Sweetheart's Ball Part I

If you missed our Sweethearts Ball this year, here is a little teaser of what you missed out on. It was truly amazing. A special thanks to Jane Johnson, Laura Hogan, Chris Boswell, Jack Garvin the Activities Committee and the Youth. A lot of work went into making this a magical evening, and it was largely successful. Our theme was all three installments of the "Back to the Future" trilogy, thus we had three different eras represented: Old West, 50's and the future. We had dinner of sloppy joes, chile, corn bread, salad, chips, root beer floats, and cobbler. We saw Elvis and heard the velvety voice of David Hogan, played a few games and learned to line dance- Thank you Gaylene. We then finished dancing the night away. What fun!

Some great decorations donated from the McMinville stake, and many others.
This looks like one desperate desperado.

The "Shootist" Jack "the Pain giver" Garvin

The "Sister Act". They even did the skateboard race. Is that mission approved?

Our chili cook off winners.

Our amazing DJ and his techinical staff. Thank you Mark for sticking with it, and sorry about your laptop:(

Our own local crooner, the one and only, David Hogan folks. Give it up.

You want a what?! A sasparilla on the rocks, in a dirty cup? What type of a joint do you think this is?

The King is alive!

Some of his adoring fans.

It was rather gruelling and very competitive, but it fell short of "Church Ball" in it's intensity.

The youth did a great job serving us, and I think they had a good time at the same time. Win/win for sure.

Once again, Tami shows us how it's done. I swear, she could have done this all night.

Sweethearts Ball Part II

February 20, 2009

The Sugar Shack, with two questionable charaters

How low can she go?

Not as low as Gannon Hess!

Duuuuuude!!!!!

Our wise instructor

HARVEST FESTIVAL

I know this is late again, but hey, I am a Mormon, right! Anyways, we decided to invite the whole stake to learn about the many wonderful things that you can do with the crops that you have just harvested, and as with any good ward function, we included eating food as part of the curriculum. We had many great exhibitions set up throughout the gym such as freezer jam, apple butter, dried fruit, grape juice (not wine, mind you), Elk jerky (I know that isn't something you "harvest" but hey, who is going to resist jerky if it's offered to you), salsa, fresh bread and I'm sure I forgot something. The great thing is that a lot of the exhibitions were done by people not of our church. We had two great classes, one on freezing fruits, vegetables and meats (did you know that you could put a straw into a ziploc bag, close it most of the way, suck out the air and seal it shut just as you pull out the straw and it works almost as good as an expensive vacuum used for freezing) and a general class on canning, put on by my beloved mother, who came, even though she was sick- if you got sick right after that, I'm sure that there wasn't any connection.

This was the yummy elk jerky- if you missed it, be glad, it is the best tasting jerky that you will ever taste, and you will never get it again.

This was totally unposed, I was just deep into meditation!

2008 Elders Quorum BBQ

The Elders quorum sponsored our wards annual bbq at Burnsridge Park on June 20th. Thank you for doing such a great job. I think we were even able to do a little bit of missionary work by feeding some passerbys. The food was really, really good, just ask Bonny. Sorry Bonny, I had to add this photo, but in all fairness, I believe she gave birth within the next 24 hours to a beautiful baby boy. Congratulations (belated)!

Enjoying some good times between brothers.

Are we seeing double? This was a great shot of two of the Walker triplets. Don't ask me which one is which.

Rylie couldn't keep it all in. Good times.

We were well stocked for the water balloon launch which proved to be a great amusement to all ages. It was fun to watch the small group of youth that tried to catch them on the other end. Oddly enough, they were never able to catch one intact.

Camp Anderson 2008

On July 17th through the 19th, we ventured off to Anderson Park in Vernonia Oregon for our annual ward campout. As you can see by these photos we had a great time playing together and getting to know each other better. If you have any other pictures that you would like to add to these pictures, please email me @ mattggold@hotmail.com. The above picture was taken at the dock at the nearby lake in Vernonia.
There is a great abandoned mill next to the lake that we had a great time exploring.

Of course, there is the river. We spent the better part of Friday afternoon playing in the water. This was right next to our campsite.

And some just watched. Trust me, you won't melt if you get wet!

Here we are hunting for the elusive crawdad (or crayfish). OK, they weren't that elusive, as is evidenced by the next photo. Last year we did this differently. We used a stick with fishing line, hook and a hot dog. This proved very challenging and time consuming. This year we were a little more impatient and just grabbed the net. Much faster!

BON APETIT!

A PLEA FOR PICTURES

We had a great time Friday night at the Elders quorum BBQ. If you have pictures that you would like me to post, I would love it. My email address is mattggold@hotmail.com

2007 Ward Campout

This is a shameless attempt to promote our Ward Campout for 2008. It also serves to help reminisce from last year. They were good times. We spent two nights at Anderson Park in Vernonia, Oregon. Here we are fishing at Vernonia Lake, about 3/4 mile away from the campground.
This is a really cool abandoned mill, next to the lake.
We even provided breakfast.
A sighting of some wildlife.
Just hanging out. We did a lot of that.

There were lots of opportunities to ride bikes.

We took over the horse arena. I don't think anyone stepped in any "horse surprise"; if you know what I mean.

Swing batter, batter. Swing!