Well, it is now August 8 and another month has passed. We saw the Pageant of Nauvoo several times during that month. The Pageant has now closed, but we are still enjoying seeing the Young Performing Missionaries and the Nauvoo Brass Band at Sunset by the Mississippi and around the sites of Nauvoo.

We have stayed very busy as usual. Norma Campbell and Andrew came and spent a week. I think they really had a good time. We enjoyed having them. It was fun to watch Andrew interact with the young missionaries who are serving here as he is preparing for a mission of his own soon. He just turned 19 after they went home from here.

Vocal Point has been here this week and will be here for one more week. Vocal Point is a men's contemporary a cappella group from Brigham Young University. There are 9 members and they make some amazing music. When you listen, you think there should be someone up there with drums and cymbals and everything, but all the sounds are made by those talented young men. It has been a special treat to listen to them.

Brother and Sister Nielsen from Flower Mound were here visiting this week and it was fun to see them. They had brought the young Sister Nielsen and Sister Brown to the Especially for Youth program held here this week. We had dinner with them and the Cottrells on Wednesday and enjoyed thinking of all our friends in Flower Mound.

We have gone on a few Geode hunts and have found some fairly mediocre geodes, but we are still looking for that very special geode that so far has eluded us. We will try again next Friday at a new dig and then probably give up after that.

We took a tour of the Montrose Iowa area on Monday of this week. Our guide was Mike Foley from Illinois Wessleyan University. He is not a member of the Church, but has done a lot of work in identifying and documenting the Mormon Trail through Iowa. We had a good time learning the history of that period and being shown how they could identify exactly where the trails had been and even where cabins and fences had been. They used a method of divining rods (similar to the old technique of witching for water) and could show where unmarked graves were as well as locations of the trails. It was very interesting even if not scientific. He is writing a book that will be titled "Where the Rods Cross".

We had a great New Mexican dinner on Friday with friends from Albuquerque who had received some Hatch green chile from their son. What a treat!

We also renewed an old friendship with Kirk and Nancy Graham. We were very good friends when our children were all younger and were in fact sealed on the same day in the Mesa Arizona Temple in 1975. It was great to catch up with them and to learn of the happenings of the past 20 years since we last spent any time together.

It has been our special privilege to spend 5 days per week in the Temple here. What joys and blessings the Temple brings to our lives.

We are glad to be serving here and appreciate all the love and support we feel from each of you.

Please feel free to comment here on the blog or to e-mail us at patbaca43@gmail.com or to send us correspondence to PO Box 310, Nauvoo, IL 62354-0310. Our cell phones are 214-534-2574 and 214-534-6739.