Catchin' Up! Summer 09'

Soo...obviously its been awhile since I've done this but I promised Grandma I'd get back into it, and keep everyone updated!



I can't remember even a fourth of everything I've done all summer but the biggest two events I can think of our Girls Camp and Youth Conference!



Girls Camp was soooo sooo sooooo hot! The one week I can count on to get tan, and instead I spend it in the cabin cause there's a heat advisory out! What can ya do :) Other than the heat, camp was amazing! I was a 2nd year YCL and I worked with the First Years again! The theme this year was the Women at the Well and I became very familiar with the scripture considering I had to do three 20 min. scripture blocks on it! A good time was had by all. We had the full camping experience, a huge thunderstorm that required us to evacuate, banana boats, testimony meeting, faith walk, messy hair, no makeup, snow cones, and spending quality time with your friends with no distractions from the outside world. (However it seemed like everyone died while we were gone!) Thank you to Sister Beaman for being our newscaster when she came up to visit! ;)



Youth Conference! Nothing gets any better than that. Being surrounded by those who have the same standards and having the best time together!
Day 1-Mixer games, dinner and dance! Before the dance we traveled to our host homes to get ready. My house was a host home and the girls staying here were Abigail, Ashley, Britta,Christin, Mellice, Katelyn, and me! Later during the casual dance we learned how to do some square dancing! I believe its called the triple step!



Day 2-Service Project DAY! My group went to Hacap and weeded, weeded, and weeded. There was a little bit of lopping but mostly weeding! After the service project we came back for lunch and the variety show which ended up being so memorable! I was in 2 skits, one with Joe, and one with Abigail, Polly, Leah, Scott and Justin. I'll try and post the videos on here later, I'm not sure if I can though so I'll give you a short recap of both.

Joe and I-Basically it was about the awkwardness of 'dating' or getting together with someone of the opposite sex. We both acted really nervous and it all led up to the punchline of, "Hey Catherine member that thing we did with our mouths that one time?" "Yeah!" "You maybe Wanna do that again?" "umm, yeaahhh" Then we walked towards each other like we were gonna kiss and then started strumming our lips with our fingers. Too classic.

The Makeup Skit- Me and Abigail were really excited to get to wear makeup for the first time, for our first date ever. Our dates were Scott and Justin. The whole skit was of Abigail and Me putting on all of our makeup. The catch was we couldn't use our hands. They were behind our backs and our sisters were behind us under a cloth with their hands. So it looked as though we were putting on our own makeup but really it was Leah and Polly's hands doing it. They couldn't see our faces so it ended up being quite hilarious. I guess they got their revenge back that way!I was referred to as looking like the joker! Pretty creepy stuff! hahaha. Like I said, I'll try and put videos up of both later!



After the show we watched a movie, "How Rare a Possesion" and then the rest of the night was spent at Noelridge Park playing Soccer, Ultimate, Volleyball, Big Booty, etc. That night the girls who were staying at my house decided to have a little fun ;) Mommy drove us to the Holzers house (thats where the CR2 boys were staying) and the Frodshams house, (where the Cedar Falls boys were staying). We chalked there driveways, heart attacked them, and wrote with markers on there cars! Unfortunatly when we woke up the next morning it was pouring rain :( And so all they saw was the heart attack and not anything else :(



Day 3-Workshop day! Morning Workshops included...

Brother and Sister Griffeth-Purity

President Johnson-Seeing Things How They Are
Brother and Sister Gerber-Being an Example Jeopardy!


We had a lunch break with a ton of picture taking fun :)



Afternoon Workshops included
Dad-Spiritual Reliance
Brother and Sister Davenport-Dating and Diamonds
Brother Clayson-Education and Careers



After the last workshop we went home to get ready for the dance. Abigail and I put on our dresses that we made ourselves. Granted I had a little help from mommy! The dance was WAY fun but so sad because it was the seniors last dance :( It'll be really sad and weird at future dances without them! That night we were pigging out on food when Abigail heard a knock. We ran upstairs and out the door. In my yard were a bunch of balloons tied to forks with helium in them. And another bunch of balloons tied to a banana on my front porch! It was soooo cute! Inside the balloons were pick up lines on pieces of paper! I have a 20 minute video of us reading those pick ups lines while sucking the helium out of the balloons! Its too funny. The balloons were also written on. They said, "We love the CR2 Girls" Love the Cedar Falls Boys! Way too cute. They definately beat us and got us back way better!



Last Day:(- Testimony Meeting was incredible, 52 people bore their testimonies and it was sooo great! After that we said our goodbyes :(

I was planning on adding pictures but there taking FOREVER to upload. I will upload them tonight, or tomorrow! Then I'll add more about my summer. Plan on an edit soon!

Watch your words, for they become actions.
Watch your actions, for they become habits.
Watch your habits, for they become character.
Watch your character, for it becomes your destiny.

Life is good.

Woooowww everything couldn't be going more perfect:)

CROSS COUNTRY UPDATE

Districts was this past week. I have never felt so anxious, crabby, excited, NERVOUS! I was ocd about getting to bed on time, eating healthy, staying relaxed, picturing my race, etc. It was nuts. I apologize to those people that I snapped at because I was so stressed:( ha.

Districts was at noelridge where I went to state my freshman year.

Temp-48, a little windy, quite chilly

Nerves- VERY high.

The race started and I got out way to slow. My coach let SCREAMED this at me so I started kicking it into high gear...big mistake. Died about halfway through. However I kept it going at a good enough pace that I wasn't passing anyone but no one was really passing me either. It came close to the end and usually my strategy is to open up my stride with 800 m left and then sprint the last 200 m with all I have. This is my forte in a race, I usually catch about 10 people at this point. However I forgot this is districts and EVERYONE wants it. Each girl on our varsity team needed to beat a dubuque hempstead girl. There was one right ahead of me at the 800 mark and i stayed with her the whole way...however her athletic butt started kicking it in at the 400 m mark. I about started crying, I just wanted to shout PLEASE SLOW DOWN! I started to go with her and I actually made it to the finish line without passing out. However, I didn't get her. I started bawling and it was awful. She was right ahead of me and I thought there was no way we made state since she beat me. All our varsity team started crying and went over to the tent sulking and crying. Our coach ran over to us about 10 min later and yelled over that we made state! It was probably the most exciting feeling in my life! We went CRAZY! Tears of sadness turned to tears of joy real fast. We doggy piled and partied:) Our guys ran after us and we thought for sure they'd get it. We were wrong:( They didn't make it which made the bus ride home sad cause we couldn't celebrate (hence we didn't wanna rub it in there faces.)

HOWEVER....were going to STATE 08!!!!!!!!! See ya up in Fort Dodge this Saturday:)

So State is this weekend therefore I gotta miss halloween:( But don't worry me and maddi made up for it by dressing up in our costumes for a party. By the way...we got the most compliments:) You'll see why when you see the following pictures! Whats funny is these costumes were made for 7 year olds:) ha. thank you deb vahl for cutting up the costumes and putting some black fabric in between to cover up our bellies.



So after the party we hit up good ol wendy's and we had to go to the bathroom. So we go inside and we decided to take some pictures while we were in there. We took about 50 pictures in there so you can imagine we were in there for a long time. Now imagine a table of reallly cute guys from uni sitting at a table that saw us go into the bathroom....and imagine there faces when we walked out about 20 min later. It was quite funny. The cutest one even came up to us and started talking to us....

Cute guy-"I just have to know a couple things...one why are you dressed like that?"

Me-"uhh..cause we can? :)"

Cute guy-"Fair enough. Last thing...why were you in the bathroom so long?"
Maddi-"WE WEREN'T GOING TO THE BATHROOM IF THATS WHAT YOUR THINKING!"

Cute Guy-"Alright glad we cleared that up."

:):):):):) HAAAAA.

I got another use out of my costume the next night at our stake halloween dance. And guess what...

CATHY TOOK HOME FIRST PLACE FOR BEST COSTUME:) You'll see 2nd and 3rd place in the pics.

HALLOWEEN DANCE

My surfer boys from CR1. And of course ammon!

KATTTY! She did AMAZING on the decorations:)

1st.Me-PowerRanger
2nd. Scott-White Trash (pretty clever)
3rd.Colby-Sumo Wrestler

Oh dain. What a cute little girl. But cross dressing=NO. ;-)

So i'm doing a little better with the updating:) I'll try to keep the streak going. Next week I'll have an update with state. I made our state shirts and there hot pink with silver writing and black outline.

Front:
9 Runners
1 Team
1 Good Race...

Back:
STATE 08' and all of our names scattered around it.

Sleeve:
LM XC

Peace.

OH so busy. Homecoming:)

Oh how I wish I had more time to write in this blog.

Sorry relatives! I'm making it up now though.

I should probably start with school since I haven't written since summer.

Well...schools busy. Anatomy is KICKING MY BUTT! But I love my psychology class. I'm such a nerd..I will sit there and for fun read the pysch text book. ha. Its so interesting!

First day of school.
Me And Leah

Cross Country has TAKEN over! However its all worth it. Districts is in 2 weeks and were standing in at the 4th team. Top 3 go to state and were only a few points between Dubuque Hempstead who is 3rd. They beat us by 11 points at the last race however I wasnt running (Sick..still am) and our 2nd best runner had a crap race. Were so ready and we WILL go to state:):):):)

Madelynne.Emily.Me

We decided to get our professional picture done together:)

Next on the agenda;
Homecoming week was AMAZING.

PowderPuff

-Lightning vs. Thunder...aka Seniors vs. Juniors.

Final Outcome-
THUNNNDERRRRR!!!

And for the record I stopped a two point conversion. Ha.

With our coaches

Me and Jarrah getting Pumped before the game

The Start-Domination!

Before the Powderpuff Game we had our parade. The Cross Country team float was lame. We just pretty much sat in the truck. Ha. This picture is with Jarrah who's on swimteam. There float was cute...and she be looking good in that floaty;) ha.

SPIRIT WEEEKKK!:):):) Monday-Pajama Day; Tueday-Gangsta Day; Wednesday-Clash Day; Thursday-Rock star day; Friday-Spirit Day. Unfortunatly I only have pictures from pajama day:( And by the way..just so you get a clue of how many people actually do dress up...picture about 2,000 kids at Linnmar. Maybe only 60 people or 70 dress up. So it was pretty funny on Wednesday when Me and Maddi showed up sporting our footy pajamas!! We were looking fly. Everyone was jealous!

FINALLY. Homecoming. I went to homecoming with a guy from Kennedy...his name is Dane. Christian(He's the one I was telling you about) Annywaaayyyy. Since its his senior year we decided to go to his homecoming rather than Linn-Mars. Wow. Whoever came up with the idea to have Kennedys homecoming in there cafeteria was DUMMMBB. All of our dates looked like they had taken a shower....in sweat. Gross. They were drenched, and even the windows were fogged up from steam. It was disgusting. Other than that though..it was really fun:D ha. I took some pictures ahead of time with Maddi and Jarrah (best friends) since I wouldn't get to dance with them at Linn-mar's homecoming. By the way..mommy made the dress and she is VERY proud. However by the time was over the bow had ripped off and the dress was drenched with sweat from the boys. aahhhh. Crazy. PS. My shoes were ADORABLE...and I've never been in so much pain in my life. I think my feet went numb within the first 2 minutes. Those suckers came off as soon as I got to the dance! Here's some pictures and Grandma and Grandpa I'll be sure to send you a professional pic of me and Dane.

My haiiirrr! The back looked so cute!

Me and Maddisen on the swings:)

Jarrah.Maddi.Me.

My Jonnnny. He was very popular in pictures. One with me and him; Me, Dane and him; Him and Maddi; and many more!

Me and Dane:)

The whole Kennedy Group

I'm still sick and need to go rest for a bit..but I will try my HARDEST to write in this more often. A little e-mail reminder wouldn't hurt either:)
Peace.

PS! I completly forgot..I thought this was so coool! So after the dance when Dane and I went back to his house to shower and get cleaned up we pulled up in his driveway and his mommy was talking outside with a neighbor and she starts freaking out that she wants to see how I look. She wants to see my dress, my shoes...etc. I got out of Dane's truck and the first thing she says is "Oh my gosh your dress is BEAUTIFUL! And you don't look like a skank! So many girls wear slutty dresses with spaghetti straps, and halter tops and you look so cute!"
Mommy was happy with that one:)

New Playlist:)

Number one new news:)

I got a new playlist. Its at the bottom of my blog, and it has AMAZING music! I don't have a lot of time to add new songs now but I'll update the playlist a lot and let you know on here when I do that. Burnin' up by Jonas Brothers is a favorite!

Number two news. Yesterday=AMAZINGGGG!!!!

Some people from church got together at the Johnsons. It was me.Abigail.Polly.Trevor.Ashley.The Fagersten Brothers.Kyle.Dain.Bryn.David.Michael. Katie. first we played Volleyball and then went to Fruitzen. After that it got REALLY crazy. It started pouring so we played volleyball in the rain for a bit....then Trevor whipped out a tarp for slip and slide! It was pretty funny and way crazy. Some of them even went running through the streets. The night ended with half of us going to the midnight showing of Batman, and the other half of us headed to Wendys.
I sooo wish everyone from church didn't live so far away:(

Philmont;Youth Conf.

Double Post.

Philmont

We left for Cimarron, New Mexico at 5 in the morning on Thursday, drove 10-12 hours to Denver, Colorado. We stayed there for the night, and while the family went to a sight seeing ghost town me and Leah decided to be poopers and stay at the hotel all day and relax by the pool:):) We stayed the night again and left early in the morning for New Mexico. We arrived in the pouring rain which we thought we left behind in Iowa. After checking in and relaxing we had the opening cermonies where we sang corny songs and met up with our groups. I met a girl, Katelyn Youngblood who lives in Tennesee. We hit it off pretty good and ended spending most of the rest of the week together.

Sunday Services were the same as usual but just with a lot of different people. I learned Saturday night that the kids in my group (we were called the broncos, kids from 14-18) would be doing the cope course. I am DEATHLY afraid of heights and I was not happy. As much as I'd like to tell you everything I did the whole week piece by piece you'd get bored. So I'll just tell ya the big stuff. We played a LOT of get to know you games all week, and we had a lot of fun together:) I made a lot of friends I'll be keeping in contact with for a long time!!Monday Afternoon we went to the Cope Course but only did Low Cope thank goodness:) That night was FHE and there was a talent show. Mommy and Julia did a duet with Beauty and the Beast. They did pretty good considering they had to play it on the piano.

Tuesday after meeting with the group was basically a family day. We went up to Tous, New Mexico and went to the Pueblos. After I got tired of looking at them, I begged to go to the MODERN Tous where there was lots of shopping:):):):):) I bought a baseball shirt and once I got home and washed it....it shrunk:(

Wednesday we went on a hike and it started raining again. We got SOAKED! But it was really fun:) We went about 4 miles into the mountains, and the 4 miles out. We went a little faster on the way home as lightening seemed to get closer and closer. Wednesday night was the barbeque and they had western dancing. It was amazingly fun:) Before the dance me and Katelyn got our faces painted. She got superman and I got batman! After the dance the broncos went to the Trading Post (The Philmont shop) to get icecream and we all hung out and talked for a couple hours.

Thursday was the day I'd been so nervous for all week. You have to understand I won't even go on a ferris wheel..I will cry. So when I heard we would be doing zipline at the course that day I wasn't too excited. Everyone was cheering for me, and I knew if I didn't do it I'd be really upset with myself later and regret not doing it. So I strapped up and climbed up the pole. Mind you this pole had TINY TINY little handles coming out to hold onto. Then you get up on the platform...and its WOBBLING! I cried climbing the whole way up, and instead of being brave and Jumping off the platform into the zipline...I calmly sat down on the edge of the platform and after awhile I finally inched my way off. Not gonna lie after I started going it was fun...so why can't that just have stairs leading up:):) Thursday night was the dance and closing ceremonies. Every group had a skit, and ours was a fireworks show. It was pretty funny. I about peed myself. After that was the dance, and we all had a great time:)

Friday was our drive to Omaha...which was very long. We stayed the night there and met up with Grandma and Grandpa. The next day we went to the Omaha Zoo.

PHEW. Vacation #1 done.

But I still had Youth Conf. 2 days away!!!!

Youth Conference

It started on Wednesday. We got there and did mixer games and said hi to everyone. Then we went back to our host homes. Mine was my house..lucky me:) I didn't have to pack! That night was the casual dance, and I'm proud to say I won the hoola hoop contest:) lol. Guess all that hoola hooping in gym class finally paid off.

Thursday-Service Project, which was weeding. I think my dad chose that just cause he knows how much I hate it. But weeding with your friends is surprisngly not as bad as out at the garden. After the service project we did road shows. (Skits). That was AMAZINGLY fun! There was a dummy that had a bunch of props and we had to pick one and then our skit was based off of that item. We picked the microphone and what do you know, the skit was based off of American Idol. Our group worked extremely well and we came up with I think was a pretty good short skit. We had to make up new words to a primary song and we chose Popcorn Popping. I wish I could remember the words that we came up with but I can't. I was Paula, KJ was Randy, and David was Simon. We had Jordan Holtzer up first and he rapped the revised popcorn popping song with some break dancing. Then little bright tracy came out and sang a REALLY out there, bad style of "I am like a star" Then the winner of the show was a girl named Monica who sang I am a Child of God. She forgot the words to the song a little bit, but she sang it beautifully:) It was really fun. Some other groups like Abigails and Elizas did the Ellen DeGeneres Show. Abigail was Ellen and they were talking about Mormons and the guest had about 10 kids with her. (Hence Mormons and big familes) haha. That night we had a barbeque out at Jones Park and the group I was in played soccer for awhile. That may have been one of the times I've sweated the most. Then we played big boooty for awhile.

Friday we had workshops all day. The morning workshops included:

My dad-He played some of the movie "Truth and Conviction"
President Talbot the Mission President-Q&A about missions

Stake Patriarch-Q&A about Patriarachal Blessings

Lunch

Brother&Sister Meyers-Sexual Purity, 10 reasons to stay a Virgin

Brother Davenport-All about disasters, Floods, Fires, Peril

President Johnson-Anything we wanted to talk about, our group came up with how to strengthen our minds against satan, How to better the homelife, and how to have a closer relationship with God, and Jesus.

That night was the Formal dance and the last night.

Saturday was the Testimony Meeting, and its not really something I can express other than it was really amazing. Also, Me, Abigail, Katie, Polly, Joe, Trevor, Ben and Jacob sang "Steadfast and Immovable"

We said our goodbyes:( and made plans to hang this Thursday.

PHEW! You probably didn't read all that and I don't blame ya! Girls Gamp is next week so expect a full update on that as well when I get back:):):)

That darn teetor totter

Poor baby got an owie:(

I came home from Coldstone the other day to find that James had gone to the clinic to see to his "gashed out eye" says my overdramatic sister.
Ridiculous.
However it was a pretty bad wound.
Who's fault? The teetor totter.
I guess James fell off...Jonathan went flying and the teetor totter slammed James in the face.



What a trooper.

Sandbaggging over!

Wednesday night-Sandbagging
Thursday-Sandbagging; break; Sandbagging
Friday-Shoveling out water with buckets.....for 5 hours.
Conclusion? Nothing. Sandbags didn't hold up. And after 5 hours of shoveling out water...we got 2 inches out of a friends basement. We decided to let the generator take over from there.

My back is still screaming at me...and when I asked my dad if he would pay for me to get a massage....he actually considered:)
I'm not complaining...I volunteered to help! But....it would be NICE if the efforts were atleast put to some use. But it all works out because now the real project begins with cleaning...and there will be plenty to do then.

This past week has been sooo crazy! I'll just give a quick update.
Wednesday-Worked, then with my church youth group we went to Palo to help with sandbags. Phase 1 of my back pain. Bending over and tieing is quite a task. I didn't know pain till Friday though.

Thursday-Me, Kenzie, Nate, Chris, and Kellan went to Mt. Vernon and after tieing for awhile we went out to a church and dropped off sandbags. Meaning we got in a line and passed those sandbags along from person to person. Thursday night I went to Aarons with Kenzie. Aarons brother Garrett was having a fight night. What guys get out of this is beyond me. They were boxing and it was pretty entertaining to watch. There was a few bloody noses, a couple black eyes, and one went unconciouness for a sec. It was crazy and me, aaron, kenzie and ian just watched them beat the crap out of each other.

Friday-Me and Kenzie went with my daddy to a coworkers house. She was right next to the flood down the street....and the water had seeped up through her basement. We tried many tactics to get the water out. After what seemed like forever passing buckets we decided it wasn't working. It was crazy, we were doing a swinging motion with the buckets and my back couldn't handle it. Not only was my back killing me but my hands killed. These weren't nice buckets with nice handles. They were the wire handles:(

NEWSFLASH!!!
Cedar Rapids and Marion must use water as a drink only basis.

So after we were covered in disgusting water, me, Kenzie and Nick decided we should probably get a shower from somewhere. So we drove to Atkins Friday afternoon. This should've taken 25-30 minutes. Nope....about 2 hours. I-380 was backed up and bumper to bumper the whole way until we got past the bridge. We finally got out to Atkins and stayed at Nicole Holzes...Thank you Nicole and Ryan!!! We showered...played some guitar hero...ate...nick slept then we decided to leave. Traffic on the way back was just as bad. Got home around 9:30ish. We came back to my house and crashed on the couch. Who goes to bed at 11 during summer? Thats how tired we were. ha.

Saturday-Chill day. Went to Andrea and Kristina's grad party, then had some friends over. Kenzie, Ian, Kyle, Aaron, Tyler, and Nick just chilled at my house and we watched movies. When they left I realized that I had some work to do......like a talk that I was supposed to give the next day. WHOOPS:) ahahahha. I had some of it done...and finished it that night.

Sunday-VERY nervous. Talked on my daddy. and it was done! However as much as I HATED getting up in front of everyone it was really nice to just think about my dad and all the great stuff he does for me:)

Today-Going shopping at goodwill:) I need some new clothes and I don't have enough money to go to Target or Old Navy hahaha. After that Aaron, and Ian and I are going to Coldstone. and then family night...which then we will be filling out medical forms for Philmont. How fun.

PS! Girls camp is POSTPONED!!!! NO more canada:(
PSS! Got my addition of Runners World yesterday...told me the top 4 running songs to Maximize heart rate. They don't seem that way to me but....it came from a lab. So it must be right?
1.The Heat is on by Glenn Frey
2.Reach by S Club 7
3,Everybody needs somebody to love by the Blues Brothers
4.William Tell Overture by Rossini

I still say eye of the tiger works.