But mom, you said we couldn't have sleepovers...

When I told the kids I'd be gone Friday night at a young women's retreat they immediately picked up on the injustice and hypocrisy. So we've amended our sleepover rule to include not only cousins, but church activities.
We left around 5:00 p.m. for Provo canyon via Heber. It's a beautiful drive, and we arrived at Virginia's cute 1938 stone cottage by dinner time. We had Brick Oven pizza, root beer, fresh fruit and a yummy salad, then headed outside to build a fire for s'mores.
I really want a fire pit in our yard. This is always a place where bonding happens. The s'mores are pretty good too.
Once we all smelled nice and smoky, we headed inside for the big reveal—the girl's had each drawn a secret sister the week before, and in addition to an anonymous service during the week, they found out three things about their sister and everyone had to guess who it was. They also found out their favorite treat and gave it to them. Becca e-mailed the husbands of the other leaders and surprised us with our favorite treats. Here are the three facts about me that Rob gave her:

1. When she was learning to drive, she high centered the car on an island in the high school parking lot. She and her dad could not get the car off the island, so her dad walked over and asked the football team who were practicing nearby to come lift the car off the island—all to Michelle's great embarrassment.

2. She speaks four languages: English, French, Italian, and Spanish. Sometimes she speaks all four at the same time, not remembering which words belong to each language.

3. She is unbeatable in Backgammon. Seriously. She will roll doubles like eight times everytime she plays. It's unreal. On the other hand, if you happen to beat her at chess, she will throw all the pieces on the ground in a huff.

As my favorite treat he recommended brownies, chocolate, caramel, marathon bars (if only they were still available!), mints or hot chocolate. I scored a box of After Eight Mints. Yum.

We settled in for a wall projector movie. We had about twenty great choices. You've Got Mail narrowly beat The Princess Bride in the voting. It was so funny to think about dial-up internet and see the huge computers. That was only twelve years ago!
It was fun. We have a great group of girls, and I love the leaders I get to work with too. I'm definitely okay sending my girls to this kind of sleepover. And glad that it won't be for another six years. :)