It took me a while to make this post about girls camp but,

I finally did it.
From July 15th to the 19th

I went with my Young Women to girls camp.
This year it was on a ward level.

So, I was able to pick where we went.
I have always loved South Fork Canyon so that's where we went.
We where able to get inner tubes and go down the river
(RIVER SALUTE! To those who know what it is.),
take a nice nature walk,
go on a spiritual hike,
do a spiritual scavenger hunt,
play "Faith Factor",
make up pass along stories,
play several rounds of telephone,
and of course just be girls!
We had so much fun!
I think everyone that went was able to feel the spirit,
grow closer to each other, and our Heavenly Father.
I just want to "Spread the Love"!

We have the BEST girls and leaders in the world!

I will have a lot of crazy and fun things to look back on when I am old!

Thanks!
To those who weren't able to go, "Look on the bright side...there's the Big Dipper!"

THANK YOU!

I wanted to take a second to thank Chris and Jaime for inviting us to go camping...

The area was beautiful,

the company was enlightening,

and the food was to die for!!
That was the first time we've been camping with all of our kids.

You guys helped make it so fun

and best of all we made a lot of good memories!
Thanks for being such good friends!
P.S. I haven't heard Justin talk so much!

Camping with The Taggarts

The Tooth Fairy...

On Sunday Blake finally got it in his head that his front wiggly tooth was driving him crazy. So he wiggled it, and wiggled it, then it finally came out really late that night.
It was so late that night that he was worried that the Tooth Fairy had already made her rounds and passed our house...We still put it under his pillow, just in case.
At around 6am Blake came into my bed and said that the Tooth Fairy missed his tooth.
Of course I thought, "Oh crud, the 'Tooth Fairy' forgot!"
I told him that we would put it under his pillow the next night, she would definatly get it then.
Blake put his tooth, in it's little baggie, on the counter and climbed into bed with me and fell asleep.
Some time between the second he fell asleep and two hours later, the Tooth Fairy came. When we woke up his tooth was gone, and he had $3 under my pillow.
Blake said, "That Tooth Fairy is soo smart!"

Camping Test!

We are going camping with our friends, Chris and Jaime Taggart, this up coming weekend. The only problem is, we haven't been real tent camping, besides the backyard and KOA's, in about five years.
Thank goodness they called us up and asked if we wanted to go on a picnic up Farmington Canyon on Saturday (7-5-08). This will give us a chance to take a camping test!

This is Justin hunting for roasting sticks!

Richard and Kaden taking a rest from setting "booby-traps" for
the people driving 4 wheelers.

Ty whittlin' his stick to roast hot dogs.

Hanna and Kaden waiting to have dinner.

They both look so enthused.

Syd's feet just a few minutes after being there.
This is just a small dose of what's to come.




Tyler and Blake after only the first layer of war paint.

Chris and Jaime on the freeway heading home.

The kids on the way home with ALL the windows open. Maybe we can blow a little dust off them before we get home.









So, I think the kids passed the camping test! They were all dirty from head to toe but, that's part of the whole camping experience. They had the best time with Hanna, Richard, and each other.
I don't know if we did though. We had the cops called on us, we are such delinquents.
So here's how it went down...
We just got there after driving up the little goat road, we found a spot, and we where getting the food out. We noticed a green Explorer with a "Red-neck" woman (that's what Justin called her) going past for the 4th time. When she came back again she stopped and started ragging on us and asking us if we payed for our spot. She was rude from the beginning, so our friend Chris being the to-the-point man that he is, basically told her to get off our back and move along.
I sent Justin to pay for a day pass so if she came back, we could say we paid.
A couple hours later we decided to go up a little further so we cleaned up and was heading out of the camp. When all of a sudden a Sheriff vehicle came blazing up the road and came to a halt in front of the Taggart truck. They asked him to get out and hand over the keys. When Chris and Jaime asked what was wrong the Sheriff said, "Oh, you know what you did!"
So one guy questioned them and the other came and questioned us.
Come to find out the "red-neck" lady worked for the Forest Service and she called them because we where committing "theft of service".
She didn't take the time to be polite, address who she was, and use a little people skills to get her job done.
The officers let us go after we showed them our receipt and told our side of the story.
Long story short, YOU CAN CATCH FLIES FASTER WITH HONEY, THAN YOU CAN WITH VINEGAR!

SUMMER!!

The kids have been so excited for Summer! Can you believe we have already seen one month come and go? The kids are lovin' it though... it is finally warm, we stay up late making camp fires, and SMORES!

Of course it's a killer for me... it's hotter than heck, I am suffering from a lack of sleep, I always smell like campfires, and I'm getting sick of smores.

Who am I kidding I LOVE IT!

We have continued with our normal family traditions

for summer and gone to the Drive-in movies.

On our last trip we finally were able to see WALL-E.

We have been waiting forever to see that!

Justin's mom
got us a
membership
to the Gateway
Discovery
Center.
So we always
have something
to do when we
don't know what
to do.

We bought a family pass to the Hogle Zoo....

Another back up when we need something to do.

We totally loved watching the

cute Tamarin Golden Lion Monkeys.