right on the St. Lawrence. I tried to upload a picture of the front of the house, but the computer is not cooperating. I will show it in another blog. This is the view outside of our weekend home. It ain't fancy but I think we will survive!

Here are the two Sister Missionaries, Sister Despain and Sister Zwick that we share the house with on weekends. They are wonderful and it is so fun to get to be part of real missionary work. This man was baptized this past Sat. and Phil got to do the baptizing.

Here's the little Ogdensburg Branch churchhouse. It is the loveliest small church I think I have ever seen.

The chapel almost looks and has the feel of the temple.

I had never known what the 1,000 Islands were (other than salad dressing). I was amazed to see they were real islands in the middle of the St. Lawrence Seaway. I have only been able to see a few of the islands by the road because there is so much folage between the road and the river, but what I could get a glimpse of fascinated me!

People buy an island and build a house on it. Some of the islands are not much bigger than the house.

I asked a man who was near by when we were taking a picture if the waves ever were a problem and he said, "Waves....nah." I can see how threatening your children, "If you don't clean your room, you are going to have to go outside and play." might be a good parenting strategy living here.

I was able to get closest to this one. The man also told me there really were about 3,000 little islands like this. I asked him if the river froze solid enough that they could walk out to their house in the winter. He said, "Sure enough. The river freezes three feet thick."

An example of some of the private docks people have built right next to their yards.

There are houses on shore built right on the edge of the River.

This is truly an amazing place and we are so grateful to have this opportunity to experience it. Thanks for following our blog.