Girls Camp: Where Near Death is Every Day.

I wanted to be sure to post some of my favorite things from girls camp before I go on yet another trip and forget all the nitty gritty details that aren't captured on camera. (Seriously, this blog would be nothing if I didn't take pictures of everything.)

Along with raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, these are some of my favorite things [about camp]:

#1-That everything was a near death experience.
"okay girls, what are some symptoms of dehydration?"
"death."

"what do you do when you encounter a bear?"
"die!"

"How was your drive up to camp in that big van?"
"So scary, we almost DIED!!"

"If it doesn't stop raining, I'm seriously going to DIE!!"

#2- The new camp songs I'd never heard before. Though if I hear another belted rendition of "Father Abraham", something is going to DIE!!!

#3- That the friendship bracelets I taught everyone to do were a huge hit! They did them for hours and hours every day and they even got some honerable mentions in Testimony Meeting at the end. Two of them even proclaimed they were going to make them every day for the rest of their lives until they had sleeves of bracelets on their arms.

#4-When one of the girls told me I was her favorite leader at camp. It was probably just to get on my good side. It totally worked.

#5- Letting 12-14 year olds climb a rock while they tell me their mothers would kill them if they knew they had done this.

#6- The teenage drama translated into some fantastic skits. As quoted here:
"You're cute, no you're cute, no you're the cuttest, no You are."

"Whatever old man!"

"She was blinded by his hottness and couldn't see the truth inside."

#7- Hearing this from our 3 African refugee young women every time I told them what we were about to do: "How do you know?". Well you see, there's this thing called a schedule and it's around your neck and it says on it that that's what we are going to do. besides that, I'm a leader and I always know.

#8- The giant moths in the bathroom drama.

#9- The totally amazing ability of all the Young Women to slack line ten times better than me on their first try.

#10- The fact that the spirit always seems to be quadroupled while at Girls Camp. It was that way when I was a girl and surprised me again as a leader.

#11- Going with the few girls that wanted to hike just a little bit more. Why? Because they were way more "beasty" than the others.

#12- Giggling on the inside when the leader driving the car I was in commented that "this road does seem really long doesn't it?" Well perhaps that's because you're driving 15 MPH. Just thinking.

#13- Getting introduced all the time as "Camp Nurse".

#14-Braiding at least 5 different heads of hair every day. Doesn't anyone else know how to french braid? (Really, it was kind of fun. I started noticing myself admiring some girl's braids and how even they looked and then realizing it was one I did! I know I'm so vain.)

#17- The blank stares when the girls "found" me when I had been "lost" and was then going to teach them how I survived since breakfast (emergency preparedness). Maybe the leaves stuck into my hair for makeshift "sun protection" wasn't as funny as I thought.

and last but not least: #16- Girls Camp being the best. send-off. ever. for now I am released from YW and moving on (or I suppose back) to Achievement Days instead.


and just for extra fun, some more of my favorite quotes:

Girl #1: "why are you wearing makeup at camp?"
Girl #2: "It's for my dream, hello? I'm going to be a cosmetologist."

"It smells like poop and soup."

"This is probably the beastiest thing I've ever done."

"She can do her hair exactly like Justin Beiber."

(describing what a "Soccer Barbie" is--sorry Hailey, it was too hilarious not to post!): "It's the girls who's parents only ever paid for them to do soccer and play piano. So all they're good at is soccer and piano and then you ask them about anything else and they're like, 'what?!'"

San Diego Day 6

In the morning, we went to the pool. The stratosphere has a a really nice pool. It made the $29 a really great deal. So did the cheaper fees to go up to the tower (only $7.50 for all the people in the room, as opposed to $15 a person normally).

We saw the tower from the pool...

...Then after checking out, rode the elevator up to the top...

... and saw the pool from the tower.

Laura had plans all weekend to bungy jump off the Stratosphere. But when we got there we realized it was a controlled free fall instead. Laura decided she didn't think that was as cool, so she didn't fork out the $100 to do it. But we watched some other people that did.

We had lunch after the tower with our tower passes that gave us a discount for pizza.

Then before leaving the casino, we had to try our hand at some slots.

Ryan tried the jumbo slot machine too.

We didn't do very well...

The last thing we did in Vegas was go to the Fashion Show Mall. Laura's nose had been getting increasingly sunburned all week, and she wanted to see if she could find a hat she liked.

We didn't find a hat, but Laura and I loved this store:

The clothes are crazy colors and designs but really cool. Also very expensive...

The drive from Vegas to Salt Lake was the longest it's ever been. I don't know why, but it seemed to drag on and on and on.

I looked back at one point and found a middle eastern in my backseat.

Don't worry, it's just Ryan. Not Jesus.

We finally made it home close to 10 pm. It was a long long day. and I've decided I'm really not a fan of Vegas. Other than the hotel pool, I thought it was all a lame stop on our trip. They've totally done away with any sort of family friendly-ness in Vegas. I think even Circus Circus has a topless something. It was all so gross and as Ryan said, "superficial".

I think we'll spend less time there next time. At least I'd like to.

San Diego, Day 5

Whew! I was at Girls Camp all week, and had night shifts all the weekend before, so I never got a chance to finish posting about our trip. I hope I can still remember it! I am going to be so behind in my blogging with girls camp and then on Monday it's Ryan's family reunion in Eden, Ut. I feel like I'll never be caught up. Sigh... oh well, what can you do? June is a crazy month for the Greens.

The last day of San Diego, we went to Seaport Village with Mary and Vince. It's right on the water in downtown San Diego, and is right across the bay from Coronado. It's just a little village of shops. The shops were all cute and unique, which made it fun. The area was actually really pretty, and it was cool to be right on the water. We spent a lot of time goofing off among the shops.

Laura was really feeling the art.

Hello. Do you like my hat?

The landscaping of the shopping center was lovely.

We ate lunch sitting right here by the water. It was so neat!

Just down the way from the shopping center was a decommissioned aircraft carrier, the Midway, that you could tour. So since aircraft carriers are one of Ryan's favorite things, we just had to go.
It really was cool.

Everyone ready with their audio tour guide.

We started heading into the Berthing area, and Vince says to Mary, "Birthing? Mary, you ready for this?"

So we got this picture of Mary "birthing" in Berthing.

I'm not really sure why laura looks so distressed here. Maybe because it's so close together?

Good time for a nap, I'd say.

We later moved on to the higher up officers quarters. Much better... I guess.

Ryan, looking at the Helicopter displays. Of course.

We really underestimated how long it would take us to see the ship. We had to skip over half and just go up to see the deck before leaving.

The Midway was really cool. I think we'll be sure to do it again, and leave ourselves more time.

Just after that we hit the road and headed to Vegas. The drive wasn't bad, we had only one major stop, which was at Buffalo Bills Casino. It's in the middle of nowhere outside of Vegas, and they have a HUGE roller coaster! We stopped to ride it.

Here's Laura and Ry looking nervous before getting on.

The roller coaster was fun but really rough. you really take a beating on that thing. My legs hurt where the bar and seat belt went and my whole body got banged around. I think I'm good for another 10 years. (it's been at least that long since I rode it last.)

Laura got this picture right after we got off. My hair and scarf hadn't been changed.

A little while after Buffalo Bills we made it to Vegas. I had made reservations on my phone as we were headed across the desert for the Stratosphere. Did you know you can stay there for only $29? It was pretty sweet. We checked in and Laura went nuttso.

I don't know if it was the long drive or the late hour, but she was crazy for the rest of the night. Ryan and I were hungry and we go to bed at 10 usually, so we weren't much for partying. We tried to find a buffet that was open past 10... and had to settle for Dennys. Which ended up being an experience on it's own. Our waiter kept saying, "Cool beans". Which led Laura to say, "I wonder what his name is? I bet he likes to party." (if you've seen Hot Rod you'll understand the reference.)

There was also a drunken Latino man that came in and walked right up to our table and started mumbling something about needing a job and some business cards. Luckily, our waiter shooed him out and we watched as he went to bug someone else in the parking lot and then almost fell on our car. It was so nice. Vegas is such a classy place.

Laura was a bottomless pit. After Ryan and I were finished, she started eating what was left off our plates. The waiter came to take them away, and with a mouthful of food she had to gesture that no... she really wanted that tiny bite left of hashbrown. It was really very funny. She was really on one.

Here she is with all our plates. She's laughing because the waiter had just been there.

It got even more awesome when, after practically licking our plates clean, Laura sighed and said, "Well, I think we got our moneys worth."

After eating, much to Laura's disappointment, Ryan and I voted to go back to the hotel and go to bed. We did try to go to the pool, but it was closed. So Laura proceeded to call the concierge and ask, while laughing hysterically, if there were any "cool dance parties" that they knew of. After that Laura was officially banned from the room to the hotel fitness center until she was tired enough to stop prank calling the hotel employees.

Oh, and one last picture. It's Laura and I making fun of the stupid faces the "Bite" show girls had on. We tried to cover up their nakedness as much as we could. Man Vegas is gross.

San Diego, Day 4, Race Day

So the climax and whole purpose of our trip to San Diego was of course... the Mud Run! We had a crazy fun time.

We got up really really early. As in 4am early. We wanted to get there with plenty of time to get our numbers and our waiver in and all that. And we hadn't ever done it before so early is always better. We were at the race parking at about 6 am. We were really early. But soon enough Mary and Vince showed up and after a stop at the portapotties we hopped on the buses to the race site.

Apparently we thought we were back in Goblin Valley...

We're such posers.


We spent about 2 hrs doing this:

Mary and Vince, the genius experienced racers, brought chairs. and Mary brought a waterproof camera. So these pictures are really all compliments of her. I didn't bring a camera because I knew I couldn't take pictures and that Mary would be prepared. :)

Soon Mara showed up... without her running shoes...
Her hubby made it just in time for her to have them for the race. It was seriously so close!

Here's the girls

and the boys

and then all over again with my phone

Look at us... all so clean!--and special.

Mary, Vince, and Mara were registered in the individuals race. They started before us team racers. But the race looked about the same as this:

The teams just seemed to be in coordinated outfits and costumes and such.

Not long after starting the race you come around the corner and get drenched in water from a fire hose. It was cold to begin with and then you're grateful for it later.

Here's Vince gettin soaked.

Then you run in some muddy creeks.

at this point Ryan was trucking along like a maniac! The adrenaline kicked in and there was nothing stopping him.

Until these hills...

Then his IT band started hating him.
The whole race kind of looked a lot like that--all hills.

I stayed back with Ry, but Loufa ran ahead and caught up to Mary and Mara.

Hey look! Someone put mud on Mara's boobs! Hey wait a second...

After lots of hill running and getting hit with squirt guns, we finally got to some mud!
Big ol' mud pits with a wall to climb in the middle.

Here's Pete (he was on our team) and a random mail-woman.
So funny!

And Laura:

The pits were surrounded in very slippery hills.
Doncha worry though, Mary and Mara rocked it.

This was Ryan's favorite part: the lake swim.

Ry and I actually caught up to Mary, Mara, and Laura in the lake.
It was a nice break from running to swim in 4 feet of water.

Laura, Mara, and Mary in the lake

So then we ran some more... and more... and then...

More mud!

Like for real, thick, smelly, mud!
It was so awesome!!

You can pretty much read the awesomeness on our faces.

There were several mud pits, another wall with marines screaming at us to get up it, and some tubes to crawl through.

Then the big muddy hill near the end.

The last bit of all is an army crawl under rope-flags in--what else?--mud!

We had mud in places I didn't know you could get mud in.

and here are all the mud runners,

Before

After

I seem to have neglected our team-mates in most of the pictures, but that's Anna and Pete on the far right who fabulously bailed out our team. They killed it and were way ahead of us pretty much all the time.

After these last photos were shot, we all headed to stand in line for the coldest shower I've ever had. Oh man. And you had to really get in it--the mud was everywhere!

Then instead of getting in the big tent with millions of other women to change, all us girlies just held up our towels around each other to change. It was freeeezing! and so hard to get dressed with frozen and wet body parts. brrrrrr...

After the race we all headed to In n Out burger.

yup, got a pic of that one too.

Then we decided to head to the beach. (actually, we were headed to Mary and Vince's hot tub at their hotel. Then it was so nice outside we decided beach first, hot tub later.) We beat everyone there cuz we changed into our suits after the mud run. While waiting for everyone, we made this incredibly amazingly professional looking not amateur at all music video.

Don't you worry, it's posted here for your enjoyment.

Mara, her hubby Jae, his brother Jordan and Jordan's fiance got there next. We all soaked up as much sun as possible because it was still actually very cold. Ry and I still managed to Boogie board though.

I only lost my boob out my asymmetrical suit once, in case you were wondering. (and even if you weren't.) I was pretty glad, I had been kind of worried how well it'd stay on. But as long as there's no crazy waves and a boogie board scraping across my belly I think I'm good to go! :)

Remember when I thought it was funny that the seals all just hang out laying on the beach together?
Maybe it's not that weird after all.

Mary and Vince came last.
I only got Vince in a picture though, but really, Mary was there.

I had had a mad craving for sushi since the beginning of the trip.
The Ovesons are not sushi fans, but they had a dinner date with their family members anyway, so the rest of us went for some sushi.

Here's the sushi place, got that one too!

This place had different sushi than I was used to. The rolls were named the same, but looked different. For example, these are Vegas Rolls:

and if you're wondering how you get a whole one of those in your mouth,
You do it like this:

Get that sushi Ry!

After stuffing ourselves, we ended up over at Mara and Jae's hotel hot tub. It was really hot, but felt good on our sore running muscles.

Then we headed home to the Trepaniers where we watched 1/2 of the Blind Side with our fam. It's a way good movie. We didn't finish because it was the kid's bed time, and since we'd been up since 4, it was our bed time too. It was nice to hang out with the Trepaniers some more though. (FYI, those non-Dearden's reading this: it's "trey-pan-yey" more or less anyway. It's french.)

Thanks Mary, for the incredible photos! I appreciate you allowing me to keife them off Facebook.