LSP Reunion in A.F. Canyon!!!

I LOVE this reunion! We only have it every 2 or 3 years and when we do it is AMAZING! My Dad has an older Sister Pauline (aunt Polly - Lucero's). When my Dad was 4 his Dad died of Tuberculosis form working in the coal mines and left my grandma alone to raise these 2 beautiful kids. 8 years later she married Harold Schow and a year after that she had a baby girl named Barbra (Aunt Barb - Peck's). Harold died not long after that and she was alone again never to remarry. Well, from that 1 amazing woman there are 102 people that are members of our family. 3 of which are no longer living. Out of the 99 people we had 76 people there. It was incredible! All from the oldest ( left to right, not from oldest to youngest - Aunt Barb, Aunt Polly, My Mom and My Dad)

to the youngest (Adams twins Allie and Ethan) who are darling!

76 of us up American Fork Canyon having the time of our lives, freezing to death, but doing it together. We got up there Saturday the 18th just in time for dinner. We would have been up sooner but the girls and I were still up in Hatch. We got home from Girls Camp at noon and jumped in the shower while Joel and the boys unloaded and reloaded the van. Then we got back in all clean and ready to go camping again for another 4 days. Sunday it rained and rained and rained. So we ate breakfast and went down into town to dry sleeping bags and clothes and play games at Aunt Barb's. It was really fun. The little kids played whiffleball in the front yard in the rain and the rest of us stayed in.




We had dinner and around 7pm the rained completely stopped and we headed back up the canyon. We made a big fire and talked about Granny Schow and told stories that we remembered about her. Jan wasn't able to be there so she wrote up a little thing and had me read it to everyone. I cried like a baby. Jan did a play on my grandma's life about 10 years ago. It is called Breathless. When she was writing it she asked my Aunt Polly if she had any information on Granny that she could see. Well, Aunt Polly pulled out Granny's journal from 1977-1981. Jan kept it. I pulled it out at the reunion and we all had a great experience looking back on her life and ours through her eyes. Her journal wasn't much to her. She just talked about the weather, her blood sugar and weight and the family. But, every page was extremely special to us. Shayne and I are now in the process of interpreting that journal (sometimes her hand writing was hard to read) so that we can give everyone a copy of there own to love and cherish. Like we do her.

Monday was a gorgeous day! We played softball,

Used Joel's Eskimo blanket - Cinco (Phillip) has the new record for the highest throw.

Painted fingernails,

Braided hair - Jaxson-

Had a moose come into camp,

and of course played horseshoes.

It was so much fun. We had a great time just relaxing. Some people went down to the reservoir to fish for awhile while the rest of us played games or colored with the little kids - thanks Shayne and Katie. It was so nice to just sit and talk and not have to have things scheduled or lessons to do or go to. Girls Camp was great but when it comes to family, time is needed to just sit and enjoy each others company. You can bond so much by just talking to each other. Especially with those who you don't see very often. I can hardly wait for another 2 or 3 years till we all get together again.

Girls Camp!

Our Washington Utah Stake Girls Camp this year was June 15th-18th. Here is a picture of our wonderful 5th Ward.

I am just writing about it now because I have been super busy. We went up to the Wilson's property in Hatch again because Cedar Mountain had too much snow still. Well, I love Hatch. I think that Girls Camp is amazing every year. Not because of where it is but because of the spirit and closeness it brings to God and to each other.
As soon as we got there we found 3 different snakes, all harmless Mom, and Bro. Allen kindly moved them to a different location.

The first night there we had Katie Cluff come up and give a Fireside about her experinces when she was a YW and how it changed her life. It was so good for those girls to hear that they need to hold strong to the gospel and to help all those around them do the same.

The Wilson's have this great homemade waterside that the girls and leaders had fun sliding down. This is our Stake YW President, Renee Cram. She is in our ward and we love her!




We had lots of crafts, games, singing, scripture reading and lessons on how we are Princess's because our Father is the King and how to get our Happily Ever After. It was amazing!
Our ward was White, FAITH. My lessons was about frogs and how sometimes we have to have faith that if we "kiss a frog" things will get better. Are we willing to give up Better for Best? Then we made a frog to hang out door knob and on the back wrote F.R.O.G. Fully Rely On God. Faith is to fully rely on God and know that if you are doing what he asks then everything will work out. Then I gave them all bracelets that had F.R.O.G. on it with a cute little frog. F.R.O.G. is the new W.W.J.D.

We did lots of certifying and we learned of a new app on my phone that if you hold it up to the night sky and line it up with a star it will not only tell you what star that is but will show you every constellation including the ones that we can't see that are on the other side of the earth. It's awesome! The 2nd year girls had to do a flag ceremony and they did a wonderful job.

This years YW theme is the 13th Article of Faith so every day we were seeking a way to find our Happily Ever After. Friday was seeking Purity and President Ellsworth and Bro. Koeven were the Sesame Street Martians helping a girl know what was pure and what wasn't. It was Hilarious!

Our Stake Presidency is incredible. On Saturday morning they and Brother Lewis all spoke and each one talked about a different Princess and sang a fun little song to go along with it. Bro. Koeven's was Snow White's "Once Upon A Dream." Bro. Lewis talked about Enchanted and sang "How do you know that He loves you?" It was darling. Pres. Ellsworth didn't want to sing and ended up singing a tiny bit and talking about Princess Bride and how Wesley always said, "As you wish", and how the girls should be looking for there prince to be a worthy priesthood holder that will love her like the princess she is and take her to the Temple. It was so neat to see them talk to the girls and see the girls faces light up. They are truly called of God to help out our stake.

There is so much more to talk about but I will have to stop and leave you with these 2 pictures. The first one is of Shayne and I with Sophie in the Background. We were just goofing around at first to get a good picture and then she moved into the background which made for a funny picture. Well, funny for me and Shayne but not for Sophie. She looks sad. Hahaha! The next picture is the 3 of us on a swing there at camp. I LOVED being there for the second year in a row with both my girls. I know that this will be my last year with them. Unless, I get called to be the Ward Camp Director and Shayne is still around next summer. We've learned in this family that you cannot make plans for your life because we don't know what the Lord has in store for us. All we can do is to live righteously so He can use us for whatever he needs us to do.

USG Basketball

The Utah Summer Games are afoot in Cedar City.


Every year Joel runs something, Shayne swims and Brian plays basketball. This year Joel and Shayne bowed out because of the Shelton Family reunion but we were back in time to go watch some of Brian's games. Brian's team was packed with collegiate talent and they made it to the finals where they played against another team from St. George that they play against all the time and are friends with. Brian's team lost by 1 point. Afterwards we got dinner and brought it up to this amazing park called Park Discovery. It's so cool. The kids played for at least an hour and played tag with the adults. It was great fun.








John also did the triathlon at the Summer games and came in 3rd in his age group and somewhere around 30th over all out of 250!

Officially a teenager!

Sophie turned 13 yesterday! Woo Hoo! She spent it in Lehi with her grandparents, Aunts, Uncles and Cousins.

It was also the start of the Lehi Round-Up and the Stock Parade goes past my parents house every year so they always have a BIG b-b-q and play loud music and have ALL of the friends and family over to watch the parade. This year was the same except they had a birthday sign and balloons for Sophie as well. Sophie said that since no one throws candy in the horse parade, Aunt Barb sat up on the porch and threw candy at all the kids from there. "It was so much fun!" was Sophie's quote. Then they all went to the Rodeo later that night. She had a way better birthday up there than she ever would have down here. I'm glad she had fun.

More Baseball!

The youth in our stake do not have enough boys or girls to have individual teams so we have combined to have co-ed softball teams. Since Shayne is still out of commission we have her pitch. When she hits she has to get to first base on her own and then we have someone run for her. Sophie is our first baseman and does a great job. We had a lot of girls that didn't want to play but after our first game they saw how much fun it was and now we have a whole team of girls and 1 boy.


Here are some better pictures of Joel in his awesome new stripped pants.



Joel is usually a first baseman but with this team they put him wherever they are lacking some talent. Last week he pitched and this week he was outfield. Obviously.

Safety Town

St. George City has held Safety Town for as long as I can remember. It is a 2 week day camp that teaches kids that are just going into or coming out of Kindergarten. They learn all about Ambulances, Bus Safety, Bike Safety, Fire Safety, Stranger Safety, When to call 911, What to do when you see a gun, Crossing the road, Dog safety and that police officers are your friend. Here are a couple pictures of David and Evan having fun at Safety Town.

Basketball Camp

This week Ben and David had basketball camp at our Rec Center.





I figure they are Beckstrands and will eventually learn to play so I'd better get them into it now so they can learn the basics before the the violence sets in.

Eskimo Blanket FHE

The first Monday of every month we have a combined FHE with Joel's family. We go in order of age as to who is in charge each month. This month it was us. Usually you invite everyone over to your house and have a nice sit down lesson. But, because we live the furthest away and have the smallest living room, we try to get creative. So we had in on the back lawn of Mike and Elaine's. It was a goregous day! Joel had borrowed the Eskimo blanket from work to use for his lesson. An Eskimo blanket is like a trampoline but the person on it doesn't jump. They get thrown. Everyone holds onto the side and pulls out launching them towards the sky. Joel had a great lesson on how we need others especially the Lord to as high as we can/were we need to be.

Doing the little kids was easy and fun but everyone got a little nervous as we moved into the adults. This is Jacob.

This is Pat flying through the air but without his plane. This other picture is of him and the nieces and Nephews. They LOVE to do thumb wars and play rock, paper, scissors with Pat.


Brian

Holly


Kristal

Shayne

We even got Joel up and proved that with help anything can happen.



This is Josh. He definitely went the highest. It was a lot of fun.

Click on any picture to see it up close and see the horror on their faces!