Summer Youth Conference, 2008!

Well, this post is definitely overdue! At the end of June, I went on probably one of my very favorite youth conferences ever! It was only one day, but it sure was fun! I've been waiting to get a picture CD from someone at Church, because I didn't get that many pictures, but I finally gave up on that. Most of the pictures they got are of me and cortneylooking very tired at the camera (so out of character for me, I know!), or of my back (I don't know why!), so these pictures will have to do! If you don't want to read the whole down, at least scroll down to my raft's picture (we went white water rafting..I just noticed I didn't mention that!)...It's pretty sweet!

So, we started out the day bright and early at 5:30 AM at the Church. For someone who never got up that early, even for school, I was not thrilled. Okay, it really wasn't that bad. They told us if we weren't there by 530, they'd leave us behind..Yeah..Right. I was there promptly at 530, and I was about the only person there, besides Cortney (whose mom made her get there at 5:15), and like one leader. We stood oustide the bus for like 15 minutes, had a prayer, and then boarded our bus! They gave us a "continental breakfast" of granola bars and Sunny D (they said it was the preliminary breakfast, because there would be an even better one at the place we were headed..yay!)

The bus ride over was pretty exciting! It was about 2 1/2 hours long..We watched "American Mormon", which I've been wanting to see for awhile...It was actually pretty funny! We were sitting my Janelle and Sam, probably the cutest girls ever!, and that was fun as usual.

When we got to Wilderness Aware (actually, I'm not really sure that's the name...), we got this great continental breakfast..cough. As you can tell, we all enjoyed it very much. The picture of me is definitely just being posed...That thing had like 500 calories in it, I definitely only a bite or two (especially cuz I had a donut before it..haha). We sat around for awhile just chatting, so that was fun! I was getting pretty excited to get our raft trip!

Janelle and Sam definitely had the best water white rafting outfits, ever!
Here we are about to get onto our buses down to the Arkansas River! Our paddles and lifejackets definitely were very attractive. Just wait til you see us in your helmets..boy you'll be blown away!


I'm not being biased when I say, my raft was the best. I was put in a group with Cortney, Janelle, Sam, Sister Jones (Sam's mom), and Brother and Sister Ballard (some of my favorite youth leaders ever!). Our boat master guy was pretty awesome. He said that our group was great and that he wouldn't have been afraid to take us into the hardest rapids on the Arkansas! I honestly don't think I've ever done something as thrilling as white water rafting..I really want to go again. It's really such a cool experience to be out there on the water, it's like all your worries and thoughts just go away, because you are totally just concentrated on manuevering through the next rapid..ah, I can't explain how great it was! I really hope I can go again. As for this picture..Well, there was about 5 pictures of each group taken. I tried to smile, I really did, but for some reason, in every single one, I had some funny face on..This was definitely my favorite, which is why I chose to get it for myself (my bishop got an 8x10 for everyone that went!). This is definitely a picture I will keep for years to come! Just a funny story...So the whole time, we were joking about how it would be funny if someone fell out while we were on the river. Well, no one did...But as we were getting out of the rafts, we were in about...2 feet of water still? Sam was like "Katie you should fall out on purpose", so I pretended too..Only, that pretend turned into my losing my balance and falling backwards, out of the raft, into the water. It was really funny. I was teased by her and a bunch of other people for falling out of the raft when it wasn't even moving. lol, I guess that's what I get for joking around! he he.



Ah, I love the mountains so much! They are soo beautiful. After our tour on the river (about 2 hours long), we stopped on the side of the river, and had a lunch provided to us by the rafting company. I didn't eat a sandwich (yes, i'm kind of weird and really try and avoid eating sandwiches that the bread isn't toasted...i just think they taste soggy and nasty!), but there was a lot of yummy fruit, vegetables, and chips and dips that were there as well! We hung around there for about..oooh, an hour or so? We all changed out of our wet clothes, and got ready for our service project. I didn't get a picture, but somehow me and cortney brought the exact same shirt, and a similar pair jeans. It was kind of embarassing, but funny at the same time. Like I mentioned, after rafting and lunch we had a service project. We went over to same place near the river, and picked up trash, and pulled thistles for awhile..it was thrilling. Cortney had an allergice reaction to the thistles though..haha. I didn't get any pictures of the service project, cuz my camera was in the bus, but if i ever get a hold of the ones from the ward, i'll have to post them.

After all the stuff we did down by the river, we had some time to kill before our barbque and fireside, so we went over to this little down, that was supposedly having an art festival. We all got out for like an hour and just walked around. It was such a cute little town! While we were wandering, we found this cool kayaking competition going on! All these people in kayaks would go into this place (see the picture below), and do all these cool tricks! That was neat.!

There was this really weird shop that sold overpriced, strange objects, such as the one below. This town, as cute as it was, was very very strange. There was like women walking around on stilts and long dresses, and this old (okay...maybe liek 40 or 50 years old) belly dancers..Trust me, that's not a sight I ever want to see again! After meandering through the town, my group went back to the place the bus was, and after realizing it was not there, went into the local kmart.


For the last part of our youth conference, we went to a house of some people that my bishop or someone knew up in the area we were at. It was so beautiful! I absolutely loved the house, and its surroundings. Course, i'd be scared out of my mind to live there (maybe I've read/watched too many stories about scary things happening to people who live in the middle of nowhere!). We had a nice barbque, with hot dogs, hamburgers, chips, watermelon (my favorite!), and really yummy brownies! Here's just a couple of pictures from that...I just realized I have very few pictures of people besides me, cortney, sam, and janelle. haha. It was pretty windy outside, so me and cortney tried (and failed) to find ways to keep warm. This first picture is our attempt to cover ourselves with a blanket..I actually really like how the picture turned out though! Anyways, after dinner, we had an amazing fireside by Bishop Dunn, of the singles ward in my stake. He talked for about an hour, and it was one of those times where I really felt my testimony grow! Definitely a great way to end my last youth conference...as a youth anyways. There was then a testimony meeting, and we boarded the bus for our journey home!





Well, here's the last picture I took before we got home. We look kind of grungy and tired, but hey..it was a fun trip! The bus ride home seemed a lot longer than the one there. A big ol' rain storm hit us on the way back, and even though i thought the bus would probably veer off the road and kill us all, we made it safely back to Littleton around 11pm. We watched this movie, Return with Honor, and everyone take now..NEVER WATCH THIS MOVIE. Honestly, worst LDS film that's ever been created. Anyways...I'll never forget this youth conference..I wish it would have lasted longer!!