Our Wonderful Ohio Vacation

When Jeff's brother invited us to meet his family in Ohio during their family trip, we were really excited.  They live in Utah, so it has been really hard for us to plan occasions to get together.  We only had to drive 5 1/2 hours to see them, and it was a fabulous trip for all of us!  The first thing I noticed about Ohio is how similar the scenery was to our Pennsylvania scenery.  With all of the green farmland and trees, we could have been driving around our own town.  But the landscaping at the home we were visiting (the home of Jeff's brother's in-laws) was especially awesome.  I had to capture a bit of this beautiful garden to keep with us.

All of us were super grateful that our newest Little Lovell nephew and his mommy were able to make the trip all the way from Utah to be with us.  He was exactly one month old :).

One of my favorite parts of the trip was visiting this church history site, the John Johnson farm in Kirtland, where the prophet Joseph Smith lived for one year.  This is where he lived when he was tarred and feathered, and where he received some very important revelations that we have in our Doctrine and Covenants.  It was a really neat place to see.

We also got to visit a friend's stables.  This was the largest horse I've ever seen!  The photo doesn't do it justice.  I was told that this horse is about 19 hands high, and weighs probably nearly one ton.  (The medium-sized full-grown pony in the stall next to it was about 13 hands high.)  Wow! 

Clark and all of the kids had a blast catching fish in the ponds.  Lots of blue gills, this one catfish, and even a couple of turtles turned up on the hooks. 

Uncle Steve was a super fishing coach.  He encouraged Clark to go all the way--so together they prepared two of Clark's fish for eating, so Clark can earn his fishing merit badge for scouting.  Thanks, Uncle Steve!

BROTHERS! 

The pet donkeys were lots of fun to see!  The cousins were super fun to play with, too, of course!  We loved our time with them.

If there's one thing I'm grateful for about this trip, it's that our kids got along 20 times better on the way home than they did on the way there.  We were all still so happy with the fun time that we had, and just a little bit tired, so the 5 1/2 hour ride home was nice and peaceful.   YAY!!!!   What a wonderful trip!

Here's a link to some more great pictures from that trip:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AYtnDZi2cN2Jp
(just click on "View Album"...no need to log in)