Goodbye July

This month has been busy with lots of little things.  I will blog about them in more depth when I have some time.  Some of the things we’ve enjoyed this month:

Celebrating the birth of a nation with friends, neighborhood block party, youth conference, swimming lessons, celebrating the pioneers and the beginning of Utah, family picnic complete with kickball game, pool party, fireworks, parades, movies, carnival rides, and lots of running for me. 

So grateful for my family and all of the fun we’ve had together so far this summer.  I can’t believe we only have three weeks of fun left before school starts again!  I’m sure we’ll find a few more fun things to do before then. 

What are you doing for the rest of your summer?

Dirty Girl Race

Last Saturday I went with my friend Bonnie to a Mud run in Salt Lake at Wheeler Farm.  It is part of a series of races to raise money for gynecological research.  It was an all girls race—no boys allowed.  There were lots of obstacles and lots of mud/water.  It was tons of fun.  Lots of people dressed up in crazy costumes and had crazy team names.  We were pretty boring and didn’t dress up, but we still had a lot of fun.  cute team costumeMe, Bonnie, and Kristin (Bonnie’s sister in law—she’s the one that told us about the race)more cute costumesour whole team (Bonnie was the only one I really knew on the team)Bonnie and I sliding in the mud

Taking a photo breakOver the wall, that’s me on the right and Bonnie on the left.  This one makes me laugh. Swimming in the mud.posing for a picturepart of our teamjust a little dirty

At the end they had a bubble machine it was lots of fun to play in those bubbles.  Our whole dirty team after the race

trying to clean off the mud—that water was COOOOLDWe were still a muddy mess even after trying to hose off.  None of the clothes I was wearing will ever be the same again.  I’m so glad we did it though.  It was a blast!  I’m so happy Tami got up early to come be our photographer too otherwise we wouldn’t have such great pictures.  She’s awesome! 

Girls Camp 2011

This year for Girls camp we had ward camp and we went to Flaming gorge.  It was tons of fun.  We left on Wednesday morning to drive up there.  Our theme was “We seek after these things”.  We stopped a couple times to do little activities and introduce the girls to the theme of camp.  The first one we had to figure out a riddle and go find one of the YCL’s then she gave us a message and each of us got a bag that we could put our treasures in during the week.  Sue Brickson introducing the theme. 

Some of the girls in rapt attention.

When we got to Vernal we stopped to eat lunch at the park and then we went to the Temple grounds to hear a spiritual message.  Having fun on the swingsStaying cool in the shade.Soaking up the sunAll the girls at the TempleAnnie giving a spiritual messageThe Temple

It wasn’t long after we arrived at the campground and got everything set up that the hair braiding and campfire singing began. 

Annie is the resident braider at camp.  I don’t know what the girls will do next year when she’s not there.  (she just graduated)The Mormon Boy Rap—it’s fun to watch. 

A tootie tot—even Bro. Lambert joined in the actions and fun of campfire songs. 

The next morning we went on a  value hike.  It was fun and the view at the end was beautiful.  There were YCL’s at each stop with a short message about their value and then they gave each girl a bead which later in the day they used to make into bracelets. 

Before the hikeAt one of the value stops.The view

Me and Em at the top.  We took pics of the whole group, but they only used one camera and promised we’d all be emailed the picture…we’ll see if that ever happens. 

That night we did skits.  You can’t tell how much fun we had or how funny they were from the pictures.  We were all laughing pretty hard. 

The beehives did one together.  It was cute and kept us laughing.  The Mia Maids had appearances from both Edward and Jacob, but Jacob was too fast so I missed him.  These are the YCL’s—they were pirates. 

these two were the narrators—they said everything and when the characters were speaking they just mouthed the words and it was hilarious because it was like watching one of those badly dubbed Japanese monster movies. 

Thankfully most of the other leaders are really creative so ours was pretty funny.  We even got the Priesthood leaders involved and they never fail to crack us up.  Our setting was a salon.Manicure and eyebrow station

hairstyling

facials—we were cracking ourselves up.

shave station—yes, that’s a hatchet he’s shaving with—don’t try this at home, kids.

Skits are always so much fun.

The cup game—super fun for all ages.  Don’t know what it is??  Ask me to teach you!

We were trying to get everyone with braids in a picture and that pole was right in front of my face. 

All the briads from the front.and from the back with the master braider in front. 

Friday while our rafts were being picked up we went to the dam and took a tour.  It was pretty cool. 

From the top of the damListening to the dam tour guide—I can’t tell you how many dam jokes everyone told while we were there.  the same jets above from the bottom of the dam.  They were shooting water out at 60 mph.  We have a VERY high water year this year so they were letting out as much water as they could to keep things from flooding and the gorge is still super full.  My camera died after this so no more pictures. 

We rode the river and it was tons of fun because of the high water.  The rapids were much better than last time I was on it.  The girls all had a blast and then that night we all got to shower and then ended the week with testimony meeting.  That’s always my favorite part of camp.  We did fire crystals again so the fire was really colorful.  It was an awesome camp.