FSY with Lacey!

Lia just wrapped up her Summer 2022 FSY experience at Seattle University.  This is a new program that the church launched last year, but it only comes to universities in our area every other summer.  When I learned about it earlier this winter, I immediately contacted the mother of Alyssa, Lia's good church friend who lives up the hill from us to see if she was free to go with Lia during one of the only two weeks that would work with our travel schedule this summer.  After finding out that Alyssa would be in Utah for family reunions both of these weeks, I started thinking about who else Lia could possibly go with.  Since she isn't quite as close with any of her other church friends, I immediately thought of asking Lacey to fly out from Baltimore to go with her.  After calling Lacey's mom (and my good friend), Kerry, to suggest the idea, I was so happy to find out that they were on board.  After a few phone calls to the FSY office in Utah and much emailing, texting, and phone calls back and forth between my bishop and me and also between my bishop and Lacey's bishop, we were able to get Lacey approved to go to our FSY a few days before the registration opened up in February.  Luckily, Kerry and I were able to get both of our girls registered on day #1 as roommates and Kerry soon after bought Lacey's plane ticket to fly out here.  For many months, the girls looked forward to going on this epic adventure together!

Although it seemed like such a long wait, the day finally arrived last Saturday night when we picked Lacey up from the airport.  After hosting her through Monday morning, I drove the girls up to Seattle on June 27th, where I dropped them off at Bellarmine Hall at Seattle University.  The girls then spent the next five nights and six days attending FSY with 300 youth from the area between the ages of 14 to 17 years old.  The girls had such a great time sharing a dorm room together, eating all of their meals in a cafeteria, attending church classes, playing games, participating in activities, and even attending two dances.  They made friends with a few other girls in their group and really were enjoying their time together when it all came to an end bright and early today when I had to pick them up at 7:15 in the morning!  With the exception of getting a little burned out with the amount of religious classes that they had to attend the first two days of the week, they really had a positive experience.  Overall, I am so grateful that Lacey's parents were willing to fly her out to Seattle and that these girls had the chance to share such a wonderful experience together!

The picture I was able take of the two girls together as I said goodbye to them at Bellarmine Hall on Monday morning.

Lia playing a game with the other members of her "company" which she apparently almost won!

Lia and her company holding up the banner they made for the banner competition.  Lia's company consisted of two girl groups and one boy group which they did everything with throughout the week.

Lacey and Lia eating cookies with their counselor, Emily, during free time one afternoon.  Both of these girls absolutely loved their counselor and enjoyed spending time with her all week long.

Cookie time in the dorms!

Lia taking notes in one of her church classes they attended on campus.

Lia and Lacey with two of their friends they made in their group, Madi and Ari.

One of the evenings, everyone had pizza night in the dorms instead of eating dinner in the cafeteria.  Lia and Lacey are the second and third from the front on the right.

All the girls in Lia's company.  Lia is third from the right in the top row.

The counselor, Emily, taking a selfie with all of the girls.  Lia and Lacey are just above her head on the far right.

Lacey brought some fun goodies with her so that the girls could do a "spa day" during free time one afternoon.  Here is Lia taking a picture with her nose mask on.

A cute selfie of the girls on campus!