The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

It was the best of times and the worst of times.  My super, swell weekend of fun and frivolity, with a little bit of pain and torture thrown in for good measure, is now over.  I have returned to real life, but the festivities were remarkably groovy while they lasted.

Diana and I left Vegas, bound for Provo, last Wednesday night.  We traveled up to Cedar City where we spent the night with a dear friend of mine.  Our husbands were in graduate school together in Riverside.  We lived in the student housing there for five years.  And despite the limited budget and cramped living conditions, those years were truly magical.  We shared dinners, played games, cheered our husbands in championship basketball games, held each others' babies, shopped, and walked, and just generally hung out together all the time.  There is something unique about the simplicity of life during the schooling years.  And just like most things, I probably didn't fully appreciate what I had, until it was gone.  And having wonderful friends to share it with made it all the more fantastic.  After those years in school, we parted ways.  They have spent 17 years on the east coast, but have come back to the west.  So it was wonderful to be able to spend the night at her house and catch up.  It is amazing how you just pick up where you left off with really good friends that you haven't seen for a long time.  That was a excellent way to begin the weekend.

Then it was onto Spanish Fork, where we arrived just in time to see my niece perform in a first grade patriotic program.  All the kids were adorable as only 1st graders can be.

That night we headed up to Salt Lake City to see the performance of Mary Poppins.  I heard about the fact that it was playing just the week before and was thrilled when we could fit this into the schedule for the weekend.  I have wanted to see it for at least three years since it first came out on Broadway. 

 Diana and I with Mary herself.  Quite satisfactory!!

Next we have me with the official curtain in the background.  It is hard to see it but it says "Mary Poppins" on it.  Apparently you are not allowed to even take this picture, because we got yelled at by the usher.  Photos are not allowed because of copy right issues.  I got in trouble for taking a similar picture at Wicked, so that is just how I roll at these things, I suppose.  I am not sure if you can see, but we are sitting on the 7th row.  Our seats were amazing.  I have never seen a show so close up before. 

We loved every minute of the performance.  There is just nothing like a professional production.  It was truly sensational. Trust me it was practically perfect in every way.   I would recommend it to anyone, except maybe small children.  There is one number with life size toys that is on the scary side.  Diana thought it might even give her nightmares.  We loved it so much, I am going to start saving up for Beauty in the Beast, that comes in March.  Mary Poppins was really the high light of the weekend, and I enjoyed it to the fullest, blissfully unaware that two days later I would witness a tragedy of mass proportions.  How is that for foreshadowing?


Friday I got my hair done.  And Friday evening I went to the BYU football fireside with my sister and brother-in-law.  The fireside was great as it always is.  Afterwards I took the chance to meet a few players that had not been assaulted by me before.

This is Corby Eason, the safety.  I watched a special about him and how his mom did such a good job raising him by herself.  I was glad to get to meet him.

I also ran into Jaimeson Frazier, who I met at the baseball game after women's conference.  Shockingly enough he recognized me and said he remembered my funny stalking book and turkey bone story.  He may have been saying that to make me feel good, but I suppose in some freakish way, I am memorable.  Not many crazy old ladies running around with turkey bones and books of their stalking pictures.

Here I am with Brandon Olgetree.  He is another defensive player and Coach Mendenhall says that he is a really nice guy, until he gets on the field and then his eyes kind of go in separate directions.  He was very kind to pose for a picture.

And finally the group shot.  Someone else had gotten this group together and taken a picture, so it was easy for me to say "hey don't move, I need a picture with all of you."  Good, good times, people.

Finally Saturday arrived.  There was a terrible downpour on Friday night, and I was worried that it might rain for the game.  But the weather was wonderful, although I did bring my coat with me just because it was a night game.  Here I am so happy and excited to be parked and at the field.  I have no idea that I am about to be run over by a mac truck, so to speak.

And of course this picture was an absolute must.  The girl before me to take her picture with this truck was actually blowing a kiss to this player, so I am capable of some restraint.  Just so you know.

And here I am ready to party.  Kettle corn, cotton candy, and spiced almonds, Oh My!!!  So the evening was not a total loss.

My sister came with me to the game.  This proved to be useful throughout the night when she would remind me that I still needed to keep breathing.  After some plays, I really forgot about things like oxygen.

And even though she is an Aggie, she was kind enough to be supportive and wear one of my BYU shirts and wave her pom and cheer with me.  She was a very good sport. 

And she pointed out this lovely sunset, which was much better to look at than anything going on down on the field.  And at other times she reminded me that yes there is more to life than football and at least no one had died, even though most of us at the stadium probably wished the earth would open up and swallow us whole.

Here is a shot of just how close to the field we were.  Yes nothing like practically a front row seat to the massacre.  It was like watching someone hit your child with their car, and then back over them again and again and again.  Not to mention that the CEO of the bank who gave me the tickets is a Utah fan.  So he with his four daughters were sitting in front of us, and the two Utah fans that won tickets were sitting next to us, and there were 3 other Utah fans right behind us.  So although mildly entertaining, it was rather disturbing and perhaps even more painful watching them bask in the glory of their teams success.  Kind of like pouring lemon juice in my paper cuts, only they felt more like lacerations than paper cuts.

It was quite eye opening to see all of the other BYU fans.  I was with my people, if you know what I mean. Sort of like finally making it to the mother ship.   One fan had a blue football helmet with angel Moroni glued to the top of it.  There were people in completely blue body suits.  My favorite sign that someone was holding said "Hey Jordan, my sister called, she wants her arm back."

Jimmer Fredette was at the game and spent most of it on the sideline just below where we were sitting.  At one point I suggested to the BYU fan sitting next to us, that perhaps we should put Jimmer in the game.  Surely he couldn't have done much worse than the guys on the field.  He seemed to agree and called out "Put some pads on Jimmer."   Here is a shot of him walking out at the end of the game.  You can see the teams on the field in the background.

Overall I would give the ambiance, company, weather, and snacks an A+.  The actual game, well not so good.  However I do still love my team.  I would go to see them again, despite the pain they gave my heart.  My status on facebook that night said "Other than the shooting, Mrs Lincoln, how was the play?"  That pretty much sums it all up.   I only hope that they can learn something positive from all of this.  I have the utmost confidence in Coach Mendenhall.  I will be there on my couch Friday night cheering them on to what I seriously hope will be a victory.  One of these days, things will click and they will march up and down the field.  And when that day happens, you can bet that I will be there, turkey bone in hand.

A New Life Experience

A couple of weeks ago, I went to my mailbox, and what did I see? A letter from the IRS staring at me. Yes, people, I can now add "Audited by the IRS" to my list of life experiences I could do without.

Of course this came in the middle of all my crazy working weeks. So I just decided to stay in denial and put it to the side.

Today, it has finally made it to the top of my "Things to have a nervous break down over today" list. So I thought I would blog about it.

Another time, the chance to blog about something is the only good thing you have to say about it. Because sitting here at my computer blogging, is so much more productive than say gathering my supporting documentation in order, don't ya think? It's all about priorities, right?

And proving once again that no good deed goes unpunished, the category they have chosen to audit is my charitable contributions for 2007. If I read the paperwork correctly, I have to get copies of all my checks for supporting back up.

The date of my audit is August 12th at 8:00 AM. Are these people saddists or what? Way to ruin my summer vacation. And the letter says to be prepared to be there/be tortured for four hours. Good night nurse! What could they possibly talk to/grill me about for four hours. That is a ways away, but I have plans to be out of town for 10 days in the next two weeks. This weekend to attend a family reunion in Preston Idaho and the next to attend a nephew's baptism in Arizona.

So I better stop typing and get to working on that little project. My husband is a bit of a doomsdayer and he is sure we will loose all we own from penalties. If I go to jail for tax evasion, could someone please send me a cake with a file in it or at the very least a lap top with an Internet card. Think of the possibilities for blogging from jail. Hmmmm. Another time blogging can make the best of a worst case scenario.

Zip lock bags, worth their weight in gold.

Well I may die from the shock, but I am getting another chance to have the laptop. Two turns in one day. What the what. It must be my lucky day. And April is right, I should put my foot down and insist on equal rights for women. Sadly, I am a pushover when it comes to my rights. So don't feel sorry for me, it is my own fault. Go ahead, play your finger violins for me in mock sympathy.

So let me see if I can remember anything that I have to write about. That is the problem with sporadic computer time. Sometimes you just have to be in the right mood or frame of mind to write. At least for me anyway. Here are some random things that have happened this week.

Yesterday, I got a bill for crutches that were given to Jared at our first doctor appointment last summer on July 2. These are the people who sent us home after 6 hours, with the diagnosis that he had a pulled muscle and the flu. Well, that is almost the same as a staff infection that would turn septic and almost kill him, so I can understand. The bill is only for $15, but talk about snail mail. Good golly, Miss Molly, I may be receiving bills for years to come. These people are not exactly timely in their billing, are they?

Speaking of medical bills, I spent the morning trying to track down and list all our medical expenses from last year. In a bad news/good news moment, we had enough expenses to deduct. I think it is a moment akin to when you accidentally set off fireworks inside the house and punch a hole in the ceiling and say, "Hey, I wanted a skylight there anyway". Not good that there was so much money spent or debt incurred, but since it happened might as well save some money on the taxes, right?

In the first tragedy of 09, we ran out of zip lock bags the other day. Not just sandwich bags, but gallon and quart sized as well. Not a baggie to be found anywhere. Horrifying, not to mention inconceivable, because I buy zip lock bags by the case at Sam's club, and they usually last for about forever. Apparently, forever was over. Who knew?

I never realized just how much I appreciate the joy and convenience that is the zip lock bag. At first I was puzzled at just what to do. See, I have a system. When there are leftovers that need to be stored, I put them in a zip lock bag. That way I can put the bag in the fridge, until it turns into some unidentifiable substance, and then I can throw it away in good conscience and with very little effort. It has been a system that has served me and the land fill well. It is also why our state of no zip locks, was a state of emergency.

Then I remembered the neato storage container set I got for Christmas. And that saved the day when putting away left overs.

So now I love my new containers, I am just not sure where to put them in my over crowded smallish kitchen. I suppose that I need to throw away all the cottage cheese and sour cream containers that I have been using in the past.

But for now, I am storing the new containers in my fridge. Of course that will mean cleaning them out when they become filled with unidentifiable slime. Dang. Maybe they are not so neato after all.

When it rains it pours.

Maybe I was wrong to mock life, with that "it couldn't get any worse" comment. Ooh, look at me at the bottom. Poor, poor, me. I take it back, Ok, are you listening. I. Take. It. All. Back. Do not bring it, not even a little, just keep it all far, far away from me. But now it is too late. Apparently there are no take backs in the game of life. Dang. Bummmmer!

Diana has been complaining that her ear hurt, ever since the day after she got home. So that was Thursday, when we were busy trying to get out of the hospital. I contemplated taking her across the street to urgent care. But honestly, I wondered if she was just trying to get as much attention at Jared. So I actually talked one of the doctors at the hospital into just looking in her ear. Just tell me if I need to go to the doctor, that is all I am asking. The doctor looked and said it looked fine. Diana was still so whiny and so we left and stopped at the corner drugstore and bought some ear drops. Once again, I listen to a doctor and ignore the inner mother voice that said she was really sick. Will I never learn?

Friday she was still complaining, but I would put the drops in and that would seem to help her. I honestly thought it was just the placebo affect. And I was so tired yesterday, I never did anything more for her. Last night she was so whiny again. I figured it was just that she has been basically motherless for a month. That seems to justify a little whining. So I held her, rocked her, gave her a bath, washed her hair, and put her to bed.

Today she had some friends over for most of the day. I took advantage of how occupied she was, and really got things cleaned up around here. Did some laundry, unpacked from the hospital, and cleared out some furniture so that Jared can walk around the house when he needs to. Then, after another yummy delivered dinner, Diana and I went to Wal Mart and got a few things we have discovered we needed. All through Wal Mart she kept saying how bad her ear hurt.

I finally gave in and took her to urgent care. I felt like a prisoner marching to the guillotine as we drove to this place that is right across that street from the hospital. Surprisingly we were in and out of there in an hour. I had prepared myself for a two hour wait. And yes, she does have an ear infection. Because of course, why wouldn't she when I mocked the Gods of Health and Wellness. Especially in writing and on the public Internet. And so for me, Yes, another nomination for worst mother award to make her suffer for three days before I finally took her to the doctor.

We had a very nice doctor. I told him a little bit about Jared and would that be contagious or have anything to do with her earache. He said no, especially at this point. Then I asked if there was any way he could give me the once a day Zithromax. Because lets face it, I need another prescription to keep track of, like I need another hole in my head. He agreed, (about the easier drug, not that I needed a hole in my head) but of course our insurance would only pay for the amoxicillin. So why not, I will just add it to my spreadsheet of things to do at certain times during the day. I'll be fine making sure she takes medicine three times a day for ten days, that she hates more than walking across hot coals, NO PROBLEM. Then I asked the doctor if there was any way I could steal a hospital gown, because it would be so nice to have two of them. He said here hide this in your purse and don't tell anyone. So now we have an official hospital gown, and the newly purchased one. Always nice to have more than one set of clothes to wear.

And so with our pilfered pajamas, we drove straight to the pharmacy. When we got there they told me that their computer showed that Diana was allergic to penicillin. Oh yea, that does sound familiar. When she was about 3 months old she did get a rash one time. And so we have always said "yes" to her being allergic. But I could swear that at some time in the past year, she took some amoxicillin and did not have any reaction. The really scary thing is that I know that is the case for me. I had a rash once when I was about 8, but for some reason I know I took some amoxicillin in the past few years and nothing, I was fine. So I had Walgreen's take the allergy caution off of my file.

The pharmacist tried to call the doctor back, but only got a recording saying they were closed for the weekend. I have a kid in total pain. I would almost swear that it will be fine. The pharmacist says he will give it to me. I can just watch her and at the first sign of any rash, stop the medicine and give her Benedryl. Or worst case scenario if she has trouble breathing, take her to the Emergency Room. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? At this point, I have trouble breathing myself and hold onto the counter for support. It is nine thirty at night, I am beyond reasonable thinking. I stand there trying to decided if I take the chance or not. I figure I might as well wrap this worst mother award up with a bow (start engraving my name on it now), so I take the amoxicillin. I also bought a huge bottle of Benedryl. I am nothing, if not prepared.

I just gave her the Amoxicillin. Now do I stand next to her bed monitoring her breathing all night long? How did this happen? Please someone take over driving this vehicle called my life, because I have obviously lost the ability to function competently.

How soon does anaphylactic shock start? If I watch her for four hours can I go to sleep? Will I ever sleep again? When I do sleep will I ever stop having nightmares about the hospital? How do you know when you are officially insane? Does the pharmacy have the ability to super size my Valium order, if I can persuade/threaten some doctor to write a prescription for me? What are the penalties for falsifying a prescription? What illness with Trent come down with tomorrow? When I have my anxiety attack, will I foam at the mouth, and if so will some one take a picture of it for my blog? Will I look fat in my straight jacket? Will someone also take a picture of that? Will it hurt when I pound my head against the padded wall of my room at the mental institution?

Tune in tomorrow to see if I still have three children in the morning.

And I was wrong, there is something worse than one sick kid........... Two sick kids.

A Day of Miracles

Yesterday something miraculous happened. I cleaned out my fridge. I know for most of you this is nothing out of the ordinary. But sadly for me it is a stupendous chore requiring superhuman powers . Slowly since I stopped working outside of the home, I am trying to get on top of things around here. Once I had managed to clear a path through the house, I thought I would move on to the daunting task of the fridge. I can not say when I last did this task, which is scary enough to admit to the public. It might explain why I found an unopened quart of whipping cream with an expiration date from June last year. Part of the reason for this would be that time seems to moving at warp speed. I seem to be running behind yelling "wait for me". Well so now for at least a day, there is nothing sticky spilled on any of the shelves of my fridge. I would say that deems labeling this day as extraordinary, amazing, fabulous, and wonderous. The thesaurus even gives the word thaumatiguric as an synonym for miraculous, so I guess that would apply as well. Anyone every heard of that word? Or in other words having a clean fridge is a good thing.

Strange Sighting

Ok, a few weeks ago I heard this very strange noise when I got out of bed . It sounded kind of like someone coughing and it was coming from Trent's room. This was cause for alarm because Trent had already left for school that day. Imagine my surprise when I went in his room and saw this strange looking bird on the roof outside his window. Of course the first thing I did was run and get my camera. Got to get blog material where you can, you know. I was hoping that I could capture the strange bird call, but of course the bird refused to perform. It did however perform another bodily function for my benefit. And notice at the end of the clip, one of the illegal alien felines that has set up camp at my house. Does it make itself useful by catching this bird? No. Through some research, I think that this is a ringneck pheasant. I did find a website with a recording of a pheasant. But I could not figure out how to attach it to my movie. So if you really want to hear it, go to Wikipedia and you can hear it here. http://www.nps.gov/archive/wica/Bird_List.htm This is really pretty much what it sounded like. I wonder why a bird that can fly would decided to live in Vegas?

CATS

Ok, the title of this post is not a reference to the musical with cute cats dancing and singing around the stage. Instead, think of this like the Alfred Hitchcock movie birds, only with cats instead of birds. That would give an accurate description of my backyard last week. So I think I have heard it said that seven is a lucky number, but I seriously doubt that it is lucky to have seven cats trying to reproduce in your backyard. That is what was took place for several days last week at my house. One day I looked out my window and saw not just two but seven cats prowling and sitting in my backyard. This was strange to me as it had not happened before. So do I get sticks and stones to throw at them? Or maybe a cage to catch some and take them away from here? No that would be the sensible thing to do, I instead get my camera and take some pictures for my blog. I could never get them to all be together in one picture, but here are several different pictures and I think you can get the idea. The picture to the right actually has five cats, but you can't quite see the orange one that is under the table. All this activity was really inspiring me to actually take some cats away, but now it has died down and I am not feeling as pressured to do something now. Dang.

Sticky Surprise

Last night I was cleaning under the couch in my family room. I realized that this does not happen as often as it should. When I pushed the couch back I found a gooey, sticky surprise. Not a good sticky surprise like carmel popcorn or crispex mix, no this was a bad sticky surprise called a melted, hardened Popsicle. Since I highly doubt that the Popsicle walked out of my freezer and went under my couch to melt into a syrupy blob, my guess would be that someone put it there. My money is on Diana. She is always saving food to eat later. I don't know why? Perhaps she'll die. Who knew laminate flooring would turn out to be a lifesaving device. But tonight it did just that. Hurray for being able to mop up the sticky mess.

Lady in Red

Yesterday after school, Diana proudly gives me her school picture. I am excited to see how it turned out. Remember the picture day, the same day I went to traffic court? Well refer back to the post titled Traffic school Graduate, if you didn't read about all the trauma we went through the morning of her picture. Let me just say that I did not send her to school wearing a red scarf. So when I saw this picture, I was a bit stunned, shocked, perhaps even horrified. Had I know that this accessory would be added, I might not have chosen purple for the background color. I questioned her about the scarf. She informed me that "Oh my friend Bianca let me borrow it." Now it might just be me, but I think this scarf might fall into the "big bowl of ugly" category. (can you tell I have been watching to much Hannah Montana) I'm not really sure how I will feel about putting this picture on my wall and seeing it every day. I guess that is just what you have to deal with when you have a child with her own sense of fashion. I wonder when picture make up day is, perhaps we should try again. But then I have to go through the "morning of picture day" marathon again. Perhaps I should just call it good enough. And know that each time I see this picture it will bring a smile to my face because I have such an independent child. Who knows, she may grow up to be a famous fashion mogul someday.

Library Follies

Many of you may know this about me, I have a terrible time returning my library books on time. I am not quite sure why this is the case. A big reason would be that much of the time when I look for my books to return them, they are lost in the Bermuda Triangle that lurks at my house. If I earned $5 an hour for all the time I have spent looking for lost library materials, I would be rich. There is a very exciting thing invented called e-mail notification. Where was this for all the years I have been accruing fines?

So two weeks ago, I got one of these coolio things, telling me my book would be due in just 3 days. This made the book due the day I had traffic school. I thought it nothing short of miraculous when I actually returned my book the day it was due. I was kind of disappointed when a band did not appear, balloons did not fall from the ceiling, I was not given a gold medal, academy award, or something akin to that. It was a red letter day for sure. I celebrated all the way home until I found the last cassette to the book still in my tape player. Yikes! My exuberance left me like the air out of an untied balloon. Oh well, surely I get an A for effort. Maybe next time I will actually manage to return all of the book on time.

Yesterday, I stopped by the library quickly to return a book and get a new one. I also gave the missing tape back. Somehow they had not noticed that it was missing, and so my account was unscathed. Then last night, Diana talked me into taking her to the library. She hasn't been for a long time, which is restful for me. Quite honestly, it is usually her movies and tapes that go missing. One time after going through everything in her room, I found a movie under her chest of drawers. Another time, she lost a veggie tales CD. After going through the entire house and waiting several months hoping it would show up, I even ended up paying an outrageous fee. Several months later, I was going through some DVD's and found the darn CD along with two other DVD's in the "My Big Fat Greek Weeding" DVD case. Good Gracious, why hadn't I looked there first?

So when I got to the library last night, I wanted to see if the book I had checked out earlier was available on tape. Not paying enough attention, I tried to use the computer for self check out. This did not show me the library catalog, but it did show that I had 3 items checked out. This shocked me, because I had only checked out 2 things earlier. It showed that I still had the book "The Falcon at the Portal" checked out. That was the name of the book on tape I returned earlier. Full of indignation, I went to the front desk and demanded justice. The librarian went and looked in the back and sure enough, found the book I returned. She profusely apologized and took the item off my account. Diana picked out several movies and CD's and we went home. Imagine my dismay when I went into my room and found the book "Falcon at the Portal" laying on my floor. Apparently I had checked out both the book, and the book on tape. So the computer was right after all. Now I get to go back to the library and eat humble pie. When I found this sitting on the dining room table, I may have discovered my problem. Perhaps it is my missing brain.

Good news, Diana's bike isn't gone for good, just my brain!

Well I had reported a while ago that Diana's bike was stolen. She was very sad about this, but replacing it has still not made it to the top of the priority list. We saw a bike just like hers at Savers one day, and wondered if it even was hers. So imagine how amazed I was when I picked her up from a friend's house last Saturday and she informed me that her bike was there. It turns out that Diana took her bike to the church for a pioneer primary parade for the 24th of July. I think I had to go to work that day or something, and so this friend offered to bring her home from the activity. Somehow the bike did not make it back to our house. Good grief, this probably happened only a few weeks before we discovered the bike was missing. You would think that I could remember that she had it at the church. I honestly thought that we had not seen it all summer long. So good news, we found the bike, now if I could only find my brain things would really be looking up.

I survived!

Well I survived girls camp. I suppose all together it was a success. No one broke their leg, like last year. We took 18 girls and brought the same 18 girls home. No one froze to death, in fact no one even got sick. The camp across the road from us had girls throwing up, so we counted our blessings that didn't happen to us. The girls all got along extremely well and that was wonderful. The tent assignments that I had spent about 40 hours worrying about all worked out well in the end. Gosh, why do we obsess about things that really are not that important in the end? I felt lucky that we were in the campsite closest to the stake. It really was nice to be so close to opening and closing flag. Last year we were in the campsite furthest away and at the top of a fairly steep hill.

Here's a picture of me singing at flag, did I mention it was rather cold the first day? I have earned the name of hypothermiac, because I am always cold and wore many layers to try and compensate. Those hand warmer things are my best friend. The first night I went to sleep with one of those warmers griped tightly in my hand and I woke up several times during the night with it still in my hand. My favorite part of camp is singing the songs. Whether it be the silly ones like Fried Ham, Noah, or Princess Pat, or singing church songs around the fire there is nothing better than music and nature. It is also really wonderful to get away from normal life of cell phones and busy schedules. Camp was nice this year because we had more free time where we could be together as a ward. We had about a million different crafting supplies, and the girls had a great time making all sorts of crafts.

The first afternoon we were there, our leaders were in charge of teaching certification to 30 third year girls. One of the requirements said to have the girls spend time observing nature and then share their thoughts through drawings, poetry or interpretive dance. I hoped for lots of interpretive dancing but no one choose that option. We made all the girls walk up a fairly large hill from our camp #6 to camp #13. We brought craft supplies with us like pipe cleaners and modeling clay. This activity went better than I had thought it would, most of the girls really got into it and made some pretty interesting things. We did however have about 4 girls who thought it would be fun to climb 20 feet up a tree to do their observing. For a while it looked imminent that we would have another injury just hours into camp. We did however manage to get everyone back to the ground safely. It was fun to see what the girls had made, although several of their creations involved worms being eaten by birds. Here is a picture of me with another leader and our beautiful pipe-cleaner creations. We were glad when our certification rotation was over and on the first day. That night at opening flag we had the assignment to present the theme of "Be Strong". We asked some of our crazy 4th years to do this. We had the idea to do a take off of "Hans and Frans" from Saturday Night Live. The girls had not ever seen this, but thanks to U-Tube they got the idea of it. They wrote a very funny skit that revolved around the idea that they were here to "pump you up, spiritually". It was very funny and went over very well, although the rest of the week the other wards all just read a scripture so I hope we were not being to irreverent.

Here is a picture of all our leaders. It was great to have so much help. Especially the two sisters who were in charge of the food. I can not even begin to say how nice it was to not worry about what we were eating and who was in charge of getting the girls to make it. And not digging through the coolers to find things was also nice. Our ward had these fun shirts just for the leaders. We all really liked the camo theme. I found hats like the pink one in this picture for just $2.50 and so we got them for all the girls. Each level had a different color.

Here's a picture of all 18 girls. We loved all of them and were pleasantly pleased with how well they all got along. Aren't their shirts cute? We were slightly sad that our picture was on the second day of camp, but I think we all still look presentable.

This is me relaxing while the girls are doing latrine duty. This is also a good shot of my fanny pack. This pack was lovingly named "My Mary Poppins bag". This of course due to the fact that almost any conceivable need could be met by my wonderful pack. But onto latrine duty...Our ward has a tradition of having sort of valet service during our latrine duty time. When you come to the latrine you are welcomed by 10 - 15 girls. Someone offers to hold your jacket or personal items, someone else opens the door to the latrine and sprays it down with air freshener, before you enter someone has folded the T-P into a nice triangle, after you come out someone turns on the water for you and gets it to just the right temperature, someone offers you sweet smelling soap, after you wash your hands someone offers you a real towel to dry your hands, after that someone offers you lotion, and finally someone offers you a mint. If by chance there is a line, someone will give you a back massage with a little massage tool. The girls really get into this and it is a lot of fun. Of course there was no question-we won the golden plunger award. See next picture.

Last year we tied with another ward and we won a crown as the Latrine Queens which is really just as good. Because really it is not about winning the award, rather about the fun we all have together serving the others in our camp.
Here is a picture of a group of our girls. Notice their cute Rainbow bags. Someone donated these great tote bags, but they had a rather obnoxious drug logo on the front and back. I decided to try to cover it up and found this great fabric. I thought about going with camo, but it seemed like the Rainbow ward girls needed something rainbowish. A friend helped me to apply this fabric with wonder under. We finished all 18 of them in about 2 hours. I was thrilled with how they turned out. The girls loved them and personalized them with sharpies and ribbon. The bags were great for the girls to haul their camp manual, scriptures, and even water around all week. Yeah, I love it when a plan comes together.

This is me as my life is flashing in front of my eyes. For those of you who don't know, I am extremely afraid of heights. I don't know how they got me to do this. The girls begged me to is one reason. I can only attribute it to a lack of sleep that impaired my judgement. Another factor would have to be one of my best friends running the zip line. She can talk anyone into anything. As I stood on the top of the platform, I admit to questioning my sanity. I was pretty scared, but I did it anyway. Yeah me. I did scream for most of it and kept my eyes closed. I did open them so I could watch my landing and not hit the platform. Unfortunately when I opened my eyes all I could see was a platform that seemed forever away. The bummer part was that because of my timid departure, I had stopped quite a distance from the other platform. This meant that I had to pull myself the rest of the way. The other reason I said I would do it, was because I was assured that it required no physical ability whatsoever. This would have been true if I had made it all the way. Unfortunately my lack of upper body strength was evident to all, most of all myself. Finally after what seemed like forever the priesthood reached out and pulled me back to the safety of the ground. I have to admit that it was pretty fun and so I tried it again. This time I made it further but still had to pull myself a bit.

This is a picture of the lovely makeover I receive at Friday's morning flag ceremony. Don't I look beautiful? I did however win the loudest applause from the audience when they were asked to vote on whose makeover was the best. And the makeup did not come out of my shirt when I washed it, Oh well.

This is me bagged up and ready to go home on Friday night. We had these darn green plastic bags for our trash. They had been stored for a year out in the scout closet and they were fused together. It took something akin to superhuman powers just to get them opened. After wrestling with the darn thing for a while I managed to get it open a little and so I stuck my leg into it to help open it the rest of the way. And once I had one leg in, well I just had to see if all of me could fit. Chalk it up to lots of sleep deprivation.

All in all, it was a great week with lots of fun and little sleep. I am still trying to recover and I have slept for about 10 hours every night. Jared is gone to scout camp this week and so things are a little bit quieter. Maybe I will be able to get my house put back together. Everyone here survived pretty well. Diana lucked out because a friend picked her up at noon last Tuesday and she did not come home until 2:00 pm on Saturday. Marion was pretty busy and she was having so much fun over there, she asked to stay again each night. With Trent at work each day, that just left Jared here to fend for himself.