Youth Conference

This year I was asked to go to youth conference with the young men and young women. I remember really enjoying youth conference when I was in YW and since this was Kaycee's first year going, I thought it would be alot of fun to go along. We started off the first day by waking up at 4:00am because we needed to be at the church by 5:00 to leave for the Provo Temple to do baptisms for the dead. Again I remember really LOVING to do that as a youth and I was excited for Kaycee to get to experience that. As I sat in the room watching our youth I was so impressed with all of them. As I watched Kaycee walk down into the water my heart swelled up and the tears started to flow. When she came out she had this HUGE smile on her face and she walked up to me and said "I feel so happy". What a great thing to hear as a parent. We were done by about 8:00 so we went home to get cleaned up and ready to leave. We went up Manti canyon to camp. It was so much fun to be around all
the youth and getting to know them. That evening we drove down the canyon into Manti to watch the Manti Pagent. It had been 14 years since I had seen it so I was excited to watch it again and Kaycee had never seen it so I was excited for her to see it as well. Watching it again made me so grateful to have my testimony of Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. Kaycee loved it as well. I figured that the kids would be so tired from getting up at 4 that they would all konk out on the way back up the canyon...not so much. Not only did they stay awake but they continued to stay that way until 2:00 that morning so many of them had a 22 hour day. Friday was filled with lots of fun activities such as fishing, playing in the lake and going out in the canoe. They also had a marshmallow war where you shoot mini marshmallows out of a piece of pvc pipe with your mouth. It was funny to watch them all running around trying not to get hit. That evening we had a devotional/testimony meeting and again I was so very impressed with the youth of our ward. They are phenomenal! I have grown to love them very much. Saturday morning we broke camp early and headed home for some much needed sleep and a shower. I am so grateful that I was asked to go and hope that I can do it again in the future. Kaycee had a wonderful time and is excited for her first girls camp in 2 weeks.