youth conference 2012

Alternate title:  'The assignment that almost killed us', or 'Why I should listen to Roger more often.'

As it turns out, I am no as relaxed as I pretend to be.  This is not news to Roger, but did/does cause him some grief at times.  Once I finally chilled out - about the week before the event - things finally went a little better.

We camped in cabins up at Hermit Park near Estes.  Perfect location.  ROGER WAS RIGHT.
The theme was 'get smart' -  the vernacular of 'oh be wise.' That won out over my original idea of 'don't be stupid.'  Positive seemed a better way to go.

Before we drove up to the mountains, we did a service project at the Community Food Bank. Best service project ever.  It's near our community, the kids got a little education about who uses the resource, how many people they serve, and how much money that takes. Visible results quickly with a very human face.  ROGER

 IS A GENIUS!

(This is Roger and Bishop Merrill next to Sue, the volunteer coordinator.  She is one powerful, tiny woman!)

Thursday night we had some speakers talk about how their life plans differed from what THEY planned, and how they learned to use the Spirit in figuring out what they really needed to do with their lives/education/etc.  GREAT.  Kat gets the genius award for that one. And my friend for suggesting two of the speakers at the last minute.  It's always nice when you get to see why things don't work out they way YOU want them to because Heavenly Father has a better plan in mind. Sometimes even the organizers get to learn a little something too.

Friday morning we did the ropes course up at YMCA of the Rockies. This was probably my favorite activity of the whole adventure. The program director lead our group, and he was great.  The kids failed one of the activities because they didn't follow directions and help each other like they were supposed to, and he called them on it.  Not in a bad way at all, but talked to them about how they could have done better, and really emphasized that it's only truly a failure if you don't learn and change and improve from your experience. 

Saturday morning on the way back home we went to Estes Park and swam for a couple hours.  Which was nice since we didn't have showers up there.  Roger and Travis had a nice diving board competition going - unfortunately the photographer needs to work on her speed shooting skills.  She did OK when everyone was  standing still though.

Overall two thumbs up.The kids had fun, the leaders had fun, the Bishop was booked with interviews the next week.  Good stuff all around.  And naturally our own kids didn't want their sleepover at Oma's to end.