June started off with us celebrating Brigham's birthday - a whopping 7 years old! In human years, I guess that's akin to 49. So he's now the oldest in our family. We are sure grateful he is a part of our family - scaredy cat-ish and all! He's a sweetie and a great running partner. He's just the best.
We had a fun rock-climbing activity for YW. We are doing the Via Ferrata as part of our YW camp in July. In order to not have to pay a guide hundreds of dollars, everyone needs to have outdoor climbing experience. So we provided an activity to give the girls this experience. The girls all rocked (pun intended) it.
I think all these pictures are of Emmy. I can't find my ones of Lucy . . .
Next up for June was Trek for our three oldest. It was supposed to have happened last year (or 2020, I can't remember) but due to the pandemic, of course it didn't. So this year the plan was for the kids from our stake to go up to the Wyoming sites and trek around there. Well . . . 6 days before this group of around 200 were to go, the bus whom the church had chartered our transportation through, backed out due to "liability issues" or something or other. 6 days before! Well, miracle of miracle, someone in our stake knew of a group of stakes southwest of us who were gathering for their own Trek - on the same exact dates as ours. Calls were made and that night our stake was allowed to join this 4-stake Trek event! Usually there are 5 stakes that do this together, but one stake group had decided to do something different. So we were able to slip right in - amazing. It still came with its logistical challenges, but that was mainly for the adults. It was about 2 hours from here and so our ward's elderly rose to the occasion and transported our youth there and back.
Here they are - all clean and adorable. :)
Emmy's extra-adorable and so she gets a few-extra pictures. :) Her bonnet was made and worn by Aunt-e - so cute!
Ha, this is at the beginning.
And this is at the middle/close to the top.
Random picture . . . but we went out to Crash Burger Friday night and Lucy got some lovely flowers stuck in her hair as we walked down there. Our good friends and neighbors, Molly and Alex Shockley, joined us for dinner. Fun.
My old friend from our Grand Junction days, Raedene - in the middle, found my daughter (whom she had never met) and grabbed this picture. Look how adorable and filthy Emmy was! The older lady is Barb Watson - she was one of our ward's amazing drivers. She's one of the best humans ever. Raedene's mom is like best-friends with Barb. So it was funny how they all connected.
Yep, just a little dirty . . .
Dirty, yep. But she wasn't as dirty as she'd been because she had used about 20 wipes by this point. :)
I worked the whole week the kids were gone, as did Ben. Lucy managed to hang out with a lot of her friends and had a good time and didn't miss her siblings too much. :) Lucy got to mow a couple of Emmy's lawns and earned some extra dough. Lucky her.
Ben and I "had" to go on a hike early Saturday morning - I was checking it out for YW camp. I have done it several times, but never with thinking about taking a group of YW . . . So we had a great morning hiking up Courthouse. It's hard. It's going to be a challenge for most of these young women. But they can do it.
Pictures are out of order, but this is at the top.
Saturday came and the trekkies finally got back home - way dirtier than when they had left! :)
They're baaaaack! Dirty but happy!
Jonas had an okay time. I think he had a better time than he let on to us . . . :) He was part of Emmy's company (about 10 youth made a family and about 12 families made a company). Emmy said she saw him smiling and having fun. He did complain, which was 100% backed by Emmy, how this one boy from our stake just constantly was rude to him. Kids. They can sometimes be the worst. I just wish kids would just stop saying and/or doing mean things to one another. This rude boy had no idea that his parents and grandparents were praying, fasting, etc. that Jonas would have a positive experience. And who knows, but this kid and his constant rudeness, could have ruined that opportunity for Jonas. I get it - kids are kids and just don't understand and don't mean the big effects that sometimes they cause. And I get that my kids have probably been on the rude side of the fence, too, at times. But I am so over it. Anyways, Jonas did get the "Hardest Worker Award" in his family group. His "ma" stated on facebook, "Jonas was a rock star! What a great kid and hard worker! It was great getting to know him!" So at least he wasn't horrible. :) He stood up for Emmy when needed to. But also went back to napping when awoken and told that his sister was in the medical tent due to heat exhaustion - "sounds like a girl thing." And he went back to sleeping. I am sure the lady who spoke to him was impressed, haha.
Emmy LOVED trek so much! She had such a great experience and just talked to me for a good 1 1/2 hours straight about it all. She truly just had a great time and loved it all - the hard rocky mountain they had to push their cart up at 11:00pm that first night. Arriving at camp at midnight - eating dinner that late. She was part of the only company that got to participate in the Women's Pull and she loved that experience. A funny story: while she liked the boys in her group, they were kind of on the "wimpy" side. So she felt that the women's pull was easier without her "brothers!" Ha. But she appreciated the boys all lined up, hats over their hearts, at the top of the hill. She said that climb was difficult - up and up a bunch of switchbacks with no relief. But it was getting too hot and so the medical staff decided to not have a women's pull for the rest of the companies and that all were to help - men, boys, etc. She loved her "memaw" and "pepaw" and her family - especially her "sisters." She loved all the activities they did, etc. She just had a great time! Yay.
As we expected, Miles had a great time too. He was so glad they went to this area and had more physical challenges - as opposed to what Wyoming would have offered. He enjoyed his family and his "parents" and all the different activities they did. Miles is pretty easy to please and easy to enjoy things and so we knew he'd have a great time. There was a bit of drama with this mean girl and Emmy. This mean girl just can't stop bullying Emmy and it's getting really old. Anyways, something happened - which led to tears by Emmy. Which led to this mean girl "apologizing" to Emmy - but it was also done in a mean fashion . . . So Miles couldn't stand it any more and went over and told this girl to leave Emmy and our family alone. Go Miles! (It gets a bit complicated as I am this girl's YW president . . . ) I was proud of him for standing up for his sister. Emmy told me she collapsed into Miles and gave him a great big hug. :)
Many kids spoke in church today - maybe about 10-12? Most of them spoke about that challenging "hill" they had to climb that first night. It wasn't a hill, but more of a mountain. A steep mountain that the kids had to push their carts up - most of them in the darkness of the night and without having dinner yet. Many of the first company's youth assisted the later ones that came. It sounded like quite the challenging feat for sure. Emmy thought the woman's pull the next day was even harder. They were pushing these handcarts up this steep, never flattening trail, in the heat of the day. The kids all loved the other activities and just playing games and hanging out with their "family" and friends there. Each of our kids thought their parents were "awesome" and shared some of the stories that their parents shared and taught them. I am so glad they went and had this experience.
The stake YW president, Kandace Booth, sent me a few photos of Jonas. Jonas was in a family with her son. Once more are posted from the whole Trek, I will probably post a bunch. Just these for now:
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