Youth Conference

This past week I went to Youth Conference with my ward. It was the same weekend as Stephanie's wedding. I had a really hard time deciding which one to go to. Should I go to Youth Conference which I've looked forward to for years, or to the wedding of a cousin who I've always looked up to? I was going to go to Stephanie's wedding until last Wednesday which was the day before Youth Conference. I was at Dairy Queen with my mom when she told me that I could go to YC if I wanted to so I texted Megan Anderson and packed that night.

The next day I met up at the church at 7:30 AM. Everyone sat around talking for a while before getting in cars to leave. I was put in a car with Karlie Boren who is Ashley's friend who's going to be a senior. The Kings drove us there (a couple with two kids, the oldest is Emma's age. They're a nice family). We met up about an hour out of Cedar City at a cheese factory to eat lunch. The people who had the trailer blew a tire so they were behind us. We got ice cream there and pet the horses. I was also really hyper. We then went on our way again. Next everyone stopped at a park in Cedar City. The boys played sports while the girls played Psychiatrist and took pictures on the slide and played on the swing. On the way up the mountain (which took an hour) a woman named Shantea (Idk how to spell it, it's pronounced Shawn-tay) got really sick so I switched cars with her because the truck and trailer made it more bumpy. We arrived at a cabin in Kolob and set up camp. Only a couple of the leaders slept in the cabin, the rest of us were in tents. My tent had to be moved after we set it up because it wasn't in view of the fire pit which was annoying. Finally everything was set up. The leaders made dinner for us while we started a fire. They got the fire to be really big so that it was really hot to be by. After dinner everyone was roasting marshmallows and popcorn but had to stand far away and shield their eyes because it was so hot. It rained a lot that night and I got discouraged because if it rained too much then we wouldn't be able to hike through the narrows in Zions National Park the next day because it would flood. I would feel even worse about missing the wedding if I didn't hike the narrows. I went into the tent to read for a while and then everyone played a game called "Four on a Couch" which I don't want to explain on here. We then played one that I think was originally "Big Budah" but they changed it to "Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John" where you slap and clap and call on people and all the fun stuff. I was Mark for a really long time. After that we all watched "The Incredibles" with a projector and sheet that they hung up and then we went to bed.

The next day my allergies were really bugging me so I woke up early. I was one of the first people awake which has never happened before while camping with my ward. We had breakfast and it rained lightly for about ten minutes. We then packed lunches and changed into swim suits. I had Karlie, Rainee, Ryan Davis, and Matt Wilcox in the King's car with me and we played psychiatrist on the way there. Everyone got out at the visitor's center at Zion's National Park and that was around the time when everyone found out that Michael Jackson died. It's pretty sad but I'm not shocked like some of them. Thriller was pretty cool and he was a cute guy when he was younger, but otherwise he's not my type. I'm sad he died though because death is a bad thing. So anyway, we got on a tour bus to go up to the narrows. When we arrived there, we walked about a mile before getting there. We started hiking through to narrows which was pretty cool because there were huge cliffs on either side of us and we were hiking through water which felt good. I kept on slipping and getting stuck so I was one of the slowest girls and had to have a lot of the leaders help me at first. We stopped about a mile into it and ate lunch and swam in a deeper part of the stream for a while. I hiked there mainly with my leader who is Heather Lieber's mom. She graciously took pictures of me and didn't mind that I am really slow. On the way back, I hiked with Mitch Davis (Ryan's older brother). I hope he didn't mind that I was slow. He was nice and we talked the whole time and it was simply spiffing. We got wet because for part of the hike the water got pretty deep. That hike took about 5 hours I think, but it was really fun and pretty. Unfortunately, my (Ashley's) shoes ripped up my heels so they were bleeding a bit. Thankfully, Mom had bought me some cool hellokitty bandaids which I took with and used. I gave some out to another girl in need and some guys who thought they were awesome. On the way back to camp, me and Ryan fell asleep. We were so tired.

A lot of people back at camp wanted to shower but I decided not to because I was going home the next day anyway and everyone else smelled bad too and there was a line. We had a delicious dinner and I had seconds and didn't even care if people thought I was a pig because it was GOOD! Other people had seconds too though. We later gathered around the fire and had a fireside which was delightfully enlightening. We then watched a slide show of the pictures that my leader, Andrea Paul, took. The pictures were awesome and Matt Wilcox told me I look like a model in them =D =D Everyone then got glow sticks and we were going to play capture the flag, but not a lot of people wanted to play. I just hung around the fire for a while. Eventually guys started throwing their glow sticks in the fire to see what would happen. Someone threw in a big fat one. It started bubbling then it exploded and the glowey green liquid sprayed out. Everyone freaked out and ducked because we were afraid it would be hot, but it wasn't. I got some on my (mom's) jacket and someone got it on their face.

The next day I was one of the last people to wake up. My hair was a huge mess so some people were making fun of me when I came out of my tent. I was so tired. We packed up and left and got home around 4 PM. I showered and then went to Marjorie's house to visit and see pictures of Stephanie's wedding and ate the extra food and candy. It was wonderful.

I'm so glad I went to Youth Conference, it was so fun.