Stake Conference Picnic

We went to Stake Conference this morning. We had to attend the Hampstead building about 1/2 hour north of us. The Stake Center is 1/2 south, in Columbia, but it is too small, so our ward and the Hampstead Ward watch on a TV feed. We got a new Stake President today, James Mitchell, who we don't know. But that wouldn't be unusual, as we only know people in our ward (and only about 1/2 of that!). Amanda is considering attending the Columbia Second ward, which is a family ward with a "single's emphasis." Singles who want to go to a single's ward but don't want to drive to DC or Baltimore go there. We really don't know much about it except they just lost their bishop, who is the new stake president!

We stopped at a park in Hampstead and had a nice picnic lunch before heading home this afternoon. It was nice and comfortable in the shade of the giant maple trees. It didn't feel anything like the 95 degrees and 50 percent humidity it was!

P.S. Elder Jensen was our visiting General Authority. He was a very engaging speaker with lots of interesting stories, and a very funny sense of humor. His experience as church historian paid big dividends for us, as he had plenty of great material to draw from.