Evening in Excellence and the question of balance

November came in with a bang.  It started out with a week that I thanked my lucky stars when it was over.

Like, really, I was almost giddy when Sunday night came to a close, and I got to lay in bed and snuggle close to Dave and exclaim how happy I was that it was all OVER.

I know that sounds all dramatic, especially since most of the happenings were really GOOD things.  But it felt like my heart was on continual racing speed, which meant I was impatient with the kids and Dave and also myself.  Yes, there were good things happening...except one that was pretty heart-breaking.  And another one that made me a little stressed out (I had to give the keynote speech at a women's conference which, although it makes me nervous, rejuvenates me in the end because I learn so much...more on that later).

Maybe my anxiety about that one heart-wrenching thing I won't go into detail about infiltrated into the planning and execution of the rest of the things going on and that was what had me on edge. But sometimes it's ok to just be glad that even the great things in life are morphing into a golden-stranded memory in your "vault" right?

All that mumbo jumbo may sound like I'm talking in code, and maybe I am just a little, because even though I'm kind of an open book, some things are not the best to share on a blog.  I'll just say that sometimes the realization of what's coming up in the future when you're dealing with an unknown future with a special needs child can be physically painful.

But let's shift and look on the bright side right here, right now, because one of the first things that hit that week was Evening in Excellence for Young Women.

And it was pretty beautiful and drenched in goodness.

In the title of this post (which I know, it's taken me forever to get to), I mentioned "the question of balance" because I was thinking about it a lot leading up to the big day.  Sometimes in this church of ours it's easy to start from a simple plan and somehow that simplicity morphs into this:

That, my friends, is not so simple.

Because think of the manpower to transport all those chairs and tables to that home and invite all those people and string all those lights (which were being put up for a wedding that weekend, not just for this just FYI, we aren't that fancy:) and find all those tablecloths, and assign all those talks, bring drinks and desserts, and also make the best video (my friend Ashley has got talent I tell you!)  Not to mention the hard work the girls put into making their posters.

No, that was not so simple.

My group of leaders was in charge, and from all our best intentions for "low-key" those pictures up there are how we ended up.  The counselor in charge found this idea on Pinterest: http://www.peekaboophotos.com/evening-in-excellence-personal-progress/ and we used it for our base.

When you divide up all the tasks it makes things so much easier but somehow we women still make it a little complicated, right?  What's our deal?  My only job was to take the pictures of the girls (and help set up) but even a simple thing like that takes some time when you have nearly fifty girls to track down (luckily I did most at church, but we have a whole slew of new families in our ward so it took some legwork to get a portion of those).

I have to admit it was the best job, though, because check out these glowing faces.



(the idea was for them to escort the girls to their seats which didn't happen, but hey, the greeting thing was pretty sweet.)

This is how it looked when they walked in:
(after much decorating from the leaders, and much work on all those great posters the girls made showing which part of Personal Progress they have been working on.)


 Everyone walked around checking out all the posters displayed...


 ...then we settled in for the program.
And do you know what?

The spirit was there loud and clear.

I sat in the midst of those sparkling lights and shining faces and I gotta admit I felt a little guilty for begrudging (just a little bit) the fanciness of it all.

Because not only did the beauty in the air there touch me, it for sure touched the girls.
And that's what matters.

Because I believe those feelings that come at times like this help them (and us leaders too) gain faith, and belief and the roots of a testimony become stronger.  Which brings a closer relationship with Christ.

And if we have a strong relationship with our Savior, things in life just seem to make sense...the bad and the good all wrapped up together.