Football Camp

I gave in. I probably shouldn't have but I did. I told myself that I had to be there anyway so why shouldn't Malia go and have some fun to. My baby went to Football camp!! And then I forced Sharadi into sending her daughter so that there would be two sweet little girls putting some hurt down on the field.
She told me she had fun except when the boys wouldn't stop stepping on her toes and then that mean kid hit her elbow and that she was really thirsty. What a GIRL

20th reunion? Who is that old?

This picture is such bad quality but it was the best I could do under the ballroom lights.

Robbie and the Arimo boys on a scout camp out. Robbie is the 3rd from the left.
Look at how cute #55 is. He said he didn't know when school pictures were but had overheard someone say that they were this week. He said he wore that shirt for a week straight so that he could have it in his kindergarten picture. He was the same age as Malia is now

Robbie had his 20th reunion a couple of weeks ago. It honestly was so much fun. Robbie went to a school that graduated 88 students. He also went to school with some of these people from kindergarten until graduation. I met a lot of these people in the single ward I went to in college. My ward was comprised of all of the little out laying towns and two roads in Pocatello. It was fun because I knew a ton of them before they got married and had families. Robbie has told me so many stories about so many of the people he went to school with and I thought he was exaggerating. I can truly attest that he was not. We are supposed to be getting a DVD of the slide show they did. When I get it I will post more photos.

Girls Camp and Bears

Sunday I had to talk in church about our girls camp. We sang a really long opening and sacrament song and had a youth speaker and also the camp director talk. We even had a really long rest hymn and I look up at the clock and I have a half hour to speak. Bro. Morris gets up and announces me and that Bro Horne will take a few minutes and say a few words after I speak. In my head I am thinking-no way is there going to be enough time for him to speak. I was wrong. I actually gave him 2 minutes. You give me half hour and I will speak for a half hour. My talk was entitled Sis. G(it had to be that because I definitely do not have golden locks) and her 3 bears. I talked about seeing bears in Yellowstone and the Laytons experience with watching the grizzly bear eat the bison, and the bears we had a girls camp. I tied all of this into obedience and that the bears are how Satan makes sin look. Anyway, for some reason I do not have a fear of speaking in church. I have more fear that I won't have enough time and that I won't get to say everything I want to.

Anyway, girls camp was awesome. I came down with what Maren had at our family vacation. I heavily medicated on Tuesday and thankfully I got a blessing on Wed. morning that did the trick. I felt so much better after that. Our stake girls camp was a baseball theme and we were the Holy Hitters. I am so amazed at the wonderful ladies I got to go with. Because I was sick, I was a big fat slacker and slept a lot. Cameron and Sandy did so much that week. Sandy is 5 months pregnant with her 7th child. She was awesome sleeping on her roll up and taking over where I slacked. Cameron was so much fun. The girls really loved her. Hopefully they connected because I think it is really important to do that with an adult women other than your mom. Hopefully they already have that connection with their moms. I also beat Cameron at WWF-Ok so she was still asleep when I put her in a head lock. What? I still whipped her. Christy came up for a day and went on the overnight hike that I reallywas looking forward to but baled on because I was sick. I was so glad she was able to go up with our girls. She is a wild women and taught them some fun game. She is who I got the game from that we played at our Willey reunion last year. Just wait family, I have so many more that you all will love. The stake did a really good job of keeping us busy and getting all of our certification done. The whole bear thing started that day when apparently a bear was seen in one of the camp grounds. The forest service was brought in and tracker dogs were let loose to chase them away. That is something to wake up to are "Coon Hounds"like in the Red Fern Grows, barking and chasing this bear. The bear loved our sight and walked through it and ripped a tree apart and ate ants out of it. Thankfully we had great priesthood in our camp and they blessed us that if we were obedient and did what we were told by the people in charge, we would have nothing to fear. I did not feel scared once. I also took a lot of day and NyQuil so I could have been just really relaxed but still.

I had a really great time. Girls camp is fun. I have gone to camp for the last 8 years. As much as I loved it as a teen(not) who would have thought I would love it so much as an adult.

Fabulous Family Vacation

So now that we have the FBI suburban we finally have been able to go on a real vacation. It was so much fun. We went up Monday night and had a great BBQ with the Gunter family. Brock, Kristy and family, Brandon, Angie, and family, Corey,Jen and family, Tyson, us, and Gma and Gpa all hung out and had a great time. We made smores and Uncle Brock put some crazy thing in the fire and it went really white and really big. Poor Vickie's trees were all singed. We had a fun time Seeing everyone. Tuesday we went up golfing at the central links in Grace with Grandma and Grandpa and Dexter. We love golfing there but seriously it is out in the middle of a potato field. They water using a pivot line and you always find more balls than you lose and you always lose balls there. We went back to the Gunter hotel on the old Fish Creek Road and it was really beautiful. Breckin and I have allergies and as soon as we opened the door at grandmas we were sneezing and eyes watering. The wind was blowing and whatever it had in it nearly put us all over the edge with allergies.
We drove up to Yellowstone on Wednesday morning and camped at Bridge Bay. Yellowstone is an incredibly beautiful place. Just driving into the park we saw lots of bison, a coyote walking on the side of the road, a huge wolf walked in front of our car. Britton yells out look at the huge dog, we look and realize that is not a dog but a big mangy looking wolf. By the time we got a picture of it, it was up in the trees. We saw 3 bears, and lots of crazy tourists.
I have been to Yellowstone several times but the only place I have been or can remember going is to Old Faithful. We stayed far away from there this time because of the 4th of July. I had no idea Yellowstone had so much to offer. We went on the waterfall tour of the park. We hung out in the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone and it truly was amazing. We walked down Uncle Toms trail that is like 380 steps down to the most amazing look of the lower falls. The power of that water was so cool. Climbing up the stairs was so much fun too. Malia spent the whole time saying, "I'm going to die, I'm going to die" I am sure those were not reassuring word to hear if you were going down the stairs. Thursday we went up to Mammoth. That is a long drive but so incredibly amazing. Friday we drove out and went up to Hebgen Lake and to Quake Lake. We ate lunch up there and honestly I can say that it was one of the most spectacular sights. The lake and the pine trees and the river are fabulous. I would love to have a cabin up there. Gorgeous. We followed the Madison River out of the canyon and you come into what you think of Montana as. Huge mountains and ranch lands and rivers. I would live up there in a minute.
My parents rented a cabin in Island Park for the 4th weekend. The cabin really was a huge house with 8 bedrooms and lots of beds in each. We stayed downstairs and it was nice and cool and felt wonderful. Everyone got there that night and we ate and played games and it was so nice to see all of my sister-in-laws that I don't get to see often. Braiden and Sharon came the farthest from PA and she is going to be having a baby in a couple of months. I really love family. I am lucky that I like all of my sister in law because I have a lot of them.Of course because we were on vacation, Breckin had to throw up. He does this every time we go somewhere. I think I had over medicated him with Benadryl and Claritin and that he also ate like a pig with his cousins. So we had a fun night. Saturday we all ate together and then everyone had free time. Some went swimming, some went fishing, some went to Mesa Falls. We went to Virginia City MO. It was quite a drive but who knows when we will be up there next. So Mom and Dad sent everyone out the door with sack lunches and we ate ours in the Virginia City Park. Really it was an overgrown field that had the old playground equipment on. The kind we all grew up with but now it isn't safe. We spent a really long time there. The kids loved it. Virginia City is an old mining town and the stores are seriously what they would look like in the 1800's. We went on the train that runs from Virginia City to Nevada City. Note to self-looks much more fun than it is and expensive. That night we hung out and played games and enjoyed every ones company.
Sunday we had family pictures which were totally crazy with as many people and kids as we had. We also did crafts. My dad brought up his leather making stuff and that was really cool. I had some flag crafts for the girls to do. I love doing that because that is when you get to talk and get to know everyone better. They turned out really good. Sunday night we grilled steaks and chicken. Robbie dutch ovened for everyone and it was really yummy.

Robbie had to be back to work Monday morning so we left Sunday night. Honestly I can say that this was one of the best vacations I have been on. I loved it. I loved seeing Robs family, being with my own children and seeing my family. I loved every minute of it. Even when Robbie ran into his moms car on our way home.