A Day in the MTC-Youth Conference 2009

Being involved with the youth at a Stake level has been extremely rewarding. Not only have I been able to associate with some amazing leaders but the youth in the Katy Stake are incredible. This year for youth conference we had A Day at the MTC, A Day of Service and Day 3 we had an impressive open house put on by the youth for their nonmember friends.
Besides helping with all the different projects involved in putting on a youth conference, my big role was taking care of feeding approximately 150 youth and their leaders and making the invitations for the open house.

{Colleen Anderson, Alyson Felt (amazing women) & Me}

Here are a few of my favorite highlights of youth conference.

As the youth arrived they each received a missionary name tag and their mission call. After a brief orientation and message from the Stake President they went to their missions and were taught.













Some of my FaVoRiTe YoUnG WoMeN!

Some behind the scenes major kitchen help and little bit of our evenings around the world entertainment.

Here is the menu I came up with to represent as many countries around the world as possible and to stay within budget. We had some priesthood holders in aprons serve this 4 course meal. It was kind of fun!

Go Ye Unto All The World
Youth Conference 2009
International Dinner Menu


Drinking
European Black Current Soda
American Water

Appetizers
German Quiche
Japanese Gyoza
Mediterranean Flat Bread & Hummus
Mexican Taco
Korean Edamame

Salad & Bread
Greek Salad
Brazilian Pao de Queijo

Entre
Italian Lasagna

Dessert
French Crepes
Venezuelan Tres Leche Cake
Chinese Fortune Cookies

The service project consisted of 3 homes in downtown Houston that needed painting, plus each home also had it's own individual projects that needed to be attended to and the youth worked extra long hours to finish. There was also a group of youth that went to the nursing home, cleaned a park AND passed out flyers for their open house.

As each group finished their project and headed back to the church, a fire truck was there waiting to cool them all off before they went home to eat and get ready for the dance.

Sunday's open house had a program of some fabulous speakers and then lots of informative booths and refreshments. Each of the booths: What do we Believe? Why are we here & Where are we going? How was Christ's Church Restored? What is the Book of Mormon? Why are we called "Mormons?" What think we of Christ? How do our Standards make us different? How do we help the world? How do we prepare for the future? and Geneology! Do you know your past?

It was a great weekend. It felt like 3 different youth conferences. I just hope and pray that each of the youth in attendance were able to feel the spirit and their Heavenly Father's love for them sometime during this youth conference. There truly are some stalwart youth in these latter days. And how grateful I am to have been able to work with some of them and to learn from their example.

Happy Father's Day!

"The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother."by Henry Ward Beecher

Steve does a great job of this....

and he also does a great job as a father.

Here are some 2009 Father Moments!!!

We Love you Dad!

And Happy Father's Day to Grandpa Spendlove & Grandpa Cannon. How lucky we are to have such wonderful father's in our lives. Thanks for EVERYTHING you have done for us. WE LOVE YOU!

(I know what I need to do next time I see either Grandpa...take some pictures with them)\

(ps. I found this quote on Pineapple Hills Design, Thanks)

Girl Scout Camp

This is the only picture I have of Rachel at Girls Scout Camp. I am still hoping to get some more from her leader. But before it gets too far gone, I need to post it. There is nothing more fun than being at an all girls camp. Rachel was in heaven. She was able to do canoeing, archery and a lot of crafts.

2009 Swim Meet #1

Here we go again! This is our fourth year of swim team and I was so excited to be able to have ALL four of my kids swimming but for some strange reason I decided to switch teams. I have a few mixed emotions. I was looking for a team that had a little more consistency since our last team had different coaches every year and I wanted more structure for my kids. Not having anything to compare it to, I decided to switch teams and since I live in a neighborhood that doesn't have it's own swim team I can join any of the teams that will allow people like us to join. Some teams will only let people join if you live in their neighborhood.

Back to my point...I almost feel like I betrayed our team by switching. I feel a little loyalty to the West Memorial Tiger Sharks and a lot of MY good friends had their kids on that team. Anyway, I was thinking of my kids and trying to do what was best for them, because this new team was also closer to home and I was hoping there would be a lot of kids from their school on this new team, Pin Oak Piranhas, and there wasn't.

AND it probably would have been just fine had they not kicked Lauren off the team.

I know, how could you do that to my cute little Lauren, who would not want to have her on their team?

I was aware of the rule that if she couldn't swim to the other end of the pool by a certain date that she wouldn't be able to compete. So I had her taking some extra lessons and she was making such good progress. I asked two different people in charge what the exact procedure was when it came to this rule. And I was under the impression that they would take every situation under consideration and I went away feeling like as soon as she was able to make it to the other side she would start competing. Long story short, that was not the case and after I bought her team swim suit and didn't really push her extra lessons anymore, I got a $20 refund and she was off the team. Just like that!!!!

You can tell I was extremely upset. I made some phone calls and even tried to switch back to our old swim team because they would allow assisted swimmers, but the cost of doing that didn't make sense.

Anyway, I just started off on the wrong foot and still get pretty upset when thinking about it, like almost to tears every time. But we are having a good swim season otherwise. The structure is there, the coaches are good and we of course are making new friends all around.

It's just that Lauren is not.

Here are few pictures of our first meet.

Rachel - she is the one in the middle with the purple flower cap.

Matthew-getting reading!

Ethan-diving and in action.

Steve + Kids + Bikes = Mom time alone

Steve takes the kids for rides a lot, he just never remembers to take any pictures and I have a hard time blogging without pictures. Here they are on one of their first days of summer. (I was busy getting ready for youth conference...more about that later.)
Lauren just got a new bike for her birthday, so they went on a Lauren friendly trail at George Bush Park. They rode 4 miles that morning.

Although it was a great time, they unfortunately had a to make a few stops.

The first one was because Steve's chain broke. The second one was because Lauren's pedal fell off.

(Thank goodness he is prepared and can fix anything)

But this just gave Matthew some time to do what he truly loves and that is to catch frogs and lizards.

And it gave Lauren some time to let her cute little toes breath. She does not like to wear socks because they make her feet sweat.

Thank you Rachel for taking such good pictures so I could do some more blogging.