YSA Summer Summit 2010

David and I were called to be over a 20 stake Young Adult Conference last October.  After hundreds of hours of work on the part of many people, the weekend finally arrived for everything to come together.  We had planned for a huge carnival, BBQ, and bon fire on Friday night and knew that the weather would need to cooperate, but alas we must have been lacking in faith because after spending the day in the fields laying out the area for volleyball games and other events, building a lighting system on the outdoor stage (all this after the fields had been mowed earlier in the week by donated hours of labor), the clouds gathered and the rains came pouring down.  At the last minute we made dozens of phone calls with our children all calling from different cell phones in order to change the entire evening.  We moved to the stake center across the street and carried on in modified fashion, praying the that YSA would still come.  And they did. 

Some events had to be canceled, but others went on inside, and yes outside in the rain.  Above one ward was in charge of lassoing, and what a fabulous job they did!

The gym was used for the bands, games, and the fun went on.

Speed dating took place in cramped quarters, but I guess that is what the goal was anyway... getting them together!

Volleyball nets were set up everywhere we could get space outside and the competition between wards went on.

The ward in charge of pie eating pulled a fast on one us and did huge cheesecakes instead.  Each ward could have a team of three take turn downing the desert.  It was messy, and oh so much fun.

Wards had come with their "champion" for several contests.  Here we tested their infant instincts with the ever popular baby bottle drinking contest.

Undaunted by the continuing drizzle, we marched over to the field at dark and lit the fire.  David felt the bon fire was not big enough, and he and a buddy augmented the work of one YSA ward by adding an additional 30 wood pallets to the top (they had to climb on top of the truck to hoist the pallets up from there).  The gasoline didn't work at first, so someone went to get another 20 gallons.... then it was an explosion.  The fields were directly across from Timpanogos temple seen in the background.

At the last minute we switched from snow cones to hot chocolate, and blankets that had been brought to sit on during the fire were used to snuggle up with (Connor and Sam) in the rain.

Saturday came off without a hitch.  David had the inspiration to ask Austin Collie to be our keynote speaker.  Austin and Trevor were good friends growing up back in El Dorado Hills, CA in the same ward.  I called Scott Collie, Austin's dad, to see if he even liked to do public speaking.  I loved Scott's response:  "It doesn't matter.  If he is well know because he plays football with the Colts, then he owes it to the Lord to speak."  Austin came and did a wonderful job.  Melissa Demaso (from El Dorado Hills, and a good friend of Trevor's also) joined us for the day.

We had a dozen great speakers for our workshops throughout the day including David Osmond, John Lund, Lynn Scoresby, dating specialists (very popular), and of course our own David Barnes.

Saturday evening the YSA returned for entertainment with ComedySportz, followed by a dance.

Our almost perfect day was interrupted by a fire alarm during the dance, which set off strobe lights everywhere.  We discovered that the air conditioner had condensed water that was leaking down a smoke detector and set off the alarm.  The agent bishop was called to come reset the alarm, but it would not cooperate.  We decided to let the strobe lights enhance the dance where the music was too loud to hear the alarm anyway.  The fire alarm OUTSIDE the building was extremely loud though, and a neighbor called the fire department to save us.  In came the police, the firemen in full gear, and the fire chief.  Only in Utah County can you talk the fire department into taking "another 25 minutes" to find the problem so that we could finish the dance.  Promptly at 11:30pm though they announce an immediate evacuation.

We ended the conference on Sunday at the Alpine Tabernacle with Scott Anderson as our speaker.  Don Ripplinger, who used to be the assistant director for the Tabernacle Choir, is in my ward and I had asked him to lead an impromptu choir for the fireside.  He expected about 50 YSA to show up the hour before the fireside started to practice the song the his son had written for the occasion.  Imagine his surprise when they kept coming and coming.  We ended up with 150 singing and had to set up extra chairs everywhere.  Nearly 1,000 YSA attended that last night.  What a great experience this has been.