Super Weekend!

OK, I give up on a steady chronology. Let's skip ahead. This weekend we went to visit my brother in Illinois. He gets bored during the week, being away from the family and all, so he frequently goes out with the missionaries. A woman he helped teach asked him to baptize her, so we drove down for the weekend to support them both. On the way there, we stopped to eat in the same city that Mom and I got stuck during the huge storm. It was interesting to see the reconstruction taking place to some of the damaged buildings. Too bad I didn't take any pictures.

A wonderful elderly couple from the church has been letting my brother live in their basement during the week when he's in IL, and they welcomed us into their home for the weekend. By the end of the week, the kids were calling them Grandma and Grandpa. I'm so grateful to them for taking Nathan in. It's been a huge blessing to the family not to have to pay for temporary housing for him in IL.

For fun, we visited the Lincoln cabin (Abe was actually born in Kentucky) and farm, complete with period-dressed actors in the house who can't "remember" anything after 1845. They had a fire in the fireplace and were entertaining themselves with a stringed instrument and sewing projects. We walked around the farm to visit the live cow and pig. Later that day we drove through Amish country and stopped into local shops to look at the Amish-made furniture and quilts. The Amish don't believe in having any graven images of themselves, so they don't like to be photographed - especially not in the face. For the same reason, they also avoid putting faces on the dolls they make. We bought some handmade candy and picked up a few pamphlets from the Mennonite faith ("The Significance of the Christian Woman's Veiling," "A Call to Modesty," etc.).

We also got to visit a nature center, which was bursting at the seems with children on field trips. This has been the wettest spring for a very long time in Illinois, and parts of the nature trail were unpassably flooded.

The baptism was beautiful, and the woman was very excited to take this step in her life. The kids were pretty well-behaved, considering the baptism was right after church, making it over 4 hours of church for them in 1 day.

On the drive back to Tennessee we stopped off in Metropolis, IL, which claims to be "Home of Superman." The main attraction is a giant statue of Superman.