4th of July

I've been a slacker. Oops. I have a trip I need to blog about, but I figured I would go ahead and knock out the 4th first. Here goes. Since the 4th was on a Sunday this year, we had a Mormon 4th of July on Saturday so that we could all spend the day with our families on Sunday. We headed over to the Smith's house along with the Shields and another couple from our ward. We had a traditional barbecue and played games and eventually watched some fireworks. We all had a great time and enjoyed each others company as we celebrated our country and the great freedom that we have. Here are some pictures :)

Some of the older girls, getting ready to eat and looking at pictures

The moms and the women

The dads and men

One of the things we did was draw chalk drawings with the little guys. Andrew and I are pretty talented, I must say. I'm thinking professional art status?

We also played some toothpick/lifesaver game. Pretty cute.

All the kids. Gray was absent, as he had to work.

Sun going down so we can do FiReWoRkS!

KABOOM!

So that was Saturday, the 3rd. Then on the 4th, we headed down to Virginia Beach to see my Grandma and my Aunt Sheri. We just had a good time as family, ate some food, and swam in my Aunt's pool. Fun!

Grandpa feeding the dogs, his best friends

Aunt Sheri and Bryce, best buds

Ryan playing on the swing

Grilling Kabobs! YUM!

Mom

I love all the water behind him!

Brother and Sister looking good by the poolside. P.S. check out my awesome hair.

Isn't he just the cutest?

Another cool picture.

Happy Fourth!

Girl's Camp 2010

This year I was a fourth year youth camp leader (YCL) and so I went on the 4th year adventure activity. I had a blast, especially with another young women from my ward. The first day we drove up to Shenandoah National Park and set up camp. Anna and I shared a tent and choose a sweet spot to set up. We had our tent in the shade, a hammock right next to it, and a clothes line by the tent. Plus camp chairs and buckets to sit upon and relax. Following setting up camp we went on a 4 mile hike (no pictures, sadly). It was a gorgeous view of the mountains and the waterfalls, however. The hike began relatively easy, but by the end all of us were pretty tired from climbing over rocks uphill. That delicious looking Ramen noodles you see in the above photo collage was cooked by me using some pretty awesome soda can camp stoves. Anna and I quickly fell asleep that night.


The second day (Tuesday) was pretty great as well. Anna and I woke up at 6 and took a shower. It cost $1 for five minutes, so we were speedy! After showering we went back to camp and relaxed in the hammock for a while before cooking breakfast. Using my handy dandy stove, I whipped up two chocolate chip pancakes! YUM. Plus somebody else had left over sausage, so I hopped right on that opportunity and ate that too. Good start to the day! Next we completed another hike in the mountains. We hiked to Rapidan Cabin, which President Hoover and his wife, Lu Henry, built as a retreat and a place to spend the summers. Apparently, Lu Henry believed in the calmness and peace of the outdoors, and spent a lot of time hosting people in the log cabins. It was pretty fun to see all that. After the hike, we went back to camp and relaxed for a couple of hours. We endured a pretty short thunderstorm as we sat in our cars. I roasted a hot dog for dinner and ate some beans with it. Yum, kind of. Then Anna and I ate Smoreos with Sister Mair, Megan, and Aimee. For those of you that are unaware, a smoreo is a roasted marshmallow in between an Oreo cookie. It was pretty good. Last thing: Anna and I went to brush our teeth, and in the way back to our tent Anna saw something. I didn't see anything. We continued to our tent. When we arrived in a couple of steps, we shined our flashlight and saw a skunk. That's right folks a SKUNK. Right in front of OUR tent. Crap. It finally went away and nobody got sprayed. We slept like babies that night.


For some reason, the only pictures I took on Wednesday were while we were tubing. Wednesday we ended the adventure activity with a tubing trip down the Rappahannock River. We had a really good time. However, while we were tubing a lot of us got sunburn on the top of our legs. Sexy, I must say. Talk about one hot tan, especially since we had on shorts! Anyways, tubing is not the only thing we did, despite what the collage shows. We drove in to Prince William Forest and met up with the other girls at camp. We had a spaghetti dinner and then went to a big field for some activity. The girls learned about putting on the whole armor of God in order to protect ourselves from the temptations in this world and to remain worthy and safe as we obey God's commandments. It was a really good activity, and the leaders did awesome. Also, all the bishops came up and spent some time with each ward.


Thursday was so. much. fun. I helped in the kitchen almost all day, because we really didn't do much as a YCL. We had cereal for breakfast, and after that we had a YCL meeting. Then we did certification with our levels for 2 hours. 4th years finished early, so I headed back to the kitchen. Things got crazy. We made lunch and created a skit. After lunch I went to the craft cabin and made some bracelets and a cute little frame. It was fun. Then I headed back to the kitchen for dinner and we went nuts. We did our hair so very lovely. We used water bottles to make our hair so tall! That night mom left camp, and so I took her place in the kitchen. I slept in the kitchen cabin instead of my YCL cabin. Sister Caldwell, Sister Wolf, Kristen, and I had a party with cake and pie. Yum. Since mom wasn't there, we placed a mop in her spot. By the end of the day, I was tired.


Friday was much like Thursday. Meetings in the morning, certification, free time, kitchen help, etc. In the morning I got up early with the kitchen crew and we cooked pancakes and bacon and eggs. Yummy breakfast. Later in the day all of us in the kitchen decided to go canoeing. It was a lot of fun. Kristen and I raced the old ladies. Turns out the old ladies are fast. P.S. the paper plate with bugs on it is a list of all the bugs that came into the kitchen. We would kill them with a fly swatter and pinned them up as a warning for others! Friday night we had the evening program, which was very spiritual and great for all the girls. The theme for this year is Joshua 1:9:

Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good
courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for
the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest.

The music program was based around that scripture. Lots of songs and narration all written by Jenny Phillips. It was wonderful. It set the mood for the testimony meeting that followed around the campfire. The night ended very spiritually, very wonderfully. P.S. I love the theme for this year.

The last day we mostly just cleaned up and left camp. However, we did have breakfast there, which consisted of everything we had left over from the previous days. Also a large bucket of candy was put out for breakfast. As a tradition, after girls camp the Wolfs and Kemmeys always go to Wendy's and get some food and a frosty. Yum. On the way home, I slept as mom drove in 2 hours of traffic.

Diane Gray

My mom's mother recently went to the doctor and got word that cancer has come back in her body. She has battled cancer before. Monthly she attends numerous doctor appointments and treatments and what not. She's pretty tough.

So cancer is back, but she is doing well despite everything. We aren't really sure what is going to happen. There are lots of doctor appointments coming up in the future, but for now we are all just having a good time. We'll know more by the 13th of this month, when she goes in to get results from recent tests.

The other Sunday mom took us and Grandma to take some pictures while she was visiting.

A's Pay

Education has always been something my parents have really pushed in all of our lives. They expect the best out of us. My dad is crazy smart, and his good genes and parenting have affected all of his kids. All of us usually get straight A's on our report cards. My mom recently discovered that for every A you get on a report card, Krispy Kreme doughnuts gives you a free doughnut. Yum. Of course, we had to go.

All of us kids got our doughnuts, totaling 26 free doughnuts for 5 kids (The maximum is 6 doughnuts per kid, and you only get them for your Math, English, History, and Science classes). Ryan had a good time, even though he didn't have a report card.

Rachel and Ryan chowing down.

My doughnuts. I only got four, because I only have four core classes (but I did get all A's)!

Kiddos (minus Gray and Harrison) with our doughnuts.

What a delicious start to the summer!

Graduate

My Aunt Rose came from Colorado for his graduation. The one he didn't even attend.

Mom, Gray, and Rose.

This is late. Better late than never.

Gray was a senior this year. He graduated with distinguished honors and a 4.3 GPA. Pretty radical. He was definitely in the top of his class. However, he had absolutely no desire to march at graduation.

So he didn't. He didn't want any part of the 3 hour rehearsal, or the hot, sweaty gym where graduation is held, or the crowds of people trying to take pictures, or the lame graduation speeches. So he did not go.

It angered a few family members, and lots of people questioned his decision. But in the end, my mom didn't care, so long as he borrowed his best friends cap and gown to take a picture.

Excitement

In a few hours, I am leaving for Girl's Camp, an annual camp for 12-18 year old girls that is a part of the Young Women's Program of my church. It is awesome. One of the best weeks of the summer I have.

This year I am going to be a 4th year Youth Camp Leader. I am pretty excited. I get to go on the 4th year adventure activity, which is a separate camp and hiking trip (and tubing!). Then on Wednesday we are meeting up with all of the other girls at camp and finishing there.

So I will be taking a leave of absence :) But no worries, there are a few scheduled posts to enjoy that I figured I could catch up on. I am off to enjoy nasty bathrooms, gross cabins, sweat, stink, bugs, and so much FUN!! It is seriously a good thing I LOVE camping.

Basically Tradition

A couple years ago, I stayed home from school on the last day and randomly decided to attack all my siblings with water balloons as they walked home from school. Ever since, I do it every year. Surprisingly, they didn't even see it coming this year. They were soaked. The teams ended up being Me, Suzanne, Ryan, and Sabrina (Suzanne's friend) against Gray, Derek (Gray's friend), Harrison, Tanner, and Bryce. Rachel didn't play. What a wimp.

The family (plus two others) after the water fight.

Ryan "helped" me fill all of the balloons while the kids were at school.

100 water balloons--ready to be thrown!

Needless to say, we are all so glad it is summer here. No more school....for 2 months.

Suzanne's Formal

On the last day of school (a week ago), Suzanne finished up with middle school, and is headed to high school (and governor's school!) in the fall! To celebrate the end of the year and have a good memory, her middle school puts on an eighth grade formal dance. Of course, she went and had a GREAT time!

Suzanne all dressed up

Suzanne and her good friend, Kayla!

Suzanne's group of friends!

All the boys in the group

All the girls.

Some boy gave her a flower...

...this boy. He has some curly hair!

And everyone in the group rode this fancy trolley to the middle school for the dance! What a great memory.

How to Do Laundry 101

Step 1: Wait until your laundry is all over your house and the hampers are overflowing. By the time you collect it all from around the house, it should cover almost your entire kitchen floor.

Step 2: Separate the huge laundry mess into piles. They shouldn't be small, rather they should be overflowing and consume your kitchen space. You need to wait until you have no clean towels left, and the pile of towels turns out like this.

Step 3: Choose a color to put in the wash machine first. However, you will have to do multiple loads of one specific color, or else you will ruin your wash machine.

Step 4: Keep all your laundry nice and neat in the kitchen. Work on it until it is all washed, dried, folded, and put away! However, if you are really good, you will want to run out of fabric softener. That way, the laundry can sit for another whole day (at least) in the kitchen before you can finish.

Poor Dad

My Dad is earning his Master's degree thr0ugh the Naval Post Graduate School. It is a lot of work and consumes a lot of his time. For example, last night he was working with his group to finish a major project that was due today. Turns out he never went to sleep. After he finished the project, he had to present it. He had about an hour and a half from the time he finished until the time he had to present, and so he wanted some sleep. My dad is an extremely hard sleeper normally, so imagine how hard he would be sleeping when he's extremely sleep deprived. He decided to sleep in his office chair a little bit instead of his bed so he could make sure he would be up and awake to present. Poor dad. Now he is sleeping, and probably will be until tomorrow morning.

Ouch

Tonight everyone was outside talking to one of our neighbors. As we all piled back into the house, Suzanne managed to slip on the stairs and bang up her leg. It wasn't anything dramatic or crazy, just a simple fall. However, she managed to get a nice little cut from it. It might not look very deep, but it was. I promise you. What a trooper. She didn't even cry at all. Even when Dad was poking her like she was some kind of science experiment.

Beautiful, huh?

Ryan checking out the situation, asking Suzanne if Dad was tickling her.

Dad poking around making sure there was nothing stuck in her like a rock. It barely bled at all, so he wanted to make sure.

Medication.

But hey, it'll be better before she's married.

Finally

I have been so anticipating tomorrow for a long time. Tomorrow is my LAST day of junior year. The only thing that could make tomorrow better is if it were the last day of my senior year. I am so ready for summer.