My Surprise Camp visitor

We had two surprise visitors at Girls Camp this week. One was the Secret Service for President Bush and the other was my cute freckle faced daughter Annie Kate.
It was the last night and everyone was at the fire circle starting Testimony Meeting. (Testimony Meeting is a chance for the girls to get up and share their personal testimony and feelings about their belief in the gospel principles of the church)
I was in the main lodge finishing up the slide show with another girl. A girl from my ward who came up just for the night said, I brought something for you about this tall and has cute freckles. I melted. I told the other slide show creator "I have to go" (keep in mind we had 1 hour to finish the slide show and we were adding photos from just a few hours before)
I ran up to the fire circle and was just crying with joy. I could not believe I missed my girls, but especially AK. I think it was because I kept imagining AK up here in just 3 years.
One of the hardest things about preparing for camp was when Annie Kate asked me when this girls camp was going to be and when she should start packing and then me explaining to her that all this that I was preparing for was only for girls ages 12-18. That was hard. She wanted to go so bad.

So when I ran to the fire circle she saw me and started running down. I could not stop hugging and kissing her. (Jeff said she had a really hard week with me gone) We sat in the back and just could not stop talking to each other. We stayed for a few testimonies and then I realized I needed to get back to help finish the slide show and AK needed to go to the bathroom. It was so much fun showing her my cabin (which was totally posh), where the girls slept, where we ate and then showing her the craft tables. One of the things I was in charge of this year was the crafts. She was so excited as she has watched me get everything ready for so many months.

She sat down and made one of the wooden necklaces. She wrote "preview of camp 2008" She also wrote a letter to all the girls from our downtown ward as she had noticed that their mailbox was empty. (oh I can't wait to talk about the camp mailbox)

It was just an awesome experience for her to be there with me. She stayed for the slide show but cried the whole way through knowing it was almost time for her to go. I gave her my camp hat to make her feel better and Jeff said she slept in it that night.

One of the blessings I never even imagined from serving at Girls Camp was how much I appreciated my girls while I was gone and how I feel such a strong responsibility to teach them as much as I can about Jesus Christ.