YW Camp

Well, Meagie and I survived camp. It was fun, but it was alot of work. Now I remember why we don't go camping - well, that and David's whole oxygen thing.

Meagan and I didn't leave home until about 11:30 on Tuesday. I felt really sick Monday night when I was going to pack. I laid on the bed and moaned felt horrible and wondered if I was going to make it to camp. Luckily, after saying lots of prayers, David giving me a blessing and taking some vitaminerals Nox, I felt well enough to go by Tuesday morning. Then I had to pack.

It was a good thing I had Meagan along as a navigator. I didn't get lost even once going up to the campground. That is unusual for me.

The first day was the Stake Day where all the girls in the Stake play games and eat dinner together. Sherry, our Stake Camp Director, really goes all out for camp every year and the rest of us just follow her lead. Our theme this year was B.U.G.S. (building up gospel standards - and enjoy the journey). The games we played were the Bug Olympics. There were 8 different events - the grasshopper jump, dirt and worm eating contest, a bee relay, metamorphosis, fly swatting . . . I can't remember them all.

I helped set that up for a while, then I helped Cindy (the Stake YW Pres) decorate cakes for dinner. Dinner was an "Ant Picnic" so we were trying to make several little ants on each cake, but they looked more like spiders, so we started doing one big ant on each cake. It was not my best work ever, but it was passable, I guess. Several of the YW tried piping ants on the cakes and said, "Wow,this is harder than I thought."

Tuesday night was relatively warm and I didn't freeze while I was sleeping, which was very nice. This year I took a big flannel lined sleeping bag instead of a little nylon one. Sleeping bags are hard to roll over in, even for me, and I'm not that big. I like sleeping in a bed with blankets and sheets much better. I went to bed at about 9:30 pm on Tuesday because I was exhausted.

Wednesday I went with 3 other Stake Leaders to Heber City to get some ice, etc. There was a hail storm in camp while we were gone. Meagan took a photo of the hail stones. Maybe she'll post it.

After that, I mostly sat around wondering what to do with myself until Sherry needed some help setting up the spiritual hike. Me, Sean (the YW 2nd Counselor's husband) and two girls from my ward that got in trouble for pulling a prank went to help set up. The hike was based on Lehi's dream of the Tree of Life, so we built an "iron" rod in the woods that led to the tree of life. We were late getting back for dinner - and I'm the one who did the meal assignments. We were really bad at getting to any of the meals on time.

Wednesday night I stayed up with the Stake and Youth Leaders and ate lots of stuff I shouldn't have (mostly sugar!) and went to bed about 11:30 pm. It was alot colder - my feet never did get warm, but I slept pretty well in spite of it. I had several strange dreams, like David and I driving our car around the inside of the fitness center and something about panhandling and how the laws had changed. It looked more like NYC than my city.

Thursday after breakfast, I packed up all my camping gear so I would be ready to go home after the spiritual hike and not have to pack in the dark. After that, it was mostly finishing setting up the spiritual hike. At one point I almost felt like I had heat stroke. That, and I really regretted the 2 pieces of bacon I had for breakfast. It tasted good, but I didn't feel so good. Maybe I'm supposed to go kosher? After sitting in the shade for a while and drinking some propel water, I felt better.

We got finished just in time to go back and eat dinner with our wards. Our ward had pulled pork (yay, more non-kosher food!), funeral potatoes, green beans and dutch oven cobbler. Technically the only thing I could really eat was the green beans, but I ate some of the other stuff anyway. It tasted good.

I walked over to East Camp, where the spiritual hike was, by myself. I somehow got to be in charge of running the ipod at the end of the hike by the "tree of life." It was a song Sherry found about Lehi's dream, which was fitting, but the song was really long - almost 5 minutes. Between that and technical difficulties with the ipod, alot of groups got backed up and had to wait for a while. The "fruit" on the tree of life was little temples made out of clear beads. Several of the leaders (not me) spent hours making them by hand. The tree looked pretty cool with little bead temples and white flowers and clear Christmas lights on it. Until the converter box connected to Sherry's van started sparking and burst in to flame. Luckily Sherry was standing there at the moment, so she got it stopped, but that was the end of the lights and music. There was only 1 1/2 wards left, so we almost made it. I think it turned out okay in spite of it all.

After that, I went back to camp and headed home. It was already 9:30, so it was dark. I only made 2 small wrong turns and made it home by 11:00. Driving down Parley's Canyon at night reminded me of playing Mario Karts - Bowser's Castle specifically. I kept expecting a stone column to stomp me. At least there were no flames. I was thinking - Meagan would be good at this - she's better than me at Mario Karts.

I was glad to get home and see my family. The house was still messy, but what was I expecting, really? At least everyone was ok. I didn't go to bed until about 1:00 am because I stayed up talking to David.

Yesterday morning I got to go back to work and it was very busy, thanks to me taking Wednesday off. I'm tired today and haven't done much. Thor is a little happier today because we let him come upstairs. He still wants to go outside, but that's not going to happen for a while.