Jorja's Beautiful Day

The kids love ducks. Here are lots of pictures.

Jorja

The ducks love crickets. They went crazy chasing them when Mike put them in the cage yesterday. Jorja found a cricket and tried to feed it to them. They aren't as adept chasing them when they are not in their cage.

The Bradley's came over to meet the ducks. And & Alex

 Georgia

 Olivia

 Zoe

Heather was in town from Georgia. Andrew, her second oldest, is going into the MTC on Wednesday. We came down to see them! Stockton drove separately with Gavin. They left after ten minutes to go to Dani's house. She received her mission call when she was in Africa. It has been sitting unopened at their house for a few weeks. She ended up getting called to San Diego, California speaking Spanish. She will go into the Mexico MTC, just like Brandon. Except in November.

Stephanie & Heather

 Stephanie, Heather & Mike

 Jorja back with her ducks.

Jorja's Beautiful Day

Preston loves the ducks too.

 Jorja

I laughed so hard when I saw Maysen with her book pillow.

Jorja and Mike made bread today. She wanted to give a loaf to a few friends. It didn't finish until close to 11:00 at night. They were still up, so we dropped the loafs off as fast as we could. She dropped a loaf and a bag of Charleston Chews at Traven's house, a loaf and a case of a weird flavor of Mountain Dew at Kenzie's house, and a loaf with two different cards at Carter's house. One card for Carter, one for his family. Carter was waiting outside when we got there. We were quite late.

First Date

Preston had his piano recital today. He is my fourth child and is parented like it. I can honestly say I have never heard him practice either of the pieces he played in his recital. He either practiced while I was gone, practiced on Stockton's piano downstairs or is an excellent sight-reader!

Preston

Preston's first song was too long to upload, but here is his second one.

Preston, Taggart, Hadley-Kate, Liam's brother, pretty girl, boy, Liam, Sister Newman, Liam's other brother

Ava, two boys, three pretty girls

Today was Jorja's first official date. Technically she went out with Mackie yesterday as part of the date today; but yesterday I wanted to put the title as Engineering Project, so I'm claiming her first date as today. Jorja spent all day getting ready. I would never have the patience to spend that much time on hair/makeup. She was trying to get her hair in a weird 50s updo. She got frustrated. I think she looks great like this. Clair picked her up first. I snapped a few quick pictures before she walked out the door.

Jorja

 For some reason I snapped a picture of the car as it drove away.

Fifteen minutes after Jorja left we got a call from her. She had been in a car accident. Claire, Jorja and Mackie were in the car. They were driving to pick up Claire's date. A lady ran a red light. She was also speeding. The car was totaled. We are so lucky that the three kids in the car were just bruised. This could have been so bad. The lady wasn't hurt either. Jorja said she was acting pretty mad at them. Jorja was looking down at her phone. When she looked up the car was right there. She said everything went in slow motion. She vividly remembers watching the car hood crumple up. They spun around. She felt like she was in a movie. All three kids were super quiet while this was happening. Mackie threw out his arm to hold Jorja in. He wasn't wearing a seatbelt, so glad he stayed in the car! Claire's leg started bruising up right away. Jorja has had chest and neck pain for a few days since the accident. Mackie's back was pretty sore by the end of the day. Still, so lucky! To think, I had been so worried about her being in a car accident the night before when they were driving up the canyon in the dark. I didn't worry about it in the dry daytime!

Jorja said Claire was crying. She felt so bad. She kept apologizing for ruining Jorja's first date. Claire's parents came down and were with them while they dealt with the aftermath. They had to stay at the crash site for a good hour. I am so glad that Jorja called us. One of our neighbors called us and asked if Jorja was in an accident. They had driven by. So glad we found out from Jorja and already knew she was okay! Claire has a twin sister, Sydney, she went and picked up Claire's date. The group was meeting at the football field. The other kids waited there for Jorja and her group to arrive. They were able to snap a few pictures before they hurried off to dinner.

Jorja and Mackie

 Maggie & Maggie's date, Jorja & Mackie, Liz & Darby, Sydney & Max, Hasti, Finn & Ellie, Christian & Brinley, Jared & Kenzie, Griffin & Claire

Hasti is by herself because her date got sick. At least she was able to go with him last night. She was a pretty good sport to go to the dance and not let that spoil her night.

 Jorja, Sydney, Kenzie, Brinley, Liz, Claire, Ellie, Hasti, Maggie

The kids then went and ate at Sonic and were able to be at the dance for about an hour. Claire's parents took them to the football field. They were split into different cars after that, so Jorja and Mackie were no longer driving together. Jorja had fun being there at the end of the dance. They do this weird circle/cheer thing. The student body and class officers all get to lead the cheer from the middle of the circle. She loved it. After the dance everyone went to Kenzie's house. They wrestled and played games and then came home. I was so happy to have her home! Overall, Jorja had a great first date. She could have done without the car accident though. She'll never be able to say her first date wasn't memorable!

Liz, Jorja, Ellie, Hasti

Stockton meanwhile had a fun time of his own. He went downtown and hung out with his diving friends. They played Mario Kart, ping pong and one other game. Stockton never lost a game. He got home shortly after Jorja did. Stockton, Jorja and I stayed up talking until 1:30 in the morning. We are going to be tired tomorrow!

Game

I was sick again today. Jorja wasn't 100%, but okay enough to go to school. I did make it to book club with Preston. I was the first parent there. The kids were excited and wanted to go to the teachers lounge. Never again! There was a book club group from Mrs. Mickelsen's class there. We ended up getting a table by the vending machine. The kids were fixated on the sodas the entire time. Oh well, I survived.

Jorja wanted to go to the Alta/Corner Canyon game tonight. She texted Kenzie to see if she could get a ride. I am thankful that Kenzie is so nice to Jorja. How cool to be a freshman and be able to hang out with the student body president as often as she has. Jorja has loved serving in student government. As an added bonus, Alta won tonight! Last time they played Corner Canyon they lost by 30 or something.

Jorja and Kenzie

Evan's mom dropped Jorja off. She was a little disappointed because she wasn't allowed to hang out with the boys after the game. It was also Evan's birthday. That's okay, because we got her! She came just in time to see the lighting of the cauldron for the opening ceremony in the Olympics. At least she was happy with us and it was nice to have her home.

Busy Day Off

Stockton was not looking forward to today. At all. The kids didn't have school today, but Stockton was still super busy. First, he had his English class down at Salt Lake Community College. It starts at 7:00, so he had to get up early on his 'day off'. He wasn't thrilled. I remember when he used to hate to sleep. Ha! Anyway, he came home and said English was great! Stockton also had an Academic Decathlon competition. Today they were doing speech, essay and interview. Stockton did a cold read of his speech to Jorja and me. I was laughing so hard. He was so good! Stockton got home pretty late tonight. He said the speech competition wasn't what he was expecting. He thought he would be giving his speech to a crowd. Instead it was two judges. Both girls. Stockton's speech was about the speedo. They didn't react at all, although I think they aren't allowed to, so he has no idea how that went. Stockton said he nailed his interview. That's good. Ochoa sent them home before they announced awards because it was snowing pretty hard. He has no idea how he did. I think he is so glad today is over.

Jorja was busy today as well. She had play practice this morning. She was disappointed a bit. She isn't able to be in the scene they blocked yesterday because she was at therapy. If she had been able to go she would have had a chance of being picked as the person that got stabbed. Ha! This next picture is random, but Jorja takes pictures like this all the time. She then texts them as an answer to a question she thinks is weird. Or something like that. She wants an emoji like this. She took this picture at therapy yesterday. I tried to photobomb it, but she didn't like that at all.

Jorja

Jorja went to the girls basketball game at Alta, then the boys basketball game at Corner Canyon. Alta lost both. The boys got creamed. By more than 20 points I think. There was a disco night at the roller skating rink Jorja was planning on going to. We stopped and bought glow bracelets. Jorja ended up not going to the disco night. She went to the twins house. Claire and Sydney. Mackie and Finn were there. That is all I can remember. I sent Mike to get her around 11:00. It was snowing a lot and I did not want to go out in it, or have a teenager bring her home. It scared me at first when she texted that Finn would give her a ride home. What? I didn't know he was old enough to drive. He's not. Mike brought Finn home instead. A much better plan. Jorja was pretty happy when she got home. She had a great time today.

Carter, person I don't know, Jorja

 Kenzie, Mackie, Jorja

 Jorja & Mackie