A day with tage

I finally talked tage into doing his back to school shopping. :) Needless to say this is not his favorite thing, but, he does like to hang out with me. :) He is leaving for the next two weeks, clear creek for a week and then yellowstone with kaleb for a week, so I told him we had to go before he left. 

Needless to say, he is MUCH easier to shop with then aliah. We went to the mall, went to a few stores, he knew exactly what he wanted, we got it, and then had lunch at the food court (him: arbys, me: chickfila). It was a very successful date with my son. :)

This handsome boy is going into 6th grade. I can't believe it. He is almost a teenager, I can see the signs. I am not really ready for  TWO teenagers in my house. He is such a good kid and I am so glad he  gets to be my only son.

Motherhood

Here is what its like being a mother:

taking my heart out of my chest and letting it be vulnerable to whatever wants to hurt it.

You hurt my child, you might as well just put a knife in my heart.

I see my child cry because of you, because of something you said or did,

you might as well just rip my heart to shreds. 

Being a mother: there is no putting a cage around your heart to protect it.

There is no protecting it. I try my hardest to protect my children, from your ugliness and hate,

but there is nothing out there to protect my heart. 

You hurt my child, you hurt me 100 times more. 

I hate the ugliness that people bring into this world, and throw it at my children.

How dare you. 

I hold my child crying in my arms, telling them that the world isn't that bad of a place,

when the proof that it really does suck is beating right in my chest.

I thought my heart suffered a lot when I was a teenager.

That is nothing compared to what it suffers on behalf of my children.

But go ahead and hurt my heart as much as you want, but don't you dare try to hurt my child.

Then you will see ugly momma bear like you have never seen before.

Don't mess with mama.

Yes, this post is dramatic and stupid.

Are you a mother??

If not, just you wait.

If you are, you know exactly what I am talking about.

Lake Powell

I got home from girls camp on friday, and monday morning we left to lake powell. It was a quick turn around for me, I could have used a few more nights sleeping in my bed. :) We went with kalebs family, we were so excited this year that kalebs parents got a time share on a houseboat. It was a great week. It wasn't too hot, we found the PERFECT camping spot for the houseboat, we were in shade ALL DAY! It was wonderful. We boated, and ate, and played lots and lots of card games, and swam and ate some more. It was pretty relaxing for me. My kids had a great time and it was just a great week.

 Getting ready to jump.

 This is my favorite picture, you can't see it too well,  but all three of my kids are jumping at the same time. What brave kids I have!!

 Lots of time  spent playing in the sand and on the beach.

 This is the one picture I took of me, by myself, relaxing on the boat. :)

 They hiked through the crack, it was pretty hard and aliah was pretty freaked out but they did it!

 celine attempting to water ski, couldn't get up.

 Tage is a super sweet knee boarder!

 So is celine.

 yes, I got up on the wakeboard, but staying up, nope, not so much. :)

 The kids had so much fun finding frogs and lizards and playing with them all week.

Thanks quinn and kris for a great week!!!

Heber Valley Girls camp

Girls camp was just amazing this year. We had ward camp and had FINALLY gotten into Heber Valley Camp, we were are super excited. Getting ready for girls camp this year was super stressful, everything in my life seemed to hit at once and I was scrambling to get everything ready on time. Needless to say I was looking forward to a week off of my life. I love girls camp, I mean REALLY LOVE girls camp. :) I think it is an amazing experience for all young woman and I feel so blessed that I get to be a leader now up at girls camp. I honestly want this calling for life. I love working with the Young Woman, they are all so incredibly awesome and I just love them all.

July 9th, here me and celine are at 730 in the morning getting ready to head up to heber valley. Yes, I know how exhausted I look. :) We got up to camp and it was amazing!! We had cabins with bunk beds, electricity and plugs!! A cooking station with a sink, hot showers, flushing toilets. It was without a doubt the nicest girls camp I have ever seen. Happy me. What I loved about our girls camp, is that is was very relaxing. there was no running from one thing to the next or stressing out that this wasn't getting done or that. If we took too long doing one thing we could just push back the next thing, no big deal. The food was great, it was nice getting fed three times a day and I didn't have to do anything! Well, ok, I did help out some, but it was still great.  We did some fun crafts and had really great devotionals. We did a confidence course that was really fun. The hardest thing for me was  that you had to climb up a swinging log and then walk across a rope to get to the zip line and go down. going up and down was fine, it was going across that rope that really freaked me out!! I wish I had a picture. but, I am a girl that can do hard things. :)

 It was so fun every  night to just hang out in our cabins and talk and laugh with the girls. When I got tired, I would go to sleep, lucky me I can sleep through most anything. :) We had lots of fun making bracelets and putting "jedi braids" or whatever they are called in each others hair.

 It is my tradition at girls camp to get a picture of me and celine together every day. I  know she hates it, but I treasure it. I love being at girls camp with her, I think it is such a blessing and I hope she doesn't mind that I am there. I just love this girl so much, and we always have so much fun together.

 My cozy cozy bed.

 Love all these girls.

 Here celine is leaving for her 4th year overnighter backpacking hike. They hiked about 8 miles.

 getting ready for bed.

 bailey gave me my own "jedi braid." love it.

 We did the most amazing service project. It was a really great experience. All week at girls camp we talked to the girls about being patriotic and really taught them about flag ceremonies, they did the most amazing flag ceremonies. We talked to them about some fallen soldiers and who they were and brought them to life. For our service project each girl made a frame that we will be giving to the family of fallen soldiers. They were so reverent during the whole project. We just played some patriotic music and the girls didn't talk or giggle or laugh and they were awesome. It was a super neat experience for all of us.

 I couldn't survive the week without my best friend, Diet dr pepper and his friend, Dr Pepper 10. The one a day I brought were soooooooo good.

Testimony of course was just amazing. It was so great to hear about what strengthened each girls testimonies and the friendships they had made and the great experiences they had at girls camp. I know that girls camp can change lives for the better. It did for me as a teenager. Girls camp are some of my best memories of my teenage years. I am so blessed to be in this ward with these young woman and working with so many amazing woman. It was a great week, so relaxing which I greatly needed. Hope I am still around for girls camp next year.

My Grandma Cleos funeral....

On July 1rst, my moms mom, my grandma cleo, passed away from this life to the next. She was my last living grandparent. It is weird that they are all gone from this life. She has had dementia for the last 5 or 6 years. I hadn't visited her in about 2 because she no longer could remember who we were, and it confused and upset her. She always remembered my mom, she knew she knew her somehow, but didn't always know she was her daughter. So, it was with sadness but also joy that I found that she had passed. My grandpa passed away the day before fathers day when I was 10 years old. My grandma has been without him for a long time, and my greatest comfort was thinking of them joined back together. Her funeral was up in Brigham City, where my mom grew up and where my grandma lived until she went into a nursing home.  It was a beautiful funeral, and my heart was full of the promise that Families are Forever. No better words than these.

 Here is my mom and dad with all 16 grandchildren. What a rare thing for our WHOLE family to be together, so this was a happy day for us to be all together. The only person missing was my brother in law Matt, who was still home in California. I am sure my grandma was happy to see us all together.

The gillmans

 The Combes (without matt!)

The Footes

 The McEvoys

 The Giebels

 The Afualos

 The Griffin Girls

 My angels.

Families can be together Forever. I know this with all my heart. And I know that I will see my grandma cleo, and all my other grandparents, again someday.