Great Artist's work appears in Kirtland, Ohio

Fiona and I had the pleasure of visiting an exhibit in Kirtland, Ohio today, on the site where Joseph Smith and the early members of the Mormon church lived.  For those who haven't visited us in Ohio [why not?!] you may not know that the LDS church has rebuilt the whole town to look like it did in Joseph Smith's day.  You can tour it and learn a lot about the early church and what life was like in the 19th century.

Every Christmas, the Visitor's Center gathers nativity scenes from people who donate them for an exhibit.    Here is Fiona standing outside the "Little Red Schoolhouse," a replica of the building that served as both a schoolhouse, courthouse, and a church meeting house.

We went into the schoolhouse and saw many nativity scenes, but we found one that we thought was especially wonderful, handcrafted and imported from Oak Lane:

From the schoolhouse, we went into the main Visitor's Center, where we found many more nativity scenes (lotsa olive wood from the Holy Land, lotsa Hallmark camels with big baby eyes...).  I saw one that I thought was especially interesting.  My cell phone doesn't do it justice, but it is from Liberia.  The sign says it is made from bullet casings that were collected by the artist after the Liberian Civil War that was fought from 1999-2003.  It made me sad to think of someone who had probably suffered through horrible violence going out to collect casings, but hopeful to think that they were put so such a peaceful purpose.

We had special tour guides all through our visit to the exhibit -- two women who are good friends of Fiona's.  One, Sister Wygant, lives on Cedar Lane, right behind Grandma and Grandpa and grew up playing in The Cousins (I guess permission is given to just about anyone these days...).

It was fun to be all the way out here in Ohio and have things to remind us of our family that we love so much back in Utah.