Merry Christmas!

Jaren's a Teacher

Jaren has turned 14, so he has now moved up to the Teachers Quorum. We're glad to have him with us!

Jonathan Wright may be next...

Moving On Up

About a week or two ago, Jeff's brother, Josh Reed turned 12, so now he is part of the Deacon's Quorum!

Sunday was Rick's birthday. He turned 14, so he's now part of the Teacher's Quorum.

We're glad to have them with us!

Happy Halloween!

Tay as Frodo, Jonathan as a Ganster,

Rick as an Army man, and Jaren as a Mexican

Ryan as a Ninja

Dallin as Cupid

Jeremy as a Cow

Travis (Me) as a Ghost

Keola as Santa

Stake Conference, October 2010

Today was Stake Conference. It was a pretty good meeting! All the Alamo, San Ramon, and Danville stakes came together to the Inter-Stake Center in Oakland, near the Oakland Temple. Elder Malm, of the Quorum of the Seventy, spoke in the meeting. Oh yeah, and Jeff Reed sang in the Stake Choir as well. He was the only Deacon or Teacher from the Danville 2nd Ward in the choir!

Usually after Stake Conference, everybody has a tailgate lunch in the parking lot. But since it was so foggy  and rainy. Everybody wanted to go home or stay inside.

It was so foggy, you could barely see the Temple!

Jaren, Dallin, and I walked around the grounds a bit. We also talked to Rick and his family.

Then, Dallin, his family, and I went to the Visitor's Center and saw the "Reflections of Christ" exhibit. It was pretty cool! Here are some of our favorite pieces:

And that's all.

The Past Few Weeks

I know that I haven't posted anything for the past few weeks. I'll try to do better! But let me go through all the events that have happened lately.

 On October 15th, the Deacons Quorum went on an overnight campout on Angel Island, in the San Francisco Bay.

Their quorum split in two, and one group got to sail to Angel Island on Tay's dad's sailboat. The other group took a ferry to the island. They camped overnight there, and got to hike around to the old military forts.

On the 16th, while the Deacons were on Angel Island, The Teachers Quorum went to the Wurzbachs' house and helped them clean out their garage. It was actually kind of fun, because we got to eat pizza that Alex Lowe bought at Costco.

Then, that Sunday (October 17th), Alex Lowe moved on from the Teachers Qurorum to the Priests Quorum, because he had turned 16.

And thats pretty much it!

Another Temple Trip

Today, all the youth went on a trip to the Temple. First, we met at the church at 4:30. Dallin and his mom brought Costco pizza for all of us to eat. Then we hopped into the different cars and drove to the temple. Jeremy, Jeff, Jaren, Tay, Dallin, and I all got into Bishop Bromley's car. We then got to the Temple in Oakland. We first calmed ourselves down, and entered the Temple.

This trip to the Temple was kind of cool, because most of our names were from China. They were all born around 1860-1890, so they were actually born during the Qing Dynasty (I just looked that up on Wikipedia).

When we were all done, we walked out of the temple, and man, was the view beautiful. The sun had just set, so the sky was three layers of red, orange, and yellow. The lights in Oakland and
San Francisco lit up. It looked a little bit like this:

Afterwards, we drove back to the church, and went home.

The New Deacon's Quorum Presidency

Yesterday, The Deacons Quorum ordained their new presidency. Kyle Worley is now the Deacons Quorum President! His two counselors are Rick Patterson as 1st Counselor, Kyle Makaiwi as 2nd Counselor, and Keola Querato is the Secretary.

I'm sorry if I don't have a picture of Keola up yet. I will...soon!

Come Together

Since Dallin's birthday was on August 30th, he became a Teacher today! And since none of the Deacon's Quorum leaders were here, the Teacher's Quorum and Deacon's Quorum joined together all in one room. Here's a list of all the Teachers and Deacons who were there:

Aden Hales

Jason Bromley

Chris Glenn

Alex Lowe

Kelani Querato

Alec Viera

Jeremy Glenn

Travis Neal (me)

Dallin Earl

Rick Patterson

Jaren Garff

Kyle Worley

Kyle Makaiwi

Jeff Reed

Dewlin Rosdahl

Ryan Hales

Tay Hyde

Keola Querato

Teddy Wright

Alex Wright

Spencer Patterson

and some of Kelani and Keola's friends

All in one room!

After church, Dallin was ordained a Teacher. Rick, Jaren, Jeremy, Jason Bromley, Dallin's family, and I were there.

All-in-all, we're glad to have Dallin in the Teacher's Quorum!

Update

I know, I haven't said anything in a while. I'll give you a quick update. The Teachers are on their High Adventure on the Klamath River, near the Oregon Border. I don't know why I didn't go with them. I didn't really want to. But anyway, they had a fun time there!

Two new families had moved into the ward as well. Keola Querato is a Deacon, and his brother Kelani Querato is a Teacher. Also, we have Jonathan Wright, who is a Deacon (and who isn't related to Teddy or Alex Wright). We're glad to have them with us!

Moving to Teacher's Quorum

It's July 11, and it's my birthday! Since I'm 14 now, I've moved up to Teacher's Quorum. Because of this, the blog will run a little differently, you'll either be hearing about Deacon's Quorum events, and Teacher's Quorum events!

Camp Oljato 2010: Day 8

Then along came Saturday, the day we went home. We all got up, packed our sleeping bags and sleeping pads, and headed out of camp.

We hauled our stuff to the dock, and then went over to the Dining Hall to have a quick breakfast of cinnamon rolls and leftover cereal.

After breakfast, we went back to the dock and hauled our stuff onto the boat. Then we hopped onto the boat, and said goodbye to Camp Oljato.

It took a little while to get back across Huntington Lake (but I'm sure it was quicker than the Mile Swim!).

At long last, we got back to the dock in Lakeshore. We hauled all our stuff out. We then took a quick group picture...

...and then since it was the last time we'd see Brandon for a while, we had a big group hug.

Then we threw our stuff into the back of Brother Jackson's truck, and picked which cars we'd ride in. Brother Kukuk, Rick, Dallin, Jaren, and I were in Brother Jackson's truck.

On the way down, Dallin realized he had no seat belt, so he tried to make one himself.

Attempt #1:

Attempt #2:

We drove down the mountains and through the Central Valley. We stopped at an In-N-Out in Tracy for lunch.

After several moments of everyone constantly yelling "SHUT UP!" and watching Brother Kukuk rock out to "California Gurls", we made it back home, safe and sound.

And that's our week at Camp Oljato! Adios!

Camp Oljato 2010: Day 7

Friday was our last full day at Camp Oljato, and it started out with a BANG! Literally! You see, Dallin Earl told some of the staff to wake him up at around 5:00 in the morning for the Mile Swim, which is when you have to swim across Huntington Lake and back. So they came into our camp banged some pots and pans, and yelled "MILE SWIM! WAKE UP!" Not only did they wake Dallin up, but everyone else!

Brother Jackson left that morning, so Randall and Brother Kukuk were our leaders. And Dallin came back from the Mile Swim, cold, wet, and tired.

The day went on as usual: Flag Ceremony, breakfast in the Dining Hall, our first two classes, and then lunch. You see, throughout the whole week, Jeremy kept on getting the bent spoon at least once a day. It was weird.

Oh yeah, in the Fish and Wildlife class, somebody found mouse and its babies. They were put in a tank in the Nature area.

During Free Time, we made a big flag pole in our camp. We were kind of inspired by the flag pole in the Comanche camp.

It was also our turn to clean the bathrooms. Grant, some Danville 1st Ward kids, and I went and cleaned some of the bathrooms. Also during Free Time, Brother Garff came up to camp for the last day.

Then came dinner. Since it was the last day, some of the staff got to eat up on the table suspended in the Dining Hall.

We also got to eat pizza and hang out with some of our favorite staff members.

We then went to a Closing Campfire, where some troops and scouts were given awards. Connor got an award from one of his classes, and Dallin got an award for the Mile Swim.

And that's all for Day 7!

Camp Oljato 2010: Day 6

Before we knew it, it was Thursday: the day of the Olympicade. The Olympicade is a series of events where each troop competes against each other, all during Free Time. Luckily, Randall and Brother Kukuk had gotten to camp just in time for it.

The first event was the Regatta, where Jeff and Rick had to sail across Huntington Lake and back. They won 3rd place for us.

Then after a few events, came the 30 vs. 30. Ryan asked Brother Jackson, "What's the 30 vs. 30?"

Brother Jackson answered, "I'm not sure. I think it may be a scavenger hunt, here you have to find 30 things,"

"Okay, I'll do that," said Ryan. Apparently, the 30 vs. 30 was a speech contest, where you had to talk for 30 minutes on any given subject.

After the 30 vs. 30, Ryan comes back to Brother Jackson with his eyes really wide and says, "Brother Jackson? That definitely wasn't a scavenger hunt!"

Then along came the Jenga Craziness, which is what Brandon and I signed up for. What we had to do was take one block at a time from one table and build a tower on another table in a certain amount of time. Whichever troop has the tallest tower wins. Brandon would hand me one block at a time and I would build the tower. We won first place with 20.74 centimeters!

After that was the Dodgeball Tournament. Kyle, Dewlin, Grant, Spencer, and Seth represented our troop. While all the other troops chose to be "shirts" we chose to be "skins".

Not to brag or anything, but Kyle, Dewlin, Grant, and Seth were really good at dodgeball, and Spencer was really good at catching, so we ended up winning 2nd place in dodgeball.

Then came the Hard Walk, which is what Jeremy and Connor signed up for. I don't know what that was, but all I heard from Jeremy afterwards was, "Man, that was hard!"

Then came the Pentathalon. Rick and Jeff had take a Snickers bar wrapped in duct tape and canoe out into Huntington Lake, capsize their canoe, get back in, and canoe back. Then they had to pass the Snickers bar on to Dallin Earl, who had to swim out into the lake, and swim back with the Snickers bar in his mouth. Then he had to pass it on to Dewlin, who had to run around a quarter of the lake, and run back. Then he had to pass it on to Dallin Bruschke, who had to unwrap the Snickers bar, and eat it as fast as he could.

He won 4th place for us.

Before dinner, we went back to camp, and we had to practice the song we were singing for the Troop Skit Campfire (each troop had to make up a skit or sing a song that night). We sang "The Joker" by The Steve Miller Band, and Connor changed some of the words so that it would be more appropriate.

We then ate steak for dinner, and then went over to the Troop Skit Campfire.

When it was our turn to sing, Connor played the guitar and sang the different verses. We got to sing the chorus. All-in-all, we weren't that bad!

And that's pretty much it for Day 6!