Scout Camp

Steve got to go to Scout Camp with our ward's scout troop this year. Double whammy considering we just went on Trek a few weeks ago!! He really enjoyed himself and they camped in a beautiful area. He said it was up above Yellowstone, so it was in the 70s-ish the whole week. Well, that's nice, while I was roasting in our 90 degree weather. 

Steve's lovely view from the campground

Inspections

The troop needed to do a service project while they were there. They decided to improve the camp's axe yard. Here is the before:

They made a nice little kindling pile-area, and put up the poles and strings for drying lines, and left a little door to enter. It was a major improvement. Here is the after:

Well, even though I had to sleep alone all week (which is rough!!) I'm glad he went. He had quite a few of these lovely pictures to show me. I love clouds. Looking at the wonders of our world really reminds me of what our Father in Heaven has given us to enjoy.

Take a moment today to count your blessings. :)

Trekkies - picture overload

And I'm not talking about Star Trek. I'm talking about our amazing family that we got to have the Trek experience with. We called ourselves the Trekkies and our motto was Trek Long and Prosper.

For now, I am going to just give you a picture overload. I will do a separate post about my experience. It was something I will never forget.

Here are the kids just getting started pulling our cart. (You can tell it just started because they still have such big smiles.)

The first night we had a dance. Here are some pictures of a few kids from our ward, and Steve doing some dancing.

We had been sunscreening all day long, and at the end of the day I thought I had still gotten a burn. But then I was washing my arms and legs with baby wipes, and realized I just had a really sweet dust tan.

One of our kids found a cool caterpillar. And it had the design of a penguin on it. Funky!

Sweet sunset from our camp.

Here is the start of our third day. They were sincerely the best ever.

 We had guides on horses the whole time we trekked.

This area was almost like a preserve - they just let nature take its course here as much as possible. So there were bones/carcasses along parts of our trail.

Walking and walking and walking some more.

Ooooh mornings. We will never be friends. (Believe it or not, I was smiling in this picture.)

We look pretty good for the third day.

Look at those girlies kicking butt pulling that cart!

There was a lot of going up and down hills. It got a little crazy at times, but we did it. It really made you appreciate the experiences the pioneers had.

And we're done. (That's the only reason I'm smiling.) Just waiting for the closing devotional and then to go home.

We hiked three separate days. After the 2nd day, the soles fell off of my shoes. These were the only tennis shoes I brought, so I had to be resourceful for the 3rd day of hiking. (Also, like my leg dust tan?)

All our handcarts lined up. Can you tell how tired we all were??

Driving home. A few of the boys from our ward zonked after about 15 minutes of driving. I won't lie, so did I.

3 Days

For Trek we have had different challenges every month for our spiritual and physical preparation. For May we were supposed to have "3 Days of Sacrifice." We were asked to give up something that we really liked for 3 days. Some examples they gave were Facebook, sugar, texting, etc. I was thinking about Facebook, but I'm not super addicted to it -- there have been times when I went three days without getting on Facebook and didn't think anything about it.

I decided I would not watch any TV or movies for 3 days, and Steve decided to do the same. When I tell people that they look at me weird like, "that's really a sacrifice? I barely even watch TV." I know -- well, Steve and I watch it a lot. It's sad. But I'm not in school and we don't have kids, so many of our evenings are spent watching TV shows, movies, or Netflix together. I look at it as some quality time together, so I don't see it as bad or anything. We are doing something we like together. We also usually have a movie on when doing other things, like puzzles, playing games, homework, cleaning, etc. The TV is on a lot in our house.

I was going to "cheat" and do this 3 Day Sacrifice during the week so we could just be at work and not have to think about it. Then I decided that would not be a true sacrifice since we wouldn't be at home with it tempting us. Or something like that ... it made sense to me. We started it Friday morning and did not watch TV or movies until Monday.

Steve was joking on Friday night and asked me, "But when we get home from church on Sunday, what are we supposed to do all afternoon??" I answered, "I guess we'll have to rough it, just like the pioneers!!" I also feel kind of silly when talking about how this 3 Day Sacrifice is supposed to show us how it felt for the pioneers when giving up something they loved or needed to journey across the country. We all know that 3 days are a tiny speck compared to what the pioneers had to actually give up for their beliefs.

Despite how silly it felt sometimes to think how small that time period was, and how silly it is to give up TV, I learned some things. They weren't really tangible lessons that I could list, but I felt the spirit because I was doing something to prepare me for Trek. We spent more time talking, we learned a new card game, we put puzzles together, we actually cleaned the entiiiiire kitchen, and got other home things finished. See the things we accomplish when we turn off the TV??


We might even try electronic-free weekends every once in a while. Even though we still had our phones available and we played video games, we still interacted more and it felt like we spent more time together. It was a great time to re-focus and think about Trek and what type of things I have learned that I can share with my family when we are there. Even though I'm still not excited to go camping and not shower, I am glad I'll have this experience. I know it will be good.

Trek is in a month. Holy crud!!

Arkansas, Arkansas, I just love ole Arkansas

HELLO! I have not, in fact, fallen off the face of the earth.
Ok, so here's my life in Arkansas. It was boring when I was home alone because I didn't have anywhere to go or any friends to see.
So mom did go to some really cool places!
Here, we went to a large cat refuge. It was really cool to be so close to lions and tigers! And other animals too!


Just chillin out, yo!!


And of course, they had a guard duck to keep all the tigers safe! What else to be scary in the front of the refuge?!


Then we went to girls camp with the girls in my mom's ward. Here's a picture of all of us! We had lots of fun...


Ever since I figured out the whole french braiding hair game, I have loved braiding people's hair! And once they found out I could do it, pretty much half the girls asked me to do their hair. And like, all but 2 of the girls were having me braid their hair by the end of the week. But I love doing it, so it was ok!!!


Clearly...I love camping... No really. I do.
And we have a river to swim in. Only a tiny bit nasty!!!

And sorry it's sideways. It wasn't when I saved it on the computer. Lame. But this was one of the girls. Her name is courtney. And she didn't want to take a shower in the bathrooms at the camp, so she shampooed and conditioned in the river. Then showed us her cute new hair do!


Awe, that's cute... My legs are glowing.
Yes. We all slept in tents.

Then this one time, mom was showing me these cows that are having tests done of them. It was weird. But here was a picture. So apparently, they put like, some....stuff in those circle things. And then I guess they see what happens to the cows.
Kinda sad. But since I knew all the technical terms, I thought I'd tell ya about it!

So that was part of my summer in Arkansas. :) It was a grand ole time!