Casey

Last night, we had our Young Women in Excellence program.  (I am still totally kicking myself that I didn't have my camera and missed all the amazing opportunities for pictures.  Too many things to remember...)


Our theme was Be Your Own Kind of Beautiful.

We decorated the room with flowers, pictures of the girls, and all the girls' Personal Progress projects (which were incredible, by the way!)  At the end of an amazing night, we had LOTS of flowers left over.  Each girl got to take her own flower home (the one that her parents picked to represent her.)  The smaller arrangements went home with the Bishop and a few of the leaders.  But the large bouquet of roses with the single daisy in the middle (like the picture above) we weren't sure what to do with.  It was large and stunningly beautiful and it needed to go to someone who needed it and who would love it.  As a presidency, we were discussing who to give it to, when TCD came bounding up behind us and said, "Can we PLEASE give it to Casey!"

Casey is a close friend of one of the boys in our ward (Ben).  She is 15 and a Sophomore at the high school.  Her family is not LDS, but awhile ago, Ben started talking to her about our Church and about the Book of Mormon.  He invited her to a few activities and then in July took a bold step and invited her to come to the Book of Mormon Read-a-Thon.  Someone who had never read the Book of Mormon before and who wasn't a member of our church committed to two 12 hour days of listening to the Book of Mormon on CD.  She stuck with the whole thing all the way through and guess what!  She loved it!!  That weekend was my first experience with Casey.  Since then, I have had several others.  She comes to church with Ben every Sunday at 9am.  She attends as many activities as her parents will allow.  She has connected with every single girl in our ward, as well as with all of the leaders, and we have all come to love her so much.  She registered on lds.org to start her Personal Progress and has completed more experiences than most of the other girls!  What an inspiration it would have been to have Casey present the projects she's completed and the things she's learned.  Unfortunately, her parents aren't quite as excited about her interest in the church as she is, so she comes to very few mid-week activities.  We all missed her at this one.  So when TCD suggested that we give the bouquet to Casey, there was no question that that was the perfect plan for those gorgeous flowers.   

Today, after school, TCD, Spell Girl and I drove over to Casey's house with the bouquet.  When she saw it, she smiled bigger than I have ever seen her smile, and then she started to cry.  She said, "I can't believe you guys came all the way over here to give me these!"  TCD explained the theme and pointed out the daisy and told her how much we missed her last night.  Casey hugged all three of us about six times and then thanked us profusely.  I have never seen a girl more excited or more deserving of those beautiful flowers.  She is the very epitome of our theme, and I am so overwhelmed and grateful that TCD had the inspiration to take that bouquet to that beautiful girl.