Being Brave

In July I had the tremendous blessing of going to girls camp as a leader with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Its an amazing week always, but this year I was there with 3 of my daughters. 

Kate and Julia went as YCLs this year(Youth camp leaders) and Anne Marie was a 1st year, cuz well, it was her first year. 

Julia's responsibilities were to help with the first years so she and I both went on Anne Marie's first year hike. Anne Marie killed it because she already hikes Manastash ridge with me and she's a runner. But it was fun to be together. 

This years theme was Be Brave. Which is why the first year hike could even be "killed". They wanted to challenge the girls physically as well as spiritually. So all the hikes were challenging. The 4th year went on a 3 day, 30 mile hike . Yeah, we weren't kidding around.

As Youth Camp Leaders it meant that my older two were out front, leading songs and having fun. It was great to watch. And you can tell that they loved that I was watching with my camera;)

 And these ladies. I can not say enough about them. They were the heart and soul of so much that went on. Fun, funny, crazy, entertaining, loving, kind, energetic, and the life of the party. It would not have been the same without them. Shenanigans. That is all I will say. Them plus girls camp=shenanigans.

 That is paint were attempting to put on our faces. Glow in the dark paint. To scare the YCLs. Glow in the dark paint that wouldn't glow. At all. We shined lights on our faces, to no avail. We had to go out into the night, not glowing.

Didn't make it any less fun though.

And then there is this. I can't sleep in. I just can't. So I was up before everybody every day. I would go down to the dock of the camp we were at, read my scriptures, pray and just soak in this. No one else around. It was Heavenly.

Part of Being Brave was that we challenged the girls to go rapelling. Something most of them had never done. There is my Julia. Kate was at the bottom helping all the girls out of their harnesses and into the water when they were finished. They were both amazing.

 And you can't really tell because my camera phone is whimpy, but there is Anne Marie. She did it. She was so scared and she did it!

Then there was the triathalon. Like I said, we weren't kidding around. Julia did the whole thing by herself. I was so proud of her. Very few girls did the entire event by themselves. Most of them did it in teams. Which was still really way cool. But Julia, on her own. So amazing. What you couldn't tell from those lovely lake pictures above is that the water is glacier water. You will get hypothermia in 15 minutes. So that portion of the triathalon was very very cold.

But biking and running, not quite a easy breezy walk. But better than glacier water.

These are the girls from our ward who participated. It was pretty neat. It was hands down the favorite thing of all the girls. We took a survey. No really we did.

I would love to participate next year. But I need to learn how to swim. Drowning isn't an option.

So since I wasn't going to be showing my athletic stuff, I thought I should show my wacky stuff. With the help of Julia, (she painted them free hand) I wore these two beauties to camp.

  ON facebook I shared the following:

I spent this last week at Girls Camp as a Leader for the LDS girls in our part of Washington. It. Was. Amazing. Seriously the best girls camp I have ever attended. The theme was Be Brave. And we challenged those girls to be brave in all things-spiritual, mental and physical. In 5 days we had them hike, mountain bike, rappel and participate in a triathalon. We had people who have overcome huge challenges in their lives come and talk to the girls-parents who lost a child, a young mother with a brain tumor. We taught them about Christ and about standing for truth and righteousness. And we taught them that they can do hard things. I can barely type this without getting emotional. And for me the icing on the cake was that I was there with 3 of my 4 daughters. Two of them rappelled and participated in the triathalon, the other did the mountain bike challenge and spread her wings as a youth camp leader. I am so proud of them. Our camp director was so inspired and I saw 130 girls leave stronger and more confident. I spent 5 days outside, hiking with them, cheering them 

on and easily meeting my 10,000 steps a day.  I am thankful and tired and so excited to get back to my ridge next week. Life is good.

It was amazing. Truly. And I can't wait to go back next year.