Time to catch up~

Summer is over as far as school is concerned and I haven't put any pictures up.  Today is a beautiful, rainy day and a perfect time to add some pics!

Let me start with pictures of My Wee.  This little girl has spunk and style.  I have been saving pictures of her until I had enough to put on here, and she does not disappoint!  She loves to mix and match her clothes and add layers upon layers.  And to add to the "look"  is her attitude!  She is either the happiest little stinker you've ever seen or a monster!!  

 OOPS!  Her chocolate cake she was making in the  sandbox exploded!  But it doesn't distract from the style.

Every summer the firemen in our area come and flush the hydrant by our house, and this day we happened to see them just in time to play in the water.  She followed these guys to the end of the circle and probably would have kept going with them if I hadn't stopped her! Fun summer days playing in the gutter!(Yes, I joined in with her!!)

 This is such a cute picture I couldn't NOT put it on here. My Vaeh;  I used to babysit her, but we have continued to love each other forever!  I call her my 9th grandchild!And I would even take her parents as my kids! (Just watch yourself, Jay! I'm strict!!)

Another pic I had to put up.  One of my best friends who also happens to be my sister-in-law.  We took a night off from mommy-hood and went go-cart racing!!  Yes we did!!  My daughter-in-law came, too but she is camera shy....

...unless she's dressed like a minion. Then she's ok to be involved!

Al got new glasses!!  He picked these out because he looks like his best friend Paul.  (Paul in our neighbor who is an adult with adult children, but is always sweet with Al!)

A lot of church events;  this was a service project the girls made for Baylee.  These girls have a heart of gold and really enjoyed making this;  they were so particular!  They wanted it perfect for her!!

Youth Conference;  we went downtown to Temple Square and was involved with other wards in many activities;  a scavenger hunt,  lunch at The Lion House, a movie, a special speaker, a dinner at The Joseph Smith Memorial Building and more!  We have a small group compared to most in the area!!

Beautiful Salt Lake temple!!

My faithful Young Women and a few leaders!

The first morning we had breakfast made by two of our Priesthood brethren and then headed to The Salt Lake cemetery.  Fascinating!!!  This is a picture of us in front of The Christmas Box Angel.

One of the activities we did was genealogy work.  After finding out what your ancestry was, you got to paste your face onto what your ancestors may have worn.  Yes, this is Alex as a Swedish man.  Kinda scare, funny and lovable all in one!!

YW Girl's Camp is another summer tradition!  This was the first year in a lot of years that I wasn't the camp director (the one in charge!)  and I thoroughly enjoyed myself.  The girls even brought me breakfast in bed!  (My bed being the back of my van because I snore too loudly to sleep with anyone else.  Yes, sad but true)

This is Bobert.  No that's not a typo.  He has been called that by the young women for at least 15 years!  He is a camp guru and we love having him come up with us.  Yes, he has lipstick on his face;  that's from a game called cheeky-weeky.  We couldn't go on a snipe hunt, which is usually our traditional yearly game, because we only had one newbie and someone spilled the beans!!  

Our awesome Stake Camp Director!  Yes, she's wearing a jacket and using an umbrella in July.

And this picture, though not the best of everyone, is where we hung out one day;  our trailer with all our camping equipment.  It was too cold and too wet to be outside!!  We still had a great time and the girls were good sports and great helpers!

Something we did this summer - that we haven't done for at least 4 years - is we finally went boating!!  It was so awesome to see this view in my side mirror!!  Our boat is a classic!  Bought in the 70's by George's uncle, then we bought it in the 80's and boating has become the BEST summer tradition that we have missed.  Unfortunately, just like everything else, getting older sucks and the boat had old man issues.  It would putt-putt-putt like an old man walking up the stairs instead of going full out fast!!  Our friend Jay helped George work on it at the end of last summer and we finally got it out on water!  Once.  But it was worth it!!

George LOVES this boat!!!  And he sure looks good in it!!

My 2 favorite men doing one of our favorite things!!

Did I mention getting older sucks??!?  He did great, but it took him a while to get up on the ski and then a while to recuperate!!

The weather was perfect and the water was glass, but the smoke in the air from the California fires made it hard to distinguish water from sky.

Our boat's wake is awesome!!  And it ran amazingly great the whole day!!  No old man issues for the boat on this day!

This isn't a very good picture because he looks so uncomfortable, but this is Alex's favorite place in the boat.  It's inside the bow of the boat;  he plays with his guys and "paints" the carpet on the roof.  He loves to take paint brushes and brush material that shows the path of the brush and that happens to be what's in the boat bow. It's quite a big area and perfect for newborns and Al!!

But Alex did try on some skis!  It was exhausting for him just putting them on but he tried!!  It is really difficult for him to hold the skis together, but we will keep trying!

The end of our day;  not one we wanted.  Waiting our turn to load the boat - so we were just motoring around the area - and hit a sandbar.  Yup.  Stopped.  Cold.   For the second time in our boat owning years we had to be towed in by a jet ski.  This time we just needed a tug while we pushed off of the sandbar, but I'm afraid George questioned his masculinity after having a lowly jet ski tow his manly boat!!!

Some random summer fun....

CUTE!!

Not so cute!!  But there is a great story behind it;  M was telling me about her upcoming 6th birthday party for her friends.  Lou was invited to do hair and nails, TJ was invited to do makeup, but I wasn't invited!  So I asked what I could do.  My daughter-in-law - who knows better - said, "You can dress like a cow and dance."  So I did.  She swears she didn't say 'dress like a cow', but she did.  I'm right.  The funny part was my children's reactions.  Everyone else laughed hilariously at this cow's version of Whip-Nae Nae, while Colby acted like it was an everyday occurrence, Lou just rolled her eyes and TJ wouldn't acknowledge my presence.  Huh.  Wonder what that all means?

Speaking of embarrassing moments...  thank goodness no pictures!!! (That I know about!)

This picture of George and Al is during the Butlerville Days 24th of July Parade.  We got to ride on the cemetery's golf carts and throw candy to the parade goers.  Kind of a way to advertise and show that cemeteries aren't just for Halloween.  Well, I was standing on the back of one of the golf carts (it wasn't even George's) and after throwing some candy I felt something around my feet.  I thought, "Who threw something back at me?",  looked down and my skirt was down around my ankles!  No kidding!  And since I was on the back of a golf cart I couldn't bend down graciously and pull it up.  Oh, no.  I had to full on bend OVER sticking my butt out then pulling it up.  I looked around and noticed some poor little 5 or 6 year old boy tapping his dad's legs saying, "Dad.  Dad!  Dad!!"  and I just looked at him and said, "I know, right!?!"

If you do find a picture, please destroy it!!!

Seven Peaks fun!!

Maughan family reunion 2015

Al did a lot of go-cart racing.  He's actually really good!  The first time he hit every corner there was during every lap!  But he has improved a ton, and the employees know him by name and treat him really well!!

And George and I got to go see Journey at the Stadium of Fire!!  Oh I love that group - but I love this guy even more.  Couldn't have been a better day!!  

So, that's part of our summer.  And as much fun as it was, I can't wait for Fall!

We survived Girl's Camp 2012!

I say 'we' because the girls had to survive my scatter-brained shot at being organized after the last month, just as much as I had to survive the late nights and cray-cray girls!!

I was so blessed to go with the group of girls that I did.  This is my second year as ward camp director and both years I have been so proud to say that I am their leader, yet they are the ones who definitely are the example to me.  There is no possible way I could have survived, let alone succeeded at leading camp this year if it weren't for the tremendous young women and their leaders that helped me with every step of the way!  Way to go Sixth Ward Sexies!!  (That's our nickname / motto.  Yeah, we are proud!)

We were able to go to a cabin this year; it belongs to one of the leaders. The picture below is of most of the girls on the patio.  It's actually the roof of the garage, but we spent as much time there as possible just because of the beautiful view and the breeze.  But it's also where our troubles began...

Here's a picture of some of the girls in front of  'the cows.'  On our first evening, we went for a value walk, which was a nice leisurely stroll down the dirt road in front of the cabin and the paved road to the river.  Like I said, a nice leisurely stroll.  Before we started, one of the girls showed us how she can talk to cows.  It worked!!  When Kelsey mooed, all the cows stopped grazing and looked right at her.  So, all the other girls had to try it.  They weren't as successful as Kelsey, but it was entertaining to see 16 girls trying to have a conversation with cows.  We think this is what caused the cops to be called on us.  Yup.  You read that right.  At 9:30 that night we had 2 sheriff officers pull up while we were having a very reverent, spiritual devotional to tell us they had received multiple calls throughout the day and would we please try to keep it down.  Are you kidding me?  After much discussion, we decided it must have been when we were cow whisperers - or maybe I should say cow yellers.  But who knew you couldn't moo at cows in Oakley in the middle of the day?

So the first day was getting settled in, the value walk, some good food and fun, and a near arrest.  Great start!  I slept in our van off the side of the road, because I snore so loud I would either keep everyone awake with my snoring, or I wouldn't sleep for fear of keeping everyone awake.  Around 6 am I hear, "clip clop.  clip clop"  and then these 2 huge nostrils are sniffing the window next to me.  I sit up to see 2 riderless horses taking a little jaunt down the street.  This is a picture of one of the horses, but they were too close for me to get them both in.

  Hmmmm. Interesting start to the day. We then went boating at Rockport (thanks, George!! You are incredible!!!) which is when we got the cops called on us a second time!! No kidding! I guess I should call them the coast guard since it was at the lake. Someone said they were nervous about how many people were on the bow of the boat. If you have seen our boat, you know that there is a railing and that we can sit on the bow if we are straddling a bar from the railing. Well, the coast guard came out and asked Mike how many people he could legally have on the boat. His smart remark, "10 1/2." After the cop guffawed, he asked again, to which Mike finally answered correctly "10." When the cop said, "But you only have seats for 5..." Mike informed him of the law in Utah that allows people to sit up front if they are straddling the bar. Looking right at them he asked, "And are they all straddling a bar?" "Yes." "Does everyone have a life vest?" Again remember he is looking right at everyone... "Yes." "OK have a nice day!"

Wow. They really have nothing to do in that area except sic cops on innocent girls.

We ended the day with no injuries, very light sunburns and a group of exhausted women.

The next day we did our 5 mile hike.  It was on our schedule as a 5 miler, but of course since we were still tired from boating, we thought we would just take a little hike then come back and do crafts.  The little hike was longer than expected!  One of our priesthood leaders took a truck up to the top so our lunches were in coolers, so instead of hiking down the longer than expected hike, and so we could maybe be 3 for 3 in the cop calling arena, we put all 16 girls in the back of the pickup!!  No cops were called (darn) but it was good fun! 

We had a fantastic testimony meeting that we started on the patio, but ended up in the living room of the cabin because of a good strong rain.  And on our last day we held a birthday party for girl's camp.  It's been 100 years since the first organized church girl's camp and we wanted to acknowledge it.  We had the girls write down something they always wanted themselves to remember - or not forget since our theme was "Forget me not."  Then they tied the paper to a balloon and we let them go out on the patio while we sang "I am a Child of God." 

Girl's camp is a place to be silly and outright weird while at the same time being filled spiritually and increasing our testimonies.  We definitely were able to do all of the above!  Because I wasn't as organized as I maybe would have been if Cali hadn't gotten sick, I led by the spirit a lot more than usual.  One thing we did that was because of a prompting was have 'family counsels' and family prayers.  They were both awesome experiences, for me and the girls.  During the family counsels I gave them a topic and we all shared our thoughts on that topic;  something you need to tell one of your parents that you like about them or that makes you proud of them, something to someone in the room that you never want them to forget, and on the last day, with the balloon launch they had to vocalize something they loved from camp that they want to always remember and want everyone there to remember as well as write down what they wanted themselves to never forget about anything.  The girls really opened up and said some deep and kind things.  Plus I think it helped us grow even closer, which if you knew these girls you wouldn't have thought possible because they are already pretty tight.

And that's girl's camp.  Sixth Ward Sexies on three. 1, 2, 3!  Sixth Ward Sexies!!!