june 2016 (part one)

Liv's first dance recital was on my birthday. I signed her up for a dance class back in January and they've been working on the choreography to "Girl's Just Want to Have Fun" every week since. She was pretty excited:

I took this photo backstage before the show:

I was really impressed with how well Liv did during the show! Most of the girls in her class have been dancing a lot longer, and some are on the competitive team. Liv was so cute, it made me get teary, of course.

At intermission, I went backstage to get ready for the "Moms Dance" which was a total blast. I didn't sign up to do it initially (practice was the same night as young womens), but one of the moms told me that it was really fun and I should come (several weeks after they had started to learn the dance). It worked out that we had young women meetings on a different night the entire month of May (because of camp prep), so I was able to go and do the dance. I knew the recital was on my birthday, and I thought that being able to perform on stage would be the best way to spend my birthday!

The night of the dress rehearsal (June 2nd), I seriously got tears in my eyes lining up backstage in the wings. I wanted to dramatically yell into the spotlight, "I'm home!"  Ha! Yep. I'm a geek.

Here is a photo of all the moms (and Tiffany our choreographer/Liv's teacher) just before the performance:

This was totally fun! I'm so glad I did it.

Link to most of the dance here: https://youtu.be/HIq6lZOc2d8

In the auditorium after the show:

Burke had a busy month of June. We spent one week at Aaronic Priesthood camp outside of Greer, AZ, and then a week at EFY in Flagstaff. He had a fantastic time at both (and was sad to return home).

We got to spend several days hanging out with August and Kiefer while Aunt Sue was in South Carolina for work. We did a lot of swimming:

Truman loves playing cars with the big kids:

I love how he is practically lying on top of the car garage here:

Movie time while Truman naps:

Cars, cars, and more cars:

I have no idea what little boys did before Match Box cars and Legos...worked on the farm, I guess?

I ventured out to the store with these four cuties one afternoon (Hewitt was home with napping Tru).

I believe I mentioned in my last post that Tosh and Hewitt are playing lots of basketball. One of their coaches is Doug Smith who played in the NBA. He is great with the kids (and looks  HUGE next to Tosh in these pictures!):

Tosh and Hewitt have done lots of reading this summer. Tosh finally got interested in Harry Potter. This was the cutest to find Hewitt reading to Tosh one night. Love these two buddies:

After starting preparation back in January (for the other stake), Girls Camp finally happened in June. It was a great experience and I learned a lot. It was really helpful to be up there with such great women (and friends!).

I was able to pick my assistants in the other stake, but when the stake changes happened, and I was asked to be the YCL leader again, the stake leaders had already selected the other YCL leaders. I really lucked out to have such a great team to work with! 

Gabi Larson, me, Christy Brereton, Jill Tarwater, Wendy Jones

Here are some of the darling YCLs getting ready for our skit on '80s night:

I don't think I was ever able to get a photo of all the girls, but this is pretty close (we had 36 girls):

Paseo Crossings girls during the humanitarian project:

Probably my favorite thing at camp was the "Heroine" program on Thursday evening. Each ward represented a different woman from the scriptures (or latter-day women) while at camp. One YCL was selected from each ward to be this heroine for the fireside. My friend Christy wrote the scripts and most of the girls had their parts memorized. It was a beautiful, inspiring program and the YCLs were incredible! This is a blurry photo, but it's a cute photo of Christy with: Abish, Sister Hinckley, Eve, Mary Fielding Smith, Ammonite Mothers, Esther, Rebecca, Ruth, and Mary- mother of Christ:

Friday morning we had four separate morningsides (one per year, 1-4) all about different aspects of the Savior's life. This will be a new tradition for our stake. The YCLs each had a part and there were different recorded clips from prophets and apostles as well as music, and some testimonies shared by the YCLs. Rob and I prerecorded a quartet of "This is The Christ" before camp with another couple in the stake. A lot of work went into this and I think it turned out really well.

After breakfast on Friday was "ward day" and our ward went to Sunrise Resort for the day. It was so much fun! Jill and I on the ski lift:

A photo of me tubing down the big slide:

All of the girls + bishopric at the top of the resort:

Serving food at the last dinner with Jill and Gabi (LOVED working with these two!!!)

The four YCL leaders just after breaking down camp and on our way home!
(I have to laugh at my look here--I forgot my sunglasses were on my head. When I got home, Rob told me that it's the first time he's ever thought that I look like my dad with my tall baseball hat--ha!)

Paseo Crossings ward leaving camp:

Camp was a blast! Hope I get to go again.