Life Unexpected

The other day I was reading the book Spare Change and came across this quote by E.M. Forster. I decided this was a main theme in my life and it seemed appropriate as the title of the blog. Hope you all agree!

What's in a Name???

So as many of you know, I've been searching for a new title to my blog since many of my readers have commented that my life is not boring. So today I decided to call the blog Floccinaucinihilipilification. By definition, floccinaucinihilipilification means to estimate something as worthless. Now I'm not necessarily suggesting that I feel like my life is worthless, which is why I didn't call my blog The Floccinaucinihilipilificatious Life. It's mostly that I just wanted a really fun word as the title of my blog and The Egregious Life is less accurate than The Boring Life. I'm seriously taking suggestions. It's too much of a mouthful to leave my blog title as Floccinaucinihilipilification for too long. Time to comment people!! Find me a less boring, shorter blog title!! There will be a small prize for the winner... probably just a shout out in future posts!!

Courage In Action: My two days as a Secret Agent (sorry it's really long)

As most of you know, my church calling is Laurel Advisor, which means I get an awesome opportunity to attend Youth Conference with the girls. This year the stake chose to make us secret agents in the CIA, which stands for Courage in Action. The YM/YW theme scripture this year is Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage, be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed for the Lord thy God is with thee, withersoever thou goest." They decided to emphasize what it means to be of good courage and taught us a lot about how courage requires action. We started at one of the buildings in our stake and received our special CIA T-shirts. After we had changed, one of the counselors in the Stake Presidency, President Farrell, welcomed us and we we were split into 7 color groups. I was in the green group with all of my girls and all of the Young Women leaders from our ward and then a few other young men and young women and leaders from other wards. The Stake Youth Leaders began with a skit where one person was the head and body, one was the arms and one was the legs. They had to get ready for the day and it was very enjoyable to watch someone else's arms feed, brush the teeth of, and otherwise prepare the face they couldn't see. The lipstick was probably my favorite part. Poor Natalie had lipstick all over her chin. Wish I had pictures, but the camera was in the car... dumb dumb dumb. After the skit we played get know you games with our groups. We all took group pictures and then loaded up the cars and headed up to the Ogden Boys and Girls Club for service. The Ogden Boys and Girls Club is a nonprofit organization that caters to the inner city kids. These kids have been through things I never even imagined when I was their age, but oh, the sweetness inside. They started at age 5 and went up to 12. The green group was paired up with about 10 kids ages 7-9. A lot of the kids are hispanic and bilingual. One little girl didn't speak any English, but luckily one of the leaders in our group did, and he helped her to communicate. We played the getting to know you games with them, then split for lunch. After lunch, we went through 8 different stations with the kids. They had tug-o-war, basketball, face painting, tag, slip n' slide, a parachute, the sponge passing game (you know wet sponge over your head and see how much water you can collect in a bucket), and then a station with popsicles and a rest. We then took a group picture with our kids and then the Boys and Girls Club leader came and talked to the kids about how special it was that we would come to play with them. It was an amazing experience and I think all of our youth left with a slightly bigger heart and a place in there for a new favorite. Some of those kids were just too cute!! When we were done at the Boys and Girls club, we headed up to our stake camp Zarahemla. We set up our cabins and then headed down to the lodge for dinner.

After dinner, President Wurthrich from our Stake Presidency talked to the youth. He told a story about an Emperor who knew he didn't have much longer to live, so he sent out for all the young people in the empire and gave them a task. He gave each one a seed. He told them to take the seed home and plant it and nurture it and take care of it, and then come back with whatever they grew, in one year and at that time he'd choose who would take his place as emperor. Well, in the empire was a boy named Ling. Ling did just what the emperor said, and took his seed home. He told his mother about the Emperors challenge and she helped Ling find a pot and plant the seed. In two weeks, after Ling had spent time watering, and nurturing his seed, nothing had grown. In a month nothing had grown. In six months nothing had grown. All around Ling, the other youth in the empire were talking about what was growing in their pots and Ling began to feel like a failure. His mother told him to wait a little longer to see what happened. The year quickly passed, and nothing had happened with Ling's seed. He was discouraged, and didn't want to go back to the emperor knowing he was a failure, and now everyone in the empire would know it as well. When Ling got to the palace, there were many young people with all different kinds of trees, shrubs, and flowers. Ling hid in the back, half concealing his pot full of dirt. When the emperor entered the room, Ling shrunk back a bit more, afraid of what the emperor would say when he found out that Ling had failed. The emperor walked through the room, noticing and commenting on the beautiful plants around him. He then walked to the front of the room and called Ling up to join him. Ling was frightened. He was sure the emperor would make an example of him and could only imagine what his punishment would be. To his astonishment, the Emperor announced to everyone, that Ling was their new emperor. He told them that the seeds they had been given had been boiled, so they would not grow. Ling was the only one who kept the original seed. The rest had noticed that their plants were not growing, and so planted other seeds in their place. Ling's integrity and honor won him the role of emperor and he ruled honestly the rest of his life. President Wurthrich then talked about virtues that are important in our lives. He quoted from President Faust and talked about 10 virtues that are very important. Exercise Faith, Be honest with yourself, Be chaste, Be humble, Develop self-discipline, Be fair, Strive for moderation, Be clean, Live with courage, and Grow in Grace. At this point the youth were blindfolded and led to an iron rod at the end of the camp. Several leaders were chosen to help them through the path as Guardian Angels. I was one of those. At the beginning, two young women Presidents greeted each youth and gave them a charge to hold fast to the rod no matter what else happened for the rod would lead them on their journey. They were given a pebble that represented unresolved sins and told to put it in their shoe. They were also given an egg, that they were told represented their virtue and they were all given instructions to guard their virtue. Then their hand was placed on the rod and they began their journey. I was right near the beginning. My job was to tell each one that they had been baptized and received the gift of the Holy Ghost. I was also to help them stay on the path. Along the way, were deceivers. They were the members of our stake’s young single adult ward. Their job was to lead the youth off the rod and to try to get them to give up their virtue egg. The youth came in two groups. I noticed a couple of key things. When the first group came through the deceivers weren’t quite as sneaky as on the second group. They would try to outwardly deceive the kids and a lot of them fell for it, but as we got further along less and less kids were falling for it and the deceivers got sneakier. It surprised me, how many kids early on gave up their eggs for a chance for help. The deceivers would say something like, “there’s a big hole here, so let me hold your egg and I’ll help you around it.” Needless to say the kids didn’t get the egg back. Each time one of the deceivers would get one of the eggs they would hold it up triumphantly and kind of laugh. I wanted to cry! It was so easy. By the time the second group came up, I had gotten a lot more insistent on my end. Instead of just telling them they’d been baptized and had received the gift of the Holy Ghost, I would add that it was so so important that they keep their hand on the rod and hold onto their egg no matter what else they were told. The deceivers got better too. They started helping the kids find the rod and then once they’d gained the trust of the kids they’d lead them off the path and you wouldn’t believe some of the tactics they were using. I heard one of them tell a girl that she could have temple marriage if she’d just give him her egg. A gleam of triumph and the deceiver was holding up her egg. It was so unbelievably heartbreaking to see each of the youth go through and I just hoped in my heart that they’d have the faith to remember my words and keep their hand on the rod. At the end of the rod, stood the Bishop of each ward. He took the youth off the rod and handed them off to a guardian angel to help them off to the “Spirit World.” The Spirit World was at the top of a hill where the Stake Presidency was waiting to welcome each of the youth in. Some had sticks instead of eggs, given to them by their deceivers. Some held fast to their virtue and were clutching it at the end. At the top of the hill they were given an opportunity to sit alone and write their feelings. It was so amazing to see and hear about their experience on the rod. We followed the experience with a very emotional testimony meeting. I was so humbled by the strength of our youth. Even the ones that were deceived into giving up their virtue, learned a very important lesson and I hope walked away from the experience a little more aware of how sneaky Satan can be. We finished the night off with scones and honey butter and a slide show of the days activities provided by our resident photographers Papa Rat See and Watt Chin Ewe. It was a great end to a great day. We went back to the cabins and luckily it was a warm night so sleeping was okay. I didn’t need my sleeping bag to sleep in, so I laid on top of it with a blanket and used the sleeping bag for padding on the wooden bunk. Not the most comfortable bed, but I did okay. Holly woke us up at 7:30 this morning singing Rise and Shout the Cougars are out… and I’ve had the song in my head all day!! That’s for you Andrew! We went down to the lodge for breakfast which was amazing!!! Big thanks to the cooking staff… we did not go hungry! After breakfast we had a devotional where the Stake President, President Martin and his wife shared with us the importance of being awakened. Sister Martin talked about King Benjamin’s people and about Enos. She related their experiences to ours as we read the pages of the Book of Mormon and feel the awakening that reminds us of our responsibility for action. They then discussed a few experiences of giving someone a Book of Mormon, and then encouraged us to write our testimony in a Book of Mormon to give to someone. President Martin said that our role was to be rescuers. We need to rescue those who are in need of being rescued even if that was us. He told us not to give away our Book of Mormon if we didn’t have a testimony of it yet, because it was going to be very important that we testify of it. He told the youth that they could write the message in the book to themselves if that was who they felt needed the rescue.

After we were finished putting our testimonies in the books, we broke up into our color groups and played Minute to Win It. For those of you unfamiliar with the game show on TV, you have some silly, somewhat ridiculous challenges that you are required to finish in one minute. On the show it’s one contestant competing against the clock for money. At Youth Conference we did it in teams and competed for ribbons. We had three attempts at each of 12 stations to accomplish the task in less than a minute. I did get some pictures of this, but I think I’ll do them all in a slideshow so you can look if you choose. The stations all had some pretty funny names, only a few of which I remember, but I’ll make it so you get the general idea. The first one was called Paper Scraper. We had 18 index cards folded in half and 9 index cards that were flat. We had to make three skyscrapers 9 stories high by putting the two folded ones down facing each other and then the flat ones on top stacked up. We did pretty well, got two out of three ribbons. The next one was called spoon frogs. We each had 3 spoons and had to flip them into a bin in the middle of the table. We had to get 12 spoons in before the minute was up. I was really good in the beginning. I got 2 spoons in right away, but beginners luck was the key. Luckily the team came through to help and we got all 3 ribbons in record time. The third one was something about blowing…. We each had to blow up a balloon and then using the air in the balloon, we had to knock 150 Styrofoam cups off the tables. Green Team holds the record! 150 cups in 16 seconds. We also got 3 ribbons on that one. The next one was something to do with a catapult and a broom. We had 3 paper plates hanging half way off the table holding a marshmallow. One person had to drop a broom handle just right to hit the plate to catapult the marshmallow and then the rest of the team was standing back with cups and had to catch 3 marshmallows before time ran out. We got 2 ribbons. The next one was Ping Tac Toe. It was probably the hardest one ever. We had to bounce ping pong balls into water filled cups alternating colors and try to make a tic tac toe. We didn’t get any ribbons, but I got really good at fielding ping pong balls! The next one had some catchy name that I can’t remember, but the main gist of it was we had to hold a spaghetti noodle in our mouth and without using our hands we had to pick up penne pasta on our spaghetti and hold it there. The 12 of us had to get 40 penne pastas to win. The catch… if your spaghetti noodle breaks, nothing counts and you start over. It was pretty intense, but we ended up getting all three of our ribbons. The next one was called Face the Cookie. You take an Oreo, place it on your forehead and move it down your face into your mouth with no hands. This one was very funny to watch and I got a couple of really great pictures. One of them is the second counselor in our bishopric and I just had to laugh. Such great facial expressions! Our team wasn’t really that great at it though and out of the 12 we needed each round, the highest we got was 6. No ribbons for Face the Cookie. Next we had to put together cereal boxes that had been cut into puzzle like pieces. Luckily it was square pieces, so not too hard, but there were 5 separate boxes we had to figure out and on the last round, we were working on the Cocoa Pebbles box and it was off center enough that it was seriously confusing people. One of the girls yelled something like, “Come on guys, it’s just Cocoa Pebbles!” That got us all laughing and we finally figured it out and got all three ribbons. We decided if they made us do cheers, that was going to be ours! Next one was called Suck It. We had to suck M&M’s up in a straw and transport them into a bottle across the stage without using hands. I tried and got about half way across before I could no longer breath, so I bowed out gracefully and then took pictures. We didn’t do so well on the first round, but rounds two and three we had it in the bag… or the bottle. Two ribbons for that one. Next we moved on to one where we had a tennis ball tied to a rope tied to our waists behind us and we had to spin to get the momentum on the rope to force the ball to swing and then knock 3 cups off the table. It was dizzying, but a lot of fun. We got all three ribbons and some awesome feelings of vertigo. The next one was called Shoe Fly. You can only imagine. You had to fling your shoe, using nothing but your foot and land it on a table about five feet away. I chose to be the shoe catcher and throw back the ones that didn’t make it. Did you know that most sneakers bounce?? We had some real shoe flinging effort but the most we ever got on the table was 10 and we needed 12. No ribbons. The last activity was called Movin’ Up. We had a stack of blue cups with one red cup at the bottom. We had to pass the cups around the circle with each person moving one cup at a time to the bottom of the stack until the red one made it back on bottom. We didn’t quite have the right rhythm on the first round, but the next two rounds we got it down and came out with two ribbons. After all the teams were done, the stake leaders counted up the ribbons. We came in second place, behind a tie for first place, but we only lost by one ribbon. The sad part was one of the teams that came in first contained the Aaronic Priesthood side of our ward and the Bishop took up bragging rights. It was a really fun activity to teach the youth the importance of team work and to let us enjoy a little healthy competition. We wrapped up with a lot of thanks to the Stake leaders for pulling it off, cleaned up the area, ate lunch, and came home. Being that it’s free fry day at Arctic Circle, that was our final stop where we gorged on ice cream cones and fries before bringing the girls home. It was a great weekend and I was very blessed to be able to go.

Righteous Living

Today I am struggling... I just read a quote by President Harold B. Lee that says, "The most important commandment is the one you are having the greatest difficulty living." I've been struggling lately with my entertainment choices, specifically movies and TV. Without trying to shove my opinions on others or sound completely self righteous, I feel like it's time to give up some of my favorite things and yet there is this part of me that isn't quite strong enough. I don't feel like the entertainment I choose is even "that bad" but the fact that I even have to write that should probably be the first clue that it's not "that good". I am working so hard on my personal spiritual life and this is like the last thing I just can't decide to let go of. I really like The Office. My struggle is in the fact that I know it's a giant waste of time, that doesn't really promote my getting closer to my Heavenly Father, but I can't seem to stop. Probably owning all the seasons isn't helping my conundrum, but like I said, I don't know if I'm strong enough to stop. One of my friends decided she wasn't going to watch PG13 movies anymore and I so admire her, but I don't know if I can give up some of my favorite movies. The logical me acknowledges that it's a colossal waste of time and I'd be a better person if I followed her in this pursuit, but I don't know if I can do it. In this respect, I'm really riding the fence. I want my Celestial mansion while keeping my Babylonian Summer Home and it doesn't work that way. God grant me strength to stop justifying and commit to choosing more righteous entertainment.

Confessions of an Addict

Hello, my name is Julianne and I am an addict. You can laugh if you choose, but I am addicted to Showtunes. Specifically Showtune Saturday Night. It's sad really. Each week for five hours I sit in my house listening to this radio program, and then when I hear music that I really love, I download it (legally of course) and then I listen to it all week. Of the 400 songs that fit on my MP3 player, about 350 are showtunes. The worst part probably is that I'm not even sorry. I'm not planning on giving up my addiction anytime soon and I'm strangely okay with this fact. Some of my friends have just accepted that if you ride in my car or come to my house on Saturday nights, it's inevitably on. So there you have it. I am a confirmed addict and intend to stay that way. Keep all your programs away from me... I won't go off willingly.