The Challenge

Please excuse the Haphazard assembly of what follows. I've had 3 hours of sleep in the last 38 hours.

I know I'm supposed to post on EFY. And I will, because EFY was an amazing experience that deserves it's due. As this is the case, I feel a need to filter out the stuff that does nothing, save making the entry longer, and that takes time.

As you may have noticed, the title of this post is not "Why I haven't posted about my trip to Washington". I titled this post, "The Challenge" for a reason.

A few months ago, some friends and I heard of a seminary class that tried to read the entire Book of Mormon straight through, and see how long it took. We heard they finished in a little more than 23 hours. Now, Seminary students are studying the Book of Mormon this year, and I, as the failure I was, had never actually read the whole Book all the way through. As you may have guessed, that is what we decided to do.

The Challenge: Read the entire Book of Mormon from start to finish
Who: Me, Brianne, Jared, Karissa, Will, Taylor, and Bailee
Start Time: Wednesday, August 12, 2009, 7:30 am
Time Frame: No more than 24 hours
Rules: Someone had to be reading aloud at all times. Cell phones were all to be on 'silent' and in a basket, which was set aside, to be checked only every few hours.

We started on the couches. Bailee actually didn't join us until later in the evening, somewhere around Alma 27. But the rest of us started, first each reading a page. Then when we started losing focus too fast, we'd each read a column. Sometimes we'd read two versus, sometimes three. The actual reading was flexible. We'd go through periods of 'easy' reading, other times we'd get behind schedule and pull a "Ok guys, 10 pages in 25 minutes. SPEED READ!" We had foods like fruit snacks, chips and salsa, granola bars, and smoothies. For Lunch, we all gathered around the table and ate cheeseburgers. Dinner, we gathered around the table again for Pasta. Somewhere around 2 am we met around the table again for DiGiorno Pizza. Then at last around Ether we met around the table one last time because it was the least comfortable place and we needed to stay awake. We also read around the more comfortable dining room table while the main room was cleaned (which is also where we found that Brianne's hair holds 33 Crayola Twist-Up colored pencils, the scripture marker of choice), then migrated to the floor next to that table, then back to the main room, couches, floor, back to the couches, all over in that room, standing when need be, moving whenever we got too comfortable. We made 1-2-3 cookies around Mosiah 27, and my mom brought slurpees around 10 pm. Those were our only doses of pure sugar that we allowed ourselves. At 6:40 pm we made it to page 270. 4 pages past the half way point, and 50 minutes ahead of schedule, we took the one and only true break. 20 minutes of no reading. Then we picked right back up and trudged onward, through the steep mountainous pass that was The Book of Alma. Around 2 am Will's mom brought us the pizzas and helped us get them cooked. In her infinite wisdom, she took my scriptures and made us all walk around the kitchen while she read to us, and then she continued to read aloud while we ate our 2nd dinner. After, she made sure we were taking care of ourselves, and then let us go. Bailee and Taylor fell asleep sometime around 4, and woke again around 6, staying awake enough to listen to us finish Moroni. We speed read all through Ether, not enjoying the unrighteous war book that included EVERYONE dying. We mostly just picked it up and read until our voice cracked, then let someone else take over, only to read again in two or three pages. By Moroni, we were all sitting at the kitchen table attempting to stay awake, and just wanting to finish the book. We read two versus each, knowing we'd stay awake better if there was less time between when each person read. Finally, after then sky was already light again, we finished, gave each other high fives, and crashed. Karissa drove home, Bai and Taylor slept in the nursery, Jared fell asleep on the couch, I'm actually...not sure what Will did...he wasn't there when I woke up, and Brianne and I fell asleep in her bed. I think I moved to the floor around 7:30 (Brianne was in a bed hog mood :) ) and woke up again at 10:15, through on my clothes, and went to work for the day, weak-knead and slap-happy delirious. And did I mention, we did it all without Caffeine and sodas? Purely Juice and Water powered.

Finish Time: Thursday, August 13, 2009, 6:36 am

Total Time, not including The Break: 22 hours, 46 minutes.

What'd I learn?
-Somehow, it's easier to read for 23 hours straight than to set aside 10 minutes each day
-Ether is a bloody book
-The people of Ancient America desperately needed a baby naming book. It's hard to keep up with which Nephi, Lehi and Gidgidoni your on.
-The Righteous Warriors of the Book of Mormon are AMAZING
-The Book of Mormon tells an incredible story
-Pride Cycles make people look stupid
-When reading straight through, the coming of Christ to the Americas feels MUCH more real, and incredible and amazing to a words don't describe degree
-The Book of Mormon is kinda a really sad story. I almost cried twice.
-Isaiah WILL make sense eventually. It made more sense yesterday than it ever has before
-Moroni is my new hero. Even while falling asleep, his story is really inspiring.

Would I change anything?
Well yes. I'd start earlier in the Morning, and I'd plan it so I didn't have work the next day. But really that's it.

I'm REALLY glad that my first full adventure through the Book of Mormon was experienced as it was. I got so much more out of it then when just reading a chapter a night.

A big thank you to Brianne, Will, Jared, Karissa, Bailee and Taylor for making it awesome.
A BIGGER thank you to our Moms for letting it happen.
The BIGGEST thank you to the Moms who helped it happen:
Mama Kelly, thanks for letting us destroy (then clean, to help stay awake) your house
Mama Baker, thanks for keeping us sane, and bringing us pizza at 2 in the morning!
And last, but far from least, thanks to my Mommy, who brought us Juice and Slurpees, and who let me participate in the first place.

Love you all,

-a VERY weary reader