McKenna's Young Women Medallion

Today marked a very special day for McKenna... one that involved countless hours of hard work and service! She finished her Personal Progress and earned her Young Woman Recognition Award and Medallion. She had to finish many "tasks" in 8 different area's, and had to do an 8 hour minimum project for each area as well. For two of the different area's she read the Book of Mormon... so that took months to finish both times!!!! She has already started over... and we have no doubt that she will finish it again! Most girls take 4-6 years to finish...she took less than 2! She won't be 14 until December!!!! She has made us very proud in everything she does and we love her so much. Thank you for setting such a great example for everyone around you McKenna!

Courtney's Cocoa

There isn't much that Courtney likes more than a huge mug of hot cocoa with whip cream and sprinkles... so I indulged her this morning! (She knows her aunt Angie would be VERY jealous right now!) Imagine how much simpler the world would be if something this small brought us so much joy!

First Day of School

School started on Thursday, August 20th... I can't believe how quickly the summer passed! It seems like the girls just got out of school! We had a busy, fun, and far too quick summer... but it is nice to get back into the structure of the school year! McKenna started 8th grade this year...

And Courtney started 3rd grade! It makes me feel OLD!!!

Girls Camp 2009..."Virtue a price above rubies..."

Harvest Hills 8th Ward... "The Finders and Refiners of Virtue." Ready for our amazing week at Heber Valley Girls Camp! Our beautiful girls...many of them first years...have no idea what lies ahead for them. What a great way to end the summer and start the school year! I rode up with Dan in our truck... the girls and a couple of the Young Women leaders rode our bus... This is one of my favorite pictures! I love Shasta's cheerleader pose!

Everyone boarding the bus... headed for awesomeness!

Here are Andrea Whidden, Noelle Taylor, and Shasta Knight... three of the four Young Women Leaders from our ward...also following the bus up to camp. Smile Andrea!

Amy Clark and the girls from our ward (and two other wards)... we are all so excited!

McKenna and Kylee... cheese!

Dan's truck and trailer... we had to bring up a lot of stuff for the stake... and our girls stuff!

Our whole gang in our cabin! Our stake did "scrubs" and t-shirts for all of us... we were "turquiose blue". It was a great color!!

Dan was there all week as our stake high council leader... it was so great having him up there all week. He is the best! He had red scrubs for the stake color, and he also got a pair our color!

The "Stake Commitee" at opening flag ceremony...

Kylee, Brooklynn, Kamree, Aubrey, Kat, Quyncie, and Baylee... leaving for some fun!

Andrea showing us her "guns"... Do you have a permit to "carry"?...

The "challenge course"... after climbing up and across they got to zipline down...very scary for some of our girls! But they did it!!!

Safety briefing...

Aubrey and Baylee... cheese!

They had several "stations" where the girls rotated through... they learned self confidence and team work!

Kamree and one of her friends from a different ward in our stake...

Another one of the stations...

The girls having fun...

Baylee and Kylee...

The Second year girls (Brayleen, McKenna and Emma) went to do "certification" while the first years were at the challenge course.

McKenna and Emma putting their knowledge of "fire building" to practice...

The finished product... made out of pretzels, coconut, and marshmallows... Not bad!

The stake leaders thought it would be funny to set up a recycling area for aluminum... and said it was for Dan's cologne fund!! He always smells so good! I buy him the good stuff!!

Jennifer Davis decorated so cute! She named the pavilion where we ate dinner and breakfast Ruby's Diner... because the Stake color and gem were Rubys...

A view of one of our flags... Virtue!

The fourth years leaving on their overnight hike... Dan included...

Shasta REALLY liked her dinner... Cafe Rio salads... she even licked her plate!!!

Emma getting our flag for flag ceremony and family home evening...

We decided to dress like gangsters for flag ceremony the first night... because we were singing our funny "I like mormon boys" song... Aubrey...
Baylee...

McKenna and Brayleen...

This picture just keeps getting bigger...

And Bigger...

And BIGGER!!!!!

Kenna, Baylee, and Brayleen...

Our gang at the flag ceremony! This is one of my favorites!!!!

The Stake Presidency doing their skit for us! It was hilarious! I love these men!!!

President Tillman sang the song... President Delis was the "bandit"...

President Evans was the "girl"...

If you weren't there... you missed out!!

After the "show" things got more serious, and they answered anonymous questions that the girls had asked... Dan did the same for the girls on the overnight hike... it was a very emotional and spiritual night.

And then we came back and played games in our cabin... "Big Booty"... and did our daily awards.

Everyone doing their PJS... Prayer, Journal, Scriptures...

Tuesday... awaiting the return of the fourth years from their overnight hike...

Here they come...

Sara Arnold...showing me her stinky pits! Nice!!

Dan and I having a little reuniting hello! I even gave him my popcicle! Am I nice or what?!

The "first years" doing certification...

We forgot our flag at flag ceremony... we made up a song and dance to get it back... it was awesome!! We even did a "kick line"...

Tuesday night was incredible! We got to take part in an activity called "Lehi's Dream...The Iron Rod." Ask me about it... it would take too long to explain on here... and I don't have any pictures to post. It was really life changing for all of us...

Dan and "Roberta" the rabbit. If you found Roberta in your cabin you had to do an act of service for another ward... Here is Dan being given Roberta...
Here we are on Wednesday afternoon for our kitchen duty... we had already made our lasanga's but we still needed to make rolls. Our girls had a blast... we sang the whole time we were in there... did I mention the power was out? That didn't stop us from having a great time!

Brayleen back at our cabin... decorating her hat before heading down to serve dinner...

Our beautiful girls ready and waiting to serve!!

May we help you?! Wednesday night is "skit night"... Dan was a part of the Stake Skit... he was the "Wizard of Oz" in their skit... nice jumpsuit Dan! Ours was based on "Snow Yellow and the 10 dwarfs"...in search of virtue!

Flex those muscles baby!!!

On Thursday was our sunrise hike... we got up at 4:15 am to hike up the mountain and watch the sunrise. Last year only 38 people went... this year almost 250 went! Dan and Kenna got to snuggle!

Dan looking for deer... he has a one track mind when he is in the great outdoors!!!

The view was amazing!!

Our girls... I'm not sure they were excited to be up that early! But it was totally worth it!!

Andrea...Me and two of my favorite people!

Here comes the sun...

Back in our cabin on Thursday painting nails and preparing for our Bishopric to come up for dinner and testimony meeting...

Thursday night was amazing as well. Our testimony meeting was inside due to rain... and we used our little lanterns in a circle on the floor as our "campfire". Ask me about that too!!

Friday morning flag ceremony... almost time to go home... they had us ward camp directors come up for a thank you...

Clean up, clean up, everybody everywhere... clean up, clean up, everybody do your share! Time to clean our cabin...

This year at girls camp was undoubtedly one of the most spirtual and amazing weeks of my life. Being that last year was the first experience I had ever had of attending girls camp, matters not. It was a week that has forever changed my life.