A Little Bit o' This (At Women's Conference)

So there were many, many people that I met at Women's Conference. Here are some of my experiences with them.



This is Ann Dibb, she is the Second Counselor of the Young Women's General Presidency. That means that she is in the presidency of the Young Women's Organization for the entire world for our church. Her father, Thomas S. Monson  is the President and Prophet of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. One thing that struck me is that she looks so very much like her father. Can you see the resemblance?



So, she was one of the speakers on Thursday and I met her briefly that day when we escorted her to the concert hall to give her speech. On Friday she came to listen to the afternoon speaker, Margaret Nadauld. Friday was packed and it was a madhouse trying to find seats for everyone. She came partway through the session and asked me if there were any seats available. I lead her to the front of the auditorium where I had found one seat on the third row. She stood outside the auditorium and told me that she didn't want to make a big fuss and cause a big disruption. I asked young girl who was sitting next to the empty seat if the seat was taken and if I could sit someone next to her. She said it was fine and you should have seen her face when she looked up to see Ann M. Dibb sit down next to her; it was an expression of shock and awe. She probably also thought to herself, "I better not act sleepy and be dilegent in my note taking."

This is Silvia H. Allred, she is the Second Counselor of the General Relief Society, the women's organization of the Church. Her session was packed! The entire main floor was crammed with women lining up to see her talk. We had to try and snake the lines throughout the art exhibits, because it was too cold to have the line go outside. Because of the tightly packed quarters, some of the women were getting a little testy. At one point, the volunteer at the entrance had to stop the line from going into the theater because someone had to escort Sister Allred in and lead her to the stage. So while the volunteer at the entrance was helping someone read a map and find her way to the class that she wanted, another woman tapped her on the shoulder and kept asking her what was going on. The volunteer held her hand up to show that she was helping someone else and she would help her soon. That woman turned to her friend and said, "I don't know what's going on! I bet there are a ton of seats still! Just you watch, that girl will turn us away and we won't be able to get in, I can't believe this!"

That's when the volunteer had finished helping the other woman and she said, "The reason we stopped the line is so Sister Allred can get in." At that, she pointed to Sister Allred who was walking toward them not more than 15 feet away. The volunteer watched the color drain away from the two complainers' faces as they stammered, "Oh, I guess that makes sense," and as to try and make up for it, they said things like, "My, Sister Allred looks lovely today, doesn't she?"

Moral of the story, watch what you say.

My impression of Sister Allred is that she is very bubbly, personable and really, really tiny! I had to seek her out several times because someone needed to talk to her and each time, she was standing right in front of me.

"Sister Allred? Sure, I'll get her for you! She is right.....here...standing... right in front of me." (Sheepish grin) It's not very often when I have to look down to see an adult, I'm just not used to it.

Margaret Nadauld is a former General President of the Young Women organization. I got to speak to her the longest. She didn't seem the least bit nervous that she was going to address almost two thousand people. Her session was so popular that we had to turn away about 600 people. She thanked the volunteers for all the hard work we were doing and she and her husband were actually very chatty.

Just meeting these remarkable women made it all worth it.