Summer Nights

Can I just tell you how much I LOVE summer nights? The weather here has been hot but the warm weather just brings people out which you all know I LOVE cuz I LOVE people and I LOVE to socialize. Summer brings about so many activities that you can't do in the winter here and its just fun. We have ward prayer every Sunday evening at my house. People just linger and talk and I love it. In the winter it seems like people always hurry home but tonight people just stayed. Then some of us went to check out another gathering up the street but it was a no go. We turned to come home and must have run into 5 or 6 different groups of people who we knew and thus began to chat with. I was almost home when I found some more friends and just kept on talking. I am just now getting home and was planning on getting this blog out hours ago. Its just SOOO much fun. I love the neighborhood where I live and all the opportunities we have for friendship and service here.

Tonight for ward prayer I shared the thought. I was reading in the July Ensign about the first Singles Branch formed in Africa and how excited the saints there are and the opportunities they have now because of this newly formed alliance among the young single adults. I shared about how blessed we are to live in a place with so many great people and how we must take advantage of this great opportunity. It really is a blessing to be surrounded by so many great people.

A girl in my ward is in the play "Ragtime" showing at the Scera Outdoor theater. I went with some friends and it was so nice. Sitting outside on the grass with blankets and enjoying a good production on a nice summer night. Ragtime is a very sad, sobering play. The music is great and the story is powerful. I'd never seen it. I would recommend it.

On Thursday night I performed with a barbershop group for our stake leadership dinner in our stake presidents back yard. It was thrown together at the last minute but it came off ok. We sang America the Beautiful and Lida Rose from the Music Man. I looked on Youtube for a clip of the real thing from the movie. I found the coolest clip that I think you'll all enjoy so I'm posting it here. Its the Osmond brothers singing Lida Rose with Andy Williams. Its SOOOO good and there is even a guest appearance by the young Marie Osmond.

Lida Rose by the Osmonds

For some reason this clip has become therapeutic for me. It makes me long for the simple life. It just seems to represent a time when things were simple and wholesome. Though I know things weren't perfect.....it says something when that was an acceptable and very popular form of entertainment.

I went camping this weekend with some great friends from the ward. We had several people come up for the night but only a few of us stayed the night. I was actually the only guy who stayed the night. It was beautiful and nice to get out of town. One of the nice things about Utah is that we were in our campsite in 20 minutes. We camped up Hobble Creek Canyon in a beautiful place there. We had foil dinners and the YUMMIEST sweet corn grilled over the fire. It was SOOOOO good.

Back row: Erica Brown, Kristy Dimmick, Chelsea Smith Middle: Tracy Mills, Kara Harrison, Bridget Dewey, ME, Autumn Humphries Front: Julia (Jewels) Burton

We had a fun night playing games, eating good food and just enjoying one another's company. I slept great and the setting was beautiful. We had pancakes in the morning, packed up and came home. Again, home in twenty minutes so it was GREAT. I am including another picture from the campout so you can see how beautiful it was even though I'm not in it.

Kristy Dimmick, Erica Brown, Cara Wiley, Chelsea Smith

Aren't summers GREAT?