Thoughts while we drive the Pioneer Trail

we are traveling and I'm trying to take the many hours of driving to get back to the habit of blogging my thoughts. It is nice when the car is quiet, the miles passing under our tires, and the beauty of our country passing before my eyes to actually be able to think beyond schedules, carpools, house decisions or homemaking responsibilities.

These past fews days I've been thinking about pioneers.

We spent two days learning about Winter quarters and Nauvoo. These locations are intricately connected in the pioneer story. Those who founded and worked to create a beautiful city called Nauvoo then werer forced to leave it for the primitive and desolate cold at winter quarters. 

John  and I both have ancestors who went from the "city of Joseph" with its hilltop temple and perfectly manicured streets across the Mississippi River and muddy trying Iowa into Council Bluffs and what would quickly become Winter Quarters. 

From beautiful homes to rough log cabins. From having all the comforts of the times to having nothing at all.

I've been thinking about that a lot.

We are in the process of buidling a Nauvoo kind of home. A place of beauty and comfort where we have made the decisions about what it will look like, the size and shape of the rooms, the colors of the walls and the materials for the floors. We've chosen windows, sidewalks, siding, brick, doors and doorknobs too. We have not afforded every luxury, but it is certainly a home full of comforts and one we hardly feel we deserve. And Ive been asking myself this week 'could I leave it all behind me? Could I lock my door ad walk ahead into an unknown future in order to keep my faith?"

Its been a great chance to go through those important "checks and balances". Checking on the priorities and balancing them with what I know to be right. 

I've enjoyed the process of building our home (affectionately called 'the Homestead'). I've loved learning new things, being creative, thinking through challenges and seeing ideas become reality.  But I'm thankful to say that, as hard as it would be, I could walk away from it today if I knew I was walking into our future with my family in tact and the promises of eternity together weighing in the balance. I could do what my ancestors did, and leave it behind me now, with a hope and promise that the future with my family around me is better than any structure built to house us and make us comfortable.