Girls Camp 2014

This year was Stake Girls Camp. Our last Stake Camp with the Saratoga South Stake and our first year as our new Stake Israel Canyon Stake. We went up to Heber Valley Girls Camp. This is Katie’s 3rd year and Madison’s 1st year. The girls left early Monday morning. They got settled and listened to several speakers on Monday and Tuesday. Their favorite was John Bytheway, he spoke on Tuesday. On Wednesday morning I headed up along with our Camp Director Lesley Daley and two YW leaders Jill Revell and Crystal Averett. When we got there Katie and Madison came running to me and hugged me tighter than I believe they ever have. It felt great to be missed so much. I had been informed earlier that Katie had thrown up on Monday and still felt ill on Tuesday night but I assumed she was just homesick. She did receive a Priesthood blessing on Tuesday night from Bother Sete Aulai and she said she slept better that night but was still queasy. On Wednesday night she slept with me so I didn’t get much sleep. When we came home we found out She actually had Altitude sickness. I'm afraid Heber Valley Girls Camp may always be hard on her . Guess what aggravates altitude sickness exerting yourself and eating salty or sweet foods. LOL. Girls Camp isn't the place to experience Altitude Sickness I guess, everything we do there makes it worse. Oh and Altitude sickness only shows it's symptoms at night and causes nausea, headaches, difficult sleeping and breathing.

On Wednesday we listened to 2 speakers as well. The 1st we didn’t really love but the 2nd was our new Stake President, President Willden and his counselors President Hilton and President Johnson. His talk was wonderful and at the end his daughter opened her mission call in front of us all it was a very touching and wonderful experience. Earlier on Wednesday we went on our hike and went down to the lake. We were able to be on the lake in canoes for an hour. It was a lot of fun to do with my 2 girls. Then we hiked back to camp. Sister Daley and I got coerced into taking the road back to camp instead of the trail and once we made it back we were very sad that we let those girls push us to go that way. We both thought we would die, lesson learned! WE did see a lot of beautiful deer at camp and even thought we saw a bear until we realized it was plastic. LOL

Wednesday night we had our Ward Testimony meeting which was one of the best I have ever been to. Katie and I both bore our testimonies and I mentioned a long time ago when I went to camp while pregnant with Madison and left Katie at Grandmas. I cried most of camp that year so I told the girls how excited and blessed I felt to be at camp with them. Then we had an exchange student who 5 days prior had never heard of God or a Father in Heaven. She had been learning a lot from our daily hour of study time and has been asking a lot of questions. She stood and said that she didn’t know God but she was going to Pray and find out who he was for sure. It was very powerful and I’m so glad me and my girls were there there for that experience, what a blessing.

Thursday was our last day since Friday was the 4th of July. We had breakfast then went to the Challenge Course. The girls all did well and had fun. Then we packed, cleaned up camp and the cabins then had dinner and headed home. We were all exhausted and happy to be clean and at home later that night.

Overall Camp was Fantastic and we just found out that our Ward is splitting so this was our last chance to do camp with this great bunch of girls and leaders. What a fantastic ward Summerhill Ward has been and I’m so sad to see it change but all in all it is a good thing. We love all the amazing leaders and are so thankful to them for all their hard work.