Girls Camp 2008

This past week was girls camp. Katie went and did participate and did have a good time despite what she might tell anyone. I can tell by the way her attitude is and it was good. I was happy about that. We left on Wednesday morning. We stopped at Provo Falls for lunch on the way up to Stillwater which is where out campground was. It's just about 100 miles from Bountiful. It was a nice group campground with bathrooms - the non flushible kind. No hot water. No electricity. But otherwise, a nice area. We set up camp and then covered and decorated journals which we then left out for everyone who wanted to could write nice little messages in each others journals. After that activity, we did an activity known as the Electric Fence. We found 4 trees spaced nicely apart and put a rope completely around the four trees then put all the girls inside the roped area. They were told that the rope was like an electric fence. They couldn't touch it or go under it and they couldn't talk to each other. They had to figure out how to get all of them outside of the roped area keeping those rules in mind. Everytime they violated a rule, it would count as a point. 3 points, and if anyone had gotten outside of the electric fence, they would all have to go back in and start all over again. It was quite the challenge for them to figure out how to get out without speaking, without us giving them any clues and without touching the fence. It took about an hour and a half before they succeeded. We were all getting frustrated by that point. Especially everytime they had to start over. It was a good learning game since they learned how they had to work together in order for all of them to succeed at the game. After the game, we started the fire and cooked our foil dinners. We had our devotional time every evening after dinner around the campfire. Katie and I slept in the back of the van next to one of the tents. It got really, really cold at night. We about froze all night long.

On Thursday we were happy to wake up to the sunshine which quickly warmed us up. After breakfast, a lady from the ward came up and helped us make plates or bowls out of pottery. We had to gather things from nature to make impressions in the pottery. It was another fun activity. For lunch I told the story "Stone Soup" and all the girls put in the items they had brought from home to add to the soup. While the soup cooked, we finished up with our pottery activity and wrote in journals. We then did a compass activity for the girls who had to pass off that skill. We played games and goofed around until dinner which was hamburgers and hot dogs. After dinner we had our devotional time and then went to bed for another long, cold night of sleep. This time, Katie and I both slept with our hoodies on our heads, double socks on our feet and we doubled up our blankets. It was better, but still cold.

Friday morning after breakfast we all made sack lunches and headed off for our hike. We did a 4-mile round trip hike. It was nice but exhausting. I pulled my groin muscle somehow and limped most of the way back in extreme pain. It was your birthday so I yelled "Happy Birthday Charlie" when we were at our stopping point of the hike for lunch out in a wooded clearing. Did you hear it?? We got back to the camp around 4:00pm from the hike. I didn't make Katie go on the hike which was a good thing. The terrain would have re-injured her healing fractured foot. She stayed behind with 2 of the YW leaders and they did their own version of solo time and got potatoes wrapped for dinner and stuff like that. While dinner was cooking, we all made bracelets. For dinner we had dutch oven BBQ chicken and baked potatoes. For our campfire devotional on that night, the dad of one of our leaders came and played his guitar and sang and did a spiritual devotional for us. He sang a song about our Heavenly Mother that brought us all to tears. After his part, we had our testimony meeting. By the time bedtime came, I could hardly walk and I could hardly life my leg without excrutiating pain. I tried to go go to sleep but even laying still brought me to tears so I finally hobbled back outside and had the Bishop and Josh give me a blessing. My nights sleep was less than comfortable to say the least since everytime I moved it hurt but I managed to make it through the night.

Saturday morning we got up, had breakfast, packed up and headed home. We got home about 1:30pm. The shower felt heavenly after almost 4-days and being able to use a bathroom that didn't stink and you could flush was also fantastic. And, I slept soooooooooooo good last night in my own, comfortable bed.

Our Cruise - 2008

Wow. What a great time we had. For those who don't know, Dennis and I took a Royal Caribbean cruise to Baha Mexico the last week of May. We finally got our honeymoon!!! "Better Late, than never" I always say.

We arrived in Long Beach about 10:30am. We caught a shuttle bus over to the cruise port. It was quite the process getting on the ship. It made me think of what it must have been like when our ancestors came over to our country and had to go through the process they did. Once onboard, we went and found our room. It was a nice room with a nice big window so we could look out and see everything on our side of the ship. We settled in a bit and then headed out to explore the ship. It was huge. A city on the water almost. We went upstairs on the top deck and got some lunch. It was strange getting food and not having to pay for it. It's all inclusive. After eating some lunch, we went back to our room and took a nap before dinner. We had the early dinner time (5:30pm) so we headed to our dining room and to our assigned table. We were put at a table of 6. We had an older couple who had cruised several times before and a younger couple who was on their first cruise. The older couple live in CA. The younger couple live in St. George, UT. What a coincidence huh? The menu choices were almost overwhelming and to think we could eat all we wanted without thought or care of the price. I believe I had the Mahi, Mahi that first night. It was prepared wonderfully and tasted good. After dinner we walked around the ship some more and went and got our port activity tickets. Then we went to a show. It was a comedian and I laughed so hard I had tears in my eyes. Very funny.....

On Tuesday, our first port was in San Diego. I had watched us arrive into port from our stateroom and it was quite impressive. We left the ship early morning and did the San Diego Harbor tour. It was really nice and we got to see sea lions and hear a little about the history of the harbor and best of all, just sit and relax in the warm sunshine. After the harbor tour, we walked over to the Midway aircraft carrier museum and did the self tour. That was also a lot of fun and very interesting. We found the CPO dining room and area and thought about dad and how it must have been for him to live on that ship for several months at a time. That evening, back on the ship, we got sang a Happy Anniversary song during dinner and enjoyed another wonderful dinner. I believe I had the leg of lamb that night and it was excellent. This was also the night we had to dress up formally for dinner because after dinner, we got to meet the captain of the ship which just so happens to be a female. The only female captain I might add. They had a reception for her and she talked to us and introduced us to the crew and it was another nice evening.

On Wednesday, our port was Catalina Island. I, again, watched us as we approached the island that morning. We had to take a boat from our cruise ship over to the island. We went on a glass bottom boat and got to see the going's on under the ocean. It was cool. I loved it. We had lunch at a fresh seafood restaurant on the island and then walked around the little shops there and just took in the whole ambiance of the island. It was a nice, quaint island. We enjoyed our day. We had our dinner at 5:30pm back on the ship and later that evening they did a chocolate feast. They had things sculpted out of chocolate and fruits and vegitables and ice and it was quite spectacular. We also went to a show where there was this guy that does impressions and imitations of people. He was really good and very entertaining.

Thursday was my birthday and our port was Ensanada, Mexico. We left the ship after breakfast and got on a bus that drove us into the center of Ensanda's shopping district. Our tour guide, of course, gave us some history while we were driving there. We had two hours to walk up and down the streets and shop and just take in Mexico. We went to a place that looked respectable and popular and had real authentic Mexican tacos and I had a virgin margarita. It was my birthday after all. After the shopping, we got back on the bus and went to a cultural center where we were entertained with a fiesta of sorts. It was fun. That evening at dinner, back on the ship, they sang happy birthday to me and I got a special dessert. The waiting staff also did a parade performance which was quite entertaining. After dinner we went to another show. This time they had both the comedian and the impressionist do some more stuff and then the Royal Caribbean dancers did a farewell show. It was enjoyable but also sad knowing it was our last night.

We got up early Friday morning and left the ship about 7:00am. We took another shuttle bus back to the airport with lots of time to spare so we had breakfast in the airport cafe and then sat outside for awile and enjoyed the palm trees and sunshine. We got back home to Salt Lake about 3:00pm.

It was a wonderful week that left us with some wonderful memories.

Katie's foot

After 4 weeks of pain and 4 doctor visits, we finally now know that Katie has a stress fracture in her foot. She has no idea how or when it happened. Her foot just started hurting her when she walked on it. We wrapped it and iced it on our own for a week or so before it started getting swollen and we decided we better get her in to get it checked. The doctor did an x-ray but didn't see anything at that point so he put her in a funny boot shoe and sent her home with a prescription for some pain meds. He suggested we take her to a foot doctor. I got her into a podiatrist the following Tuesday. Another x-ray was taken but again, although the swelling showed up this time, nothing that would indicate anything more than maybe a torn ligament. This doctor put her in a "soft cast" and told her to come back in a week to follow up. She went back and the foot was still hurting and still swollen. He said it was too soon for another x-ray and that if it was indeed fractured, it wouldn't show up for at least 2-weeks. So, he gave her a frankenstein boot to wear (that's what it looked like to us anyway) and sent her home to wait it out for another week. She would not wear the frankenstein boot. Truthfully, I can't blame her, it is quite bulky and hard to get around in. So, another week went by of pain and continued swelling. She would come home from work almost in tears because of having to be on her foot for so long. Yesterday we returned for our follow up visit. This time the x-ray showed the fracture. Horray! We now know what it is. So now what? He said that since the fracture is only on one bone, they normally don't do much but let nature take it's course. You could see on the x-ray where the bone was already forming a spur, for a better lack of word, on each side of the fracture to start the healing process. He told her to keep it wrapped in an ace bandage, stay off of it as much as possible, take Ibuprofen for the swelling, and he want's to re-x-ray it in 2 weeks.

Modern medicine is great but it still takes time to figure some things out. At least we now know what we're dealing with. It will hopefully heal well without any further complications.

Bad timing

The day before leaving on our cruise (blog post about cruise to follow shortly), our washing machine decided to break. We've only had this washer for about 4-5 months now which made it doubly frustrating. What bad timing!!! Fortunately, I had most of the laundry done but not enough to sustain us now that we're back home. We called Maytag and the soonest they can get here to fix it will be on Friday. That means a whole week of using a laundromat. I thought I had finally advanced in life to not need those anymore but I was wrong.

The good news: The washer is still under warranty so it won't cost us anything to have it fixed!!

There's a bright side to every story isn't there?