There are seasons of life when one of my children has so much going on and I have so many posts written about them. (i.e. the last month of Hallie’s senior year with tennis, prom, graduation, etc.)

But I’m mindful when posting because I know all my kids want to see themselves and their experiences represented on here (and they read it regularly). But this means sometimes posts get lost in the shuffle. Clearly, last fall, I had already been posting a lot about Hunter, so I decided to table this post. But it’s too good to not have it included in our family’s book of life…so I’m circling back almost a year later!

John Bytheway is a voice from my childhood. I remember listening to his devotionals from EFYs and reading his books when I was a teenager. And today his voice is still familiar because I listen to his podcast.

Last summer, he spoke at our Book of Mormon Quest. At the time, he offered to come speak at our stake about his experience of helping rewrite/restructure the “For the Strength of the Youth” if we were interested. Of course we took him up on that offer, and when he came, he spoke with a young man and young woman from our stake. Hunter was the lucky one sitting on the stand next to him and speaking.

He was asked to talk about how the “For the Strength of Youth” program has blessed his life. Here’s an excerpt from his talk:

“The For the Strength of Youth guide can be an amazing tool. Like a lot of you, I go to the gym. There are SO many machines that work and focus on certain muscles in your body. If you want to strengthen something specific, the gym has a machine for it. Each machine targets specific muscles you want to work out. While using the bench press, you aren’t thinking about how restrictive the machine is, you think about how much stronger you are going to get in that particular muscle area. 

Like a machine at the gym, the For the Strength of Youth Guide isn’t going to help you get better at shooting a 3-pointer or baking a cake. It is going to help you make decisions to build a certain muscle, the muscle of becoming a better disciple of Jesus Christ. It is a tool to deepen your conversion and make your relationship with God stronger and stronger. “

….

“At the beginning of the year, I made a goal of finishing the Book of Mormon in one year. Over the summer, I got behind on my readings. I had low motivation and would make up excuses to not read on one day or another.

A little over a month ago, I decided I needed to go back to reading every single day. I already woke up at 5:15 to go to the gym almost every single morning, so I thought, “Why don’t I just wake up 15 minutes earlier?” 

Like the For the Strength of Youth guide says, through Jesus Christ and prayer, I was strengthened, and my desires to read the Book of Mormon were magnified. I started reading every single morning before going to the gym. 

Let me tell you: You can not feel the difference between 8 hours and 30 minutes of sleep and 8 hours and 15 minutes of sleep. I have not been able to feel the difference between 15 minutes of sleep, but I have been able to see the difference in having 15 minutes of personal scripture study every morning. 

I was blessed in feeling the most peace I have ever felt, even when the world was at its darkest and most chaotic state. I was blessed with answers to many, many prayers. I was blessed with stronger relationships and a clearer peace of mind. 

I was also blessed for making time for the Lord. I started not only reading the Book of Mormon more, but also praying, choosing to listen to conference talks, and seeing Jesus Christ in my life more often than I was before. Most importantly, I started striving to live what I learned. 

Jesus Christ helped change my desires, thoughts, and actions for the better.”

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Earlier this summer, Steve’s sister invited anyone who wanted to join them for a few days at their place on Flathead Lake in Montana at the end of July. Somehow, every single sibling/spouse and Steve’s parents committed. I think we did the math and this was the first time all the siblings had gathered in 10+ years. We have had so many family events in the last ten years, but it seems like we’re always missing one or two siblings.

But not this weekend – everyone was on board because no one wanted to miss out.

The agenda included: Wakesurfing. Bucket golf. Talking. Eating. Repeat.

And we had the most beautiful backdrop while we enjoyed our time together.

The kids staying in the house next to us were having a great time on their flying tube (a tube that actually launches up in the air instead of skimming across the water) As we watched, we wondered if it would be just as fun as adults, so naturally, we had to find out. They graciously offered us a turn on the tube and I can confirm, it was just as fun as I had imagined. We were screaming, laughing, and hanging on for dear life the entire time.

Being launched in the air, hanging on for dear life, was a fun adventure but my happy place is always going to wake surfing.

If you’ve ever been to Flathead, you know it is chilly mountain water, even in July. (I know “cold” is relative but when you live in Arizona, water in the 60’s is frigid!) And I don’t do cold water very well. My kids will make fun of me for not joining them in the “shoulder” boating season, but its not nearly as fun because it takes me too long to warm up after getting wet!

But Montana was different. The water was crystal clear with a beautiful tree-lined shore – I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to surf. I mustered everything in me to get in that water, especially when we went in the mornings and the outside temperature and water temperature were in the 60s. But it was totally worth it.

In between surfing, there were continuous rounds of Bucket Golf. And Steve’s family is nothing if not competitive and there was trash talking and yelling and holes-in-one. They couldn’t get enough of the Bucket Golf and they found great pleasure in rearranging the course to make it even more competitive.

We enjoyed some beautiful, albeit smokey, sunsets on the dock.

Steve’s parents who started it all! Still adventurous in their older age.

We call these guys the originals, in order of oldest to youngest.

And somehow the family joke has been to take in-law only pictures – we like to refer to ourselves as the glue! 🙂

The weather couldn’t have been more cooperative while we were there, which added to our experience.

We played games late into the night.

Watched old reunion videos that had us in tears we were laughing so hard.

We enjoyed cherries straight off the trees.

Jet ski adventures.

Quiet mornings on the dock.

Church in a quiet neighboring town and a family discussion after.

Slow boat rides around the bay.

Prepping food together around the kitchen island.

We’re hoping it doesn’t take another 10 years to gather everyone.

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Every summer has something that becomes the thing. The song everyone listens to. The food everyone eats. The inside joke that somehow survives for months.

For our family, “the thing” this summer was the board game Secret Hitler. (It has a 4.9 rating on Amazon with almost 15,000 reviews and most resembles the party game “Mafia”) This is a game Hallie used to play with her friends in high school and when she returned from her mission, it got pulled back out of the closet and made the grandest of comebacks.

And when I say this game followed us around all summer, I mean it was everywhere. It somehow made its way into nearly every adventure we had. Different houses. Different cities. Different groups of people. Different ages. It didn’t matter. If enough people were willing to play, Secret Hitler was coming out.

And apparently, our family got really good at it.

Briggs and Cannon became so good, they were invited to join games with Hunter’s friends and Hallie’s friends. (and they were always hopeful we would forget they were up long past their bedtime, which worked on many occasions.) They learned how to read people, cast doubt, and perhaps most importantly, convince everyone else that they were telling the truth.

Spoiler alert: they were not always telling the truth and they were hard to read.

There were games played late into the night. Games played immediately after church. Games that started as a casual “let’s just play one round” and somehow turned into round after round after round. There was yelling. There was running around the house. There were accusations flying across the room and some very serious trust issues.

Nobody could be trusted.

The funniest part was watching the age difference become irrelevant. Briggs was sitting across the table trying to outsmart college students. Siblings were either calling each other out or suddenly trying to convince everyone that this time they were telling the truth (which was always suspicious!) Friends who thought they knew each other discovered they apparently knew nothing at all.

And after the last round ended, they dissected who deceived who and replayed the best moments. And even better than pictures – I have so many moments captures on video which is hilarious and we’ve replayed some oer and over again.

I’m not sure what says “family bonding” quite like spending hours together, accusing your siblings of treason, and questioning everyone’s motives!

Summer 2026 will forever be remembered for the board game we played too many times to count.

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We still have framed portrait of John Pork hanging on our wall. And yes, every time someone walks into our living room that hasn’t seen it before questions our choice in design.

But Bennett has been scheming (with the help from his brothers) – and he’s had it in his mind for a while that he wanted to place these photos in someone else’s house.

It made the most sense to do it at Steve’s parents house. They have a lot of grandkids and he wasn’t sure how closely they actually look at the grandkid wall! A while back, he carefully measured the openings so he could print pictures to size.

Steve’s parents left town for a few weeks but still needed our boys to take care of their yard. Bennett thought it would be a great time to infiltrate the photo wall – and then see how long it would take after they got home for them to realize they had some new grandkids.

Hunter sent a picture to our family chat, “I spy with my little eye…3 John Porks. We’re evil.”

We had a good laugh.

And we laughed again when Bennett got a message from Steve’s mom asking about photos. What’s funny is she recognized the picture and knew exactly who was responsible!

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