What's up??

It's been a while for me. It's been a long few weeks. First of all, our stake had girl's camp. It was great! Busy, but great! I'm the 2nd counselor in the stake YW, and it was a stake camp this year. (Our stake does camp every other year, and then Youth Conference the next and the wards are responsible the opposite years for their camp and Youth Conferences.) Our poor camp director.... she was called a year ago. Plenty of time to put together a camp, right? well, add to that her wedding, multiple basketball camps, buying and refurbishing a new home, then moving into the home the weekend before camp. Whew! Her assistant was her prior roommate, so you would think that she'd be able to take part of the load off, especially since she's been her ward's camp director for years!! Well, her mother was not doing well - in fact she died while we were at camp. So, obviously we didn't let her come to camp, not knowing how her mom would be, but, again, this woman was amazing and pulled together all the food and organized all the activities... all while helping her dad and trying to cope with the possibility of her mom dying. So, as a stake YW we probably did more than we normally would have to try to help out. Hopefully, we didn't do too much!! Hate to step on toes!! But this year we saw a very positive attitude from all the wards as far as being patient with us, and helping us out at every turn!!

When I got home. I crashed for about 3 days!! I'm getting too old for that kind of stuff.

Then Alex had swimming lessons. I have a video that I'm hoping to put up once I figure out how (any help??) but I have to tell you he is amazing!! Let me give you a little history; after Alex moved in with us we wanted to do the old 'everyone in the bathroom while we bathe the new child' routine. That didn't work! We didn't know that Alex was deathly afraid of water. He literally ran up Mike's body and held onto his head for dear life! We had to sponge bathe him for about 9 months, and then we found that if he got in the tub (or pool, or lake...) on his own time and terms he would be ok. Usually by the end of the summer he would jump into the pool / lake a lot faster than at the beginning, but by the next summer we were starting at square one. Until this summer!! We went to the lake for Mac's birthday and Al jumped right in! We were all shocked, and actually thought he'd remember he was afraid and get back into his routine. Then he went to Cherry Hills with Mike while I was at girl's camp, and he was under water more than he was above!! So, at swimming lessons (which I signed him up for hoping to get him a little more confidence in the water) he was a total fish!!! To us as a family, it's nothing short of a miracle. We are so proud and happy!!!!

Then, I took my dad to the 'fake' Abba concert at the Sandy Amphitheater. This is what we saw. A lot of backsides!! The music was good and my date was fun!! I grew up on Abba music, and admit that when I hear their music I think of my dad. We got a good laugh at other's expense; there was a man about my dad's age that sat by us and he had NO rhythm in his body at all. It was fun to watch him try to clap or dance. Then there was a whole row of women my age and older who all did the 80's 'step, touch, step, touch' dance throughout the whole concert.

So, anyway. That's my last few weeks in a nutshell.