This week the Branch Relief Society had a dinner to honor their husbands for Father's day.  After the dinner a Cornhole Tournament was held.  A Cornhole game is a cross between horseshoes and a bean bag toss.  Each player has four bean bags that are tossed at a six inch hole in a board like the two in the bottom of the picture. The boards are set apart about the same distance as horseshoe pegs.  You can lob the bag in or slide it in and you get points for being close.  It was good enjoyable inside fun.  In the picture is one of our traveling elders and the Branch President's wife.  Each team was made up of two players.  I teamed up with the former Branch President and as luck would have it, we were runners up to the winners.

We love our traveling elders that visit our branch twice a week.  Elder Thompson is on my right and he is from Eagle, Idaho.  Elder Sorenson is on Sister Peterson's left and he is from Las Vegas, Nevada.  They are very good and we enjoy working with them.  They really enjoyed being at the RS social because there were three non-members and a couple of inactives in attendance and they love to play Cornhole.

One of the young families that attended the social that we have been teaching.  Last week we team taught them with the traveling elders.  We have really enjoyed getting to know them and love their little ones.  we have high hopes for them.

Our Branch President with his family.  He is a convert of about 15 years.  He does a great job and carries a heavy load in this small branch.  We really respect and enjoy him and his wife.  Their daughter, Regan is adopted.  She is the sweetest thing and always comes up and gives us a big hug when she sees us.

We spent most of this week cleaning our new "digs" and moving in.  I am a day late with the blog because we were still getting settled.  This week it is on with missionary work and it started with a bang.  Today we began teaching a new lady the discussions.  She has already came to Sacrament Meeting several times and has been reading the Book of Mormon.  She has been saying her prayers and already believes the Church is true.  She is a missionary's dream and maybe we might get a baptism yet?
Elder and Sister Peterson (Teachin" and Baptizin" in Kentucky)

We were at a member's home visiting and saw this hibiscus blooming and took the picture,  The sister in this family was the former Relief Society President and she has been very kind to us.  Giving us tasty sourdough bread on several occasions and giving us some fresh strawberry jam.  She is also a great source of information on inactive members and where they live.  Her husband is actually a non-member but a great guy and he had to show me his garden.  He already has potatoes in it the size of baseballs and he gave us some new squash and peppers.  He also has some tomatoes that aren't far from being ready.  It is very interesting to see how much earlier the season is here.  All of the winter wheat is already thrashed.  At home we seldom thrash winter wheat until mid July.

Golf carts are very big here even though the golf course is far away.  They use the them to ride around their big yards in their small communities.  The Kentucky Wildcats are also very popular here although Louisville is actually closer.  You very seldom see the Louisville red but Kentucky blue is everywhere.  This golf cart is painted Kentucky blue with the big logo on the front.  It belongs to the same former Relief Society president and she drives it to Church.  There is a nice community of about a dozen homes located around the Church and they live in that area.

She wanted to take our picture in the golf cart and it was actually sitting in their large garage.  They actually have a unique and beautiful home that is built into a slope with two sides below ground level.  As you might can tell by the size of the garage, it is really a nice home.

Our sign of the week, it was on a road leading to an old church that was being repaired so we didn't take any pictures of the church.  The sign near the front of the church said that it was built in the 1850's but it looked like it had been remodeled several times.

We have been offered this home to live in for the rest of our mission.  It is an older home that belonged to one of the matriarchs of the Church in this area.  She was 94 and struggling with alzhiemers and her family had to put here in an assisted living facility.  None of the family live close by and they can't settle the home situation until November so we would be house-sitting for them and taking care of things.  All of the lady's things are still in the home so we have been a little reluctant to accept the offer, although it would give us a lot more room.  This is the home where we encountered the two big black cats that loved to terrorize Sister Peterson so there is some reluctance on her part and some concern about her allergies.  Anyway we might be moving if it all works out.
Elder and Sister Peterson -  Movin' on down the road?

This is a great young active family in our branch.  The young lady on the right is the non-member girlfriend of the boy next to her.  He invited us to their family home evening to teach her about the gospel.  The lady on the far left next to Sister Peterson is the non-member mother of the mother of the family standing on her left.  So we got to teach two non-members and it was a great evening.  We had dinner first which included catfish and hush puppies.  Yes we have tasted our first catfish and actually it was quite good!  Hush puppies are flour and cornmeal rolled around a sweet onion and deep fried or baked.  They very a lot according to who makes them but these were good.  After the lesson we played games in their big yard and had a great time.

This is a beautiful Southern Style home in Morgantown that we drive past and finally decided to stop and take a picture.  It is an older home that has been refurbished and added onto.  There is a large three car garage in back although the picture doesn't show it very well.  We are told the inside is also very beautiful with flooring of the period and very nice furnishings.  The columns are a prominent feature of the older homes.  This is a beautiful example of what one might picture as "My Old Kentucky Home".

This is a beautiful large Baptist Church called Belmont.  It is about five miles out of town in a wooded area. There is a school in part of it but it still is very large and seems to have a large congregation.  We have several members nearby that we visit and there always seems to be a lot of cars there on Sunday.  It has even affected the branch a little because occasionally wayward members will defect here.

This is what most of the small churches look like out in the country.  They are everywhere in small communities.  Most are Missionary Baptist churches but there are some Church of Christ chapels and an occasional Methodist one.  This one has some class room area.  Most are smaller and only include a chapel.  However there will always be a covered picnic area with tables for dinners and a small cemetery.  There are small cemeteries throughout the area.  Some are private family burial plots but most are near these small churches.  We were driving down a gravel road one day looking for an inactive family when we saw a side road we thought might take us to their home.  Instead it wound up the ridge through the trees to a very secluded cemetery completely hidden in the trees.  There were fairly recent headstones so it was still in use.

We were attracted to this one because of the name.  We learned later that lick refers to a salt lick that deer and other animals frequent for a taste of salt.  This one was named after Barnett.  It was interesting that the church and the area would take the name given the old salt lick.  Unfortunately we have one inactive member that has decided to return to this particular church.  His grandparents were the first to start this Baptist congregation in the Barnetts Lick area and he has returned to the church of his forefathers.  In a area that is so strongly Baptist/Protestant, we get more of that than we would like.,  Some will join but don't really get converted and after a few months drop away and return to their easier religious lifestyle.

This has been an interesting week with some real dog days that we seemed to get little accomplished.  Then we had a couple of days at the end of the week where we seemed to catch everyone we stopped to visit.  We taught two investigator lessons this week and have another new investigator starting the lessons this next week.  So we are doing some missionary work along with visiting a lot of inactive members.

We are still enjoying our surroundings and have heard our first whipper-wills and really enjoy the lightning bugs or fire flies that are prominent here especially after a rain storm.  The other night we were driving home and the fireflies were everywhere.  They flash for a second or two then are gone and will flash for a second some where else and the light is surprisingly bright.  With all those flashes of light, I was afraid some might be deer eyes reflecting the headlights.  I was very jumpy and a good thing because a big doe walked in front of us and we had to slam on the brakes to miss her.  Later the same evening we had to swerve around a possum in the road that was blinded by the headlights and didn't move.  It is very common here to see road-kill possums.  They are about like the jack rabbits used to be at home.  Oh well, that is probably enough gory details.
Elder and Sister Peterson (Sittin' in our rockin' chars 'n' watchin' the farflies)

Saturday we attended our first baptism.  Unfortunately it wasn't one of our investigators.  Our District Elders taught the lady and they had to come to our font.  There is only a small branch in their area of about 60 members.  Their chapel is a rented Methodist Church that doesn't have a baptismal font.  We helped them with all the preparations for the baptism and provided refreshments after the meeting.  We have two more baptisms scheduled for the next two Saturdays.  One will be for a young lady and her grandmother that we have helped with.  We taught them one lesson, have sat in on couple of more and are trying to fellowship them.  They came to Church today and stayed for all three meetings, which was a big step.  I taught the Gospel Principles class and the grandmother attended and participated so it was great.

One of the major attractions in Bowling Green is the Corvette Museum. We went there Saturday afternoon after the baptism with our friends, the Oakleys.  GM made Corvettes in Bowling Green for a time.  It is one of the largest museums in the world dedicated to a particular car.  It was interesting to those who love fast, expensive cars but wasn't particularly my cup of tea.  The tour was organized by one of our office couples and seven senior couples came.  We really enjoyed meeting with and enjoying their fellowship.  We shared our failures and successes and had a good time together eating a meal and touring the museum.

I was taking pictures of the group when someone volunteered to take pictures for me, so I ended up on the end of the group away from Vicki.  All the rest are standing next to their companions.  At the present time there are 12 senior couples in our mission, which is quite surprising and more than normal.  We have enjoyed all of them and have found it interesting that we feel a bond with each and find it very easy to socialize with them although they come from different areas.  Two couples are from Oregon, two from Utah, one from Colorado, one from Texas along with us Idahoans.

This is Brother and Sister Austin from Logan Utah.  They are serving in Bowling Green and we see them fairly often.  They live right across the street from the Anthonys that we have written about and not far from Brent & Candace in Logan.

We have quite a few Amish and Mennonites in the area, hence this road sign.  We were coming down one of the major roads the other day and came up behind an Amish fellow in his one-horse buggy.  We felt bad we hadn't put the camera in the car that day for we would have dearly loved to had a picture as we followed him for about a mile.  Below is a telephone pole covered with the wild ivy, a sight we see in this green country quite often.

We are very grateful for Kiara's efforts to post pictures of the boys graduations on Facebook.  We have looked forward each day to those pictures.  We have missed being there very much, but the pictures have helped.  We are grateful for the graduation announcements and have them on the refrigerator door.  We also love to post pictures that are sent to us.  We got some of McCoy this week and he is right there with the graduation boys.  We enjoy skyping with those who can and it helps us feel close to our family.  In case anyone wonders, we do really miss family, especially when we get a little discouraged on a hard day.  Then we have a good visit and it all seems worth it again.
Elder and Sister Peterson (Y'all come see us, y'hear!)

We had such a good time at Mammoth Caves a couple of weeks ago, the rest of our district missionaries wanted to go.  So we all went there on P-day this week.  It was a rerun for us but enjoyable to spend time with the Oakleys and our young district elders.

The elders had a great time and it was quite a diversion for them from what they normally do on p-day.

Part of the fun on this trip was riding the ferry in the Park that takes cars across the Green River.  In this picture we are the lead car of three on the ferry and we are about midstream of the River.  Sister Peterson was very apprehensive about riding on the ferry but it turned out to be pretty tame.

An interesting road sign we found on our way home from Zone Meeting in Hopkinsville, the stake center for the area.  We do have some serious activities and I would like to share some.  Last Sunday I went home teaching with one of the High Priests in the branch.  He is a wonderful man that has quite a conversion story.  He loves Blue Grass music and plays the harmonica and banjo, both by ear.  He plays each week in a Blue Grass band that plays in a local Church.  He took his harmonica with him and played for a home bound widow we visited.  He played Amazing Grace, Church in the Wildwood and several other old time favorites.  I don't believe I have heard a prettier rendition of Amazing Grace.  The sister loved it because she too is a lover of Blue Grass music.  After the music we administered the Sacrament for her, taught her a lesson and gave her a Priesthood blessing.  Now that is what I call real Home Teaching!

Our next visit was too an illiterate older brother who had been converted some 20 years earlier in Mississippi.  He lives in the basement of a fellow that lets him work with him, but mostly he makes his living by stripping small copper wire by hand and selling the copper.  There were buckets of copper wire everywhere and only one chair but we still gave a lesson and had prayer.  Bob treated him very well and you could see the love he had for Brother Bob.

We visited one other active family but were gone for almost four hours.  There was some travel time involved because we went from one end of the ward to the other.  But mostly the time was consumed by Brother Bob.  For you see he openly says he has a disease, "diarrhea of the mouth."  He just loves to talk and even after we got back to our trailer, Bob visited for about an hour.

Later in the week I was teaching a lesson on the Plan of Salvation to our favorite hillbilly family that we have grown to love.   They consider themselves hillbillys and always say "y'all com back now, y'hear" to emphasize it when we leave.  Anyway I used the scripture about "In my house are many mansions . . .," and tried to focus on the idea of preparing to live in the Celestial Kingdom.  I asked the sister if she wanted a heavenly mansion.  She replied that she didn't know about a mansion but she would sure like a nice motor home with a roll out front room.  Of course Sister Peterson and I both lost our composure and it was a little difficult to get a serious conclusion to the lesson.

The wild ivy grows everywhere, on fences, telephone poles, old barns and even on top of this road sign.  There are places where it grows so thick on the trees along the roadside that you can't hardly see through it.      We have found it quite interesting.
Elder and Sister Peterson (Enjoying ourselves in Rural Kentucky)

Tuesday was transfer day in the mission.  All of the missionaries being transferred and their companions come into Nashville to a stake center near the Temple.  All of the departing missionaries and the incoming missionaries meet with them.  Our mission is small enough that all transfers and new assignments are made in this meeting then everyone can go home with their new companions.  All of the senior couples are invited to come, especially if they have to bring missionaries that don't have transportation.  It is a wonderful meeting where the outgoing missionaries get to say farewell and bare their testimonies.  Incoming missionaries get introduced and assigned and the Mission President gets to give some good direction.  Then we have lunch and later the Mission President and his wife say their goodbyes by taking the departing missionaries to a Temple session.

One of the departing missionaries this week was one of the Assistants to the President, Elder Stringham from Lehi, Utah.  Named to replace him was Elder Hill from Malad, Idaho.  Elder Hill is on the left in this picture.  The other Elder in the picture is the AP that wan't changed.  We love Elder Hill because we have got to know him as he has been serving in this area.  He is a wonderful Elder and we both felt he would be called to this new assignment.

We traveled to the Temple with Oakleys and had a very enjoyable day.  The Nashville Temple is quite small, smaller than our Twin Falls Temple and all basically on one floor.  It is only open on some evenings and on Friday and Saturday.  Our Tuesday session at four was by special arrangement just for the missionaries.  Eight couples and 11 missionaries attended the session and we nearly filled the room.  It was wonderful to be in the Temple again on such a spiritual occasion.

This old log church, called the "Old Hebron Church", was where the first missionaries preached the Gospel in this part of Kentucky.  It is located across the river in an adjoining county in an area called Hunstville that was first settled by a Civil War soldier.  It figures very prominently in the history of the Church in this area.  Missionaries came up the Green River by boat and taught the Hunt family and others and started quite a congregation.  Reportedly Charles A. Callis visited the area and preached at this church.  The Hunt family was persecuted and eventually left but many in the area claim ancestors that stem from those converted in that first congregation.  The church is fairly well preserved for its age because there is a cemetery in the church yard that is still being used.  It was located down a quite a gravel lane in the woods and we had to try three times to find it.

We were traveling a quiet country road when we saw this sign.  for a moment we thought we were back in Utah.

We got a kick out of this sign - a year round garage sale?  Garage sales are big here and we will see several nearly every day.  They will be anywhere, even way out in the country byways.  There are three major consignment shops in town where people sell their antiques (junk).  I guess it is part of the culture but people keep their treasures in their homes to the point of clutter.  Then they sell them to each other at yard sales, (trading clutter).  I guess we shouldn't comment but we do find it amusing.

Some pictures in the gardens at the front of the Temple.  Travel time from our home to the Temple was about a hour and a half.  Thankfully it is that close and we will have several chances to visit there while we are here.  We took quite a few pictures while there.  I guess we have missed attending the Temple more than we realized.
Elder and Sister Peterson (On the Road Again)

For P-day this last week we went to Mammoth Cave National Park.  It is about 50 miles from where we live.  It is a huge cave complex reported to be about 400 miles long.  Supposedly the largest cave area in the world. It was very interesting and we actually took one of the smaller tours of a remote part of the cave.

This is proof that I went in the cave even though I worried a little about my tendency for claustraphobia.  There were some small passage areas where we had to bend over and we could touch each side.  The tour went well and we enjoyed our experience.

This is one of the smaller areas in the cave and I was relieved to get through it.

This is the large main entrance to the cave.  We didn't go down into this part because it was so many steps down.  This large cave area actually goes down into an underground river that eventually exits and forms the Green River that flows through the area where we live.  Kentucky has many smaller cave areas because of all the limestone in the area but none are as large and distinctive as this Mammoth Cave complex.

I am always impressed by the thicket/forest that naturally grows in this part of the world.

The roads in the Park are beautifully manicured but still in places the trees hang over the roads.  This whole area of the Park was farmed until 1925.  After the Park was created the area quickly grew into what it looks like in this picture.  The forest is very think and extends for miles.

Mother decided it would be fun to post a road sign of the week.  We travel many small roads in the countryside.  Most are oiled and well marked with a sign.  Some lead only to one house and the sign will carry the owners name like Darrell Smith Road.  It will still have a sign and the signs are well-maintained and "thank heavens" or we would have a hard time finding people.

This is what part of Possum Hollow road looked like.  We have traveled down quite a few like this and enjoy it unless the oil ends and the road gets smaller.  We have been warned about going down secluded country roads especially if we come to "No Trespassing" signs.  There are some pot farmers in the area and some "meth" labs secluded in the woods.  Fortunately we haven't run into any yet but we have turned around a few times and quickly backtracked.  We were trying to find one member when we came upon numerous no trespassing signs and on the side of the trailer was scrawled, "Smile your on camera".  Needless to say we didn't knock but went on down the road.

Mother and I in our rocking chairs on our front porch.  We had just hosted district meeting and Elder Oakley took our picture.  We have had some wonderful spiritual adventures too but I suppose not quite as interesting as the pictures.  We have found some interesting members that have wanted to remain lost.  One of them asked for his name to be removed from the Church.  Things will be tough for most of a day then we will have a great visit with someone and it will be all worth it again.  I suppose that is the way most missions go and ours is no different but it has been a real adventure!
Elder and Sister Peterson - "Kentucky Hillbillies?"