Lia's Week at FSY

After only being home for 1.5 days, I drove Lia off to the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma to attend FSY this week for the second time in her life.  Since it was the only week that worked with her busy schedule this summer, we decided to sign her up after only being home from Africa a short of amount of time so that she didn't miss out on this experience.  Since the two friends in our ward who Lia is close enough to room with were unable to attend FSY this week, I registered her to go alone after she said that she would be fine trying this experience on her own with the hopes of making friends with her roommate and the other girls in her group.  However, after getting home from the trip of a lifetime and dealing with the effects of jet lag, it all started to hit her by Sunday night.  By Monday morning, she was very nervous about going without a friend and was regretting the decision she made to go.  With the promise that I would pick her up on Wednesday evening (instead of Friday evening) if she was not having a good time, I dropped her off on Monday during the check-in time at 12 o'clock.  After getting her situated in her dorm room, Lia nervously waited for her roommate to show up by 1 p.m. After texting me a couple of times as 1 p.m. approached to tell me that her roommate had arrived, I received another text at 1:03 telling me that a miracle had happened as a girl named Grace from her high school and seminary class (who is in another ward) had just walked in the door!  I was so grateful for this answer to prayers and for the fact that Lia would not have to brave this experience alone.

Although Grace ended up choosing to spend most of her time with friends from the stake in another group, there was luckily another girl, named Courtney, who Lia knows from high school who was also in her group.  So, Lia still had another friend who she could spend most of her time with this week.  And, although Lia had the same problem as last time with being a bit bored that each day focused so much on scripture classes instead of fun activities, she managed to get over her jet lag and make the most of FSY for the first few days.  But after texting back and forth on Wednesday evening, we both decided that it would be best for Lia to come home a day earlier than we had planned.  So, I drove out to Tacoma last night and picked her up at 9 p.m.  Her counselor, Emily, and two girls from her group (including Courtney) walked her out to meet me in front of the student center building.  And, although, Lia didn't have an experience nearly as amazing as her time in Africa, I am grateful for this second and final chance that she was given to go and have this spiritual and social experience with other LDS teens in our area.