Gracie's Youth Conference

Wow, I really am a procrastinator...









So a few weeks ago, our stake was doing Youth Conference. This year, we were helping refugee families. We split up into groups within our wards and each group had a different family. Our family had moved from Burundi (it's the tiny orange one on the map) and they are now living in West Jordan.









The Parent's names were Florida and Leonitis, and I don't know how old they were. They had 5 (almost 6) kids. The oldest boy was Jephet, 12, and then Jeremiah, 9, Angeline, 7, Jacqueline, 5, and Eric, 15 months, and Florida is expecting a baby girl in August. Florida, Leonitis, Jephet, and Jeremiah were baptised about a year ago. We don't know exactly how long they have been living here in Utah.









The First day, we met with the family and got to know them. There was a part right across the street from the apartments where they live, and within the first 20 minutes of us showing up, all of the kids wanted to go over. The Boys (from the family and from our group) all went over into the field and played soccer, while us girls went to the playground. After that, they all wanted to play freeze tag so we started a pretty big game of that. Then they wanted to play other various types of tag and we ended up being at the park for a long time.









Day 2:









We went over to the house and found out what they needed. I went with a few people to a laundromat and did 7 loads of Laundry. While we were waiting for them to finish, we walked next door to a pawn shop. I almost bought a guitar. (just kidding) After all of the laundry was finished, we met up at the house and from there drove out to eat lunch and go to Target to get them what they needed. We got them a new light fixture, some diapers, a needle for their pump so they could pump up the soccer and basket balls, some fruit, and some treats and toys for the kids. It was amazing to see just how happy a coloring book could make the little kids, and how grateful they were for us doing all of the laundry. The kids were just so cute and always so happy. We went over to the park and played one last game of soccer before we told them that we had to go. We were all sad when we had to leave. One of my leaders said that for a mutual activity, we may go visit the families sometime. It wouldn't work out for one of the groups though, because their family was moving to Washington. I hope that we do get to see them again.