Civil War Country

Being deep in the South, we have found ourselves in the midst of Civil War country... and come to find that a major battle of the Civil War took place right in Vicksburg! The "Siege of Vicksburg" they call it! The Patriots came from all sides, and attacked the Rebels of Vicksburg. The Rebels definitely had the advantage, being up on the bluffs of Vicksburg, but when more supplies and aid never came from Jackson, they were forced to surrender on July 4. Because of this, Vicksburg never celebrated fourth of July until about 10 years ago! Hahaha...
BUT there is an AWESOME National Military Park here in honor of that Vicksburg battle. Last Saturday the entrance fee was FREE so of course we had to go :) It's a driving tour (because the park is HUGE) and you can get out and stop at several important spots along the way...

In front of the Illinois memorial...

In memory of all their troops...

Inside, looking up

Inside, looking down

Oh look, there's me :) I didn't dress up for the event...

And there's Jon!

It looks small, but it's really a HUGE statue of Ulysses S. Grant- General of the Union Troops

The best part of the WHOLE park was this incredible iron clad Union boat that is on display. It sunk in the Mississippi river, and 102 years later they pulled it out from the depths of the murky river and restored it! It's now in the park, along with a sweet museum of all the artifacts like clothes, bottles, safety pins, weapons- that had remained on the boat when it sank.

USS Cairo

I'm a sailor- I sail!

Boys and their toys...

Included in the park was the war cemetery....

Near the end of the park we came to a fort up on the bluffs banking the Mississippi. At only 300 feet, we could see all the way into Louisiana :)

Just us and the Mississippi

And we ended our adventures with some deep-fried pickles... Mmm-Mmm!

Our new place...

After making our 32 hour trek across the country, we were excited to finally get to move into our new place. A bit apprehensive to what we may find, since we found this place online and had never seen it otherwise, it turned out to be a great place for us! It's small, yes... and the floors are uneven and squeaky- but it has character :) It was built in the late 1800's and is in the historic district of Vicksburg, and not too far away from the ghetto part as well :) But it works for us, and it's home for the next two months. Here is the beginning of our mess...

Small bedroom

Bathroom

Living Room

and Kitchen :)

Moving in....

These pictures don't even capture...

how much of a disaster area it really was!

Our little room needs help!

And then we got it somewhat put together...

Home Sweet Home :)

And the best part about all this... is that in 2 months we get to pack it all up and do it all over again :)

Our cross-country expedition!

This is an epic tale of strength, courage and valour.... ok not really but we did have to travel all the way across the country! We moved to Mississippi! Whew... what a long drive it was.. we spent all day Friday packing up our U-haul that was WAY too small, but Jon and my Dad were determined to fit all of our furniture in it... my mom and I laughed from inside the house as they used every nook and cranny of that trailer... but we stopped laughing when they came in the house triumphant. That next morning we woke up at 5 am, ate breakfast with the family, and hopped in our car ready to start our cross country adventure. We left beautiful St. George, made our way down to Hurricane, and into Arizona...

Leaving St. George :(

Arizona!We only made it to Flagstaff before we had to fill up with gas again... towing a trailer does great things for gas mileage I tell you what :)

Once we left Flagstaff, the weather got incredibly windy, I was driving and thought I was going to die because the car was ALL over the road! So.. I promptly pulled over and let Jon drive... we tried taking pictures of the ridiculous dust storms... but they pictures didn't do the wind and dirt justice... so just imagine :) We finally got into New Mexico! Surprisingly, I found New Mexico really pretty! I know... strange...

Bored in the car :)

Oh look here we are filling up with gas again! We almost didn't make it to this gas station.. we were riding on fumes and pretty scared of breaking down. Come to find, there's not much in New Mexico! But do you see that road sign? It says "WELCOME TO TEXAS!" And we called it a day in Amarillo Texas, 10:34 p.m, and after 17 hours of driving...

Our alarm clocks failed us the next morning... (and I have no idea why I am typing underlined.. how do I change that?... Oh well!) so we got a late start on the road.. but the hotel had a free breakfast! Wahoo! Texas was really dry... and had alot of these oil thingys for the first half of the state... but as we crossed through Dallas and the state started to turn green...




Jon found it amusing to keep track of gas prices along the way... and they held pretty steady for us!

Dairy Queen makes the world a better place :).. and aren't these Texans ridiculous?

You know what was the most depressing thing about Texas? It took us 10 hours to get across it! Bah! There is WAY, WAY too much Texas... but we finally made it to Louisianna! Woot-yeah!

Welcome to Louisiana! We're almost there!

Still green :)

Louisiana was beautiful... everything green, and more green, and still green... and I'm sure it was a wonderful state but we were getting pretty anxious to just be in Mississippi. It had been 15 hours and our bums were quite sore! But we finally went over the Mississippi River...

And entered Mississippi! Vicksburg is the town right on the river front, so we had finally made it! 32 hours later.. we had arrived at our new home!

Here we are!

So.. after much convincing from MULTIPLE family members and friends, I decided to update my life and finally make a blog. I'll be the first to admit that I am a little bit "blog-retarded" and it may take me some time to figure this out :) But for the time being... here we are! Jon and I! (but mainly me) For those of you that don't know, we got married last year... December 27, 2008 to be exact,



and both just graduated from BYU! Jon graduate in Physics (he's the brainiac) and I in Dance. We both just finished our individual tours with the BYU International Folk Dance team,



and NOW we're off to start life FOR REAL down in Mississippi! We leave in about one week... and are excited for the cool, fresh climate of Mississippi in the summer time ;)