Bee

Mike and I went early this morning to drop off Jorja's car at the repair shop. Mike had a couple of bottles of coolant with him. He only made it down Pepperwood Drive before he had to stop to fill it up. He managed to make it the rest of the way to the repair shop. It was smoking when he got there, but had just started. Hope they can fix it! It sure has been a great car for her.

Jorja - Last homecoming dress. We really thought this one would win, but it did not.

Jorja ended up talking with Packer on the phone for over an hour. He was in a car wash when she called him and he ended up crashing into the wall. Not a big crash, just a baby one. He seems to be doing better and might let the kids do more things this year. Fingers crossed for that! Today is Jorja's first day out of quarantine! She made the most of it. She had online school, but managed to go out to lunch with Ella and Giselle.

Ella, Jorja, Giselle

Jorja had a double date with Giselle. She took Riley as a late birthday date and Giselle took Ethan. Jorja said they had the best time. They went to this rolled ice-cream place in Salt Lake, then just did different things downtown. Jorja gave Riley his birthday present, which was a Minecraft bee she made him. Actually, Riley was killed in assassin right as they were getting into the car when Jorja picked him up. She gave him his present then to make him feel better. All in all, Jorja had a great time. It is nice for her to be out and about again.

Jorja & Ethan

Jorja & Riley

On a side note, this is what my pantry looks like now. I took these pictures for Rachel.

Smoking Car

Welp, today was crazy. Jorja made fettuccine for dinner, then she decided to take a little drive with Preston. They went up Little Cottonwood Canyon by Alta. Where Jorja's car started smoking. Luckily there was a place she was able to park as soon as she noticed all the smoke. Mike was out in the duck pond covered in rubber paint. No way he was going to be able to leave soon. So, I drove and picked up the kids. I came back later with Mike. He brought some coolant, but it wasn't enough. We drove back down the mountain, stopped at the Smith's by Cottonwood the drove back up the mountain. Mike poured as much as he could in Jorja's car. He drove halfway down the mountain before he had to stop and pour more coolant in. Then he was able to make it to Wasatch Blvd before he had to do it again. Right as he turned into the driveway it started smoking a ton again. So, that is going to be fun to deal with.

Preston & Jorja

Preston

Miles on the pilot

Jorja isn't able to go shopping for homecoming dresses, so we ordered a ton and had her try them on here. I forgot to take pictures of the first ones she tried on, but here are the last three.

Spoiler alert: This one is going to be the winner

Snow Day

School was actually cancelled. In Utah. It was weird. There was a lot of snow, but it didn't seem like a crazy amount. I was nervous to go to my exercise class since I wasn't sure if the plows would be out that early. I decided to take Jorja's car because she has the best tires, but then I couldn't find the keys. I looked and looked and looked. I even woke Jorja up. She told me they were on the piano. Nope. Turns out they were in her student government sweater in her room. I didn't check there. I ended up missing my class. Maybe that was for the best since they ended up cancelling school. Too bad I was up by 4:00. I hope the weather is better for Saturday!

The snow let up for a bit in the afternoon and I decided to try a locksmith place to get Jorja's key re-keyed. When we bought her car they gave us a blank key thing. We couldn't find anywhere that would do it. The VW place wouldn't even do it. I called a different VW place today. They recommended Bob's locksmith. They were able to do it! It ended up being around $40, which is a ton better than over $200. That is what the VW place quoted me as. He did have to call in a specialist to do it. I waited about twenty minutes for him to get there. It took awhile, but they were able to get it done. The snow started up again while I was there. The bad thing was, I had to push back Jorja's seat so they could get in there and mess with things. Then the seat would not go forward. It wouldn't latch. I tried to drive home, in a snowstorm, like that; but there was no way. The locksmith guys were super helpful. They worked with me for 45 minutes on it. They tried everything from putting boxes behind the seat to wedging an iron bench in there. Finally they came up with a cool padlock they were able to put in the latch. It took them forever and the seat was too close. He tried again. It was still a little close, but I told him it was fine. Jorja had to get to work, my phone died, the car was out of gas, and they had spent forever helping me as it was. I was ready to get home. The guy didn't even charge me for the $11 lock he used. They were so nice.

Jorja's car at the locksmiths

Jorja was stressing when I got home. She didn't know how she would get to work. I got home about ten minutes before she needed to be there. I drove Jorja to work because I was not sure the car would make it. At least Jorja had a cell phone that we could call from if we got stranded. Luckily that didn't happen. On the way down we passed the flower sign. I made Jorja take a picture so I could send it to Jordyn, then I forgot. Too bad Jordyn's name came up during the biggest snowstorm. Canyons School District has never closed for snow before. This was the first. I think they've been around for 10 years.

 Flower Kanani gave me...we haven't killed it yet!

The worst thing to happen today, by far was this.....Brett sent my brothers' and I a text that was not happy. Here is our message thread....

Stephanie: So happy for you Brett (sent on Monday)

Brett: Haha. Just kidding. They messed up and told me I was promoting. Turns out I'm not. Weird turn of events. So this just in...not promoting.

Dad: Foot

Matt: Seriously? The military is dumb.

Dad: Door

Brett: Foot is right.

John: That's lame.

Stephanie: Wait! What?

John: It's like when Slytherin won the House Cut in Year 1 and then all of a sudden Dumbledore just gives a bunch of points to Gryffindor for the win.

Brett: First, my boss brought the whole office together to tell me I was promoting. Then, the vice commander of the base brings the whole office together to congratulate me on promoting. Then, the wing commander sends out a congratulatory email to the whole base that me and one other guy are promoting. Then I go to the official list today to see what my line number is to see when this promotion happens and I don't see me on the list. So I dig deeper and now it turns out I'm not on the promotion list.

John: Maybe the list is wrong. Has anyone confirmed to you that you are not promoting?

Brett: We called the lady at the personnel center that has a pretty official list. I'm confident the list is correct and somewhere along the way the messaging of the list derailed.

John: Crazy. Does your boss, vice commander and wing commander know about this?

Brett: Yeah. My boss just said they are upset. He gave me the heads up that the wing commander is probably going to call me.

John: Hope he can maybe pull some strings for you.

Brett: I wish, but he is pretty powerless against the Air Force promotion machine.

Stephanie: I'm not a fan of that machine.

John: Two thumbs down. Glitchy machine.

Bubs: So I just got all these messages out of order, but did the Air Force really just jerk you around like that? That's ridiculous. Who's in charge of promotions over there, Steve Harvey?

Brett: It's cra cra. I forgot about that Steve Harvey thing. Yes, like that.

Bubs: So in effect, they decided to tell you in the most painful way possible that you didn't get it.

Brett: Correct.

Bubs: We were in Vegas the night that happened, so I feel connected to it.

Brett: No. They feel super bad. It wasn't their fault. I saw the email notification they got and it looked official and exactly like they usually see.

Bubs: Well, that's terrible. Sorry they did you like that.

Brett: Not sure where the messaging went wrong though. It's super embarrassing to them so I have no doubt they are finding out how this happened.

Matt: gif image of the host taking the crown off of the announced Miss America and putting it on the actual Miss America

Bubs: Seems like these promotions are kind of random anyway. Did they give you a reason why you weren't promoted?

Brett: No. Not being promoted isn't a big surprise. I figured I had a 50/50 chance on it.

Bubs: They told me I didn't move up in reffing last year because I'm too fat. The guy who told me, who's one of the highest ranked refs in the state, is a huge sloth of a man that is at least 70 lbs. heavier than me.

Brett: Weird. Who cares about competence.

Bubs: All about perception in reffing. They like guys that can "sell" calls better than guys that make good calls. It explains a lot.

Mike: I'm really sorry Brett....that really sucks.

Mermaid Wishes

Hailey sent me this picture of how she answered Drew.

I love it! I love socks. Plus, now he has five new pairs of socks!

I spent most of my morning at the Festival of Trees. I love it. Our ward did a tree this year. Camee was in charge of it. And another super cute girl that I don't know very well. They did an awesome job. The lady that was standing by the tree said that people were just blown away with it, especially when they realized it was decorated with coffee filters, q-tips and straws. I dyed a lot of the coffee filters and even made one mermaid. The tree was beautiful. I'm glad I was able to see it in person.

 Close up look at the coffee filter coral

 You can see the q-tips pretty good here.

 Straws

 The lady asked if I wanted pictures of the back of the tree. She took them for me.

 Stephanie and random person looking at Emery's tree

 Blue straws

 Emery before her brain surgery

 This tree reminded me of my friend Rae in Georgia. I sent her pictures.

 I took a picture of this tree for Jorja

 The vanity next to it is exactly the same as Jorja's, just painted silver.

 Jorja loves llamas too.

 What a cool Utah State tree! I sent these pictures to Maysen and Stockton.

 I thought the lego head at the top was funny.

 Now this is a Maysen tree. I texted it to her. She immediately texted me back to go get divinity!

Maysen was in a chocolate competition in college for one of her marketing classes. The first competition they had to come up with chocolates and market them. Maysen's group worked with this divinity lady and created different versions of her divinity. They ended up winning the competition. The next competition she was in, with a different group, was to market the new chocolate lab that will be at Blue Square. Maysen's group won that competition as well. They even got to split a lot of money. I can't remember how much, but after it was split seven ways Maysen ended up with several hundred dollars in her scholarship account. That was awesome. Maysen was the only one in the class who ended up winning both competitions. Anyway, this is the booth of the person Maysen worked with for the first competition.

I ordered a tray of four. I expected that they would just give it to me then. Nope. They took down my name as 'Setphen' and my cell phone number. The girl said she would text me when my order was ready. I walked around the festival for another hour and was ready to go. I went back to ask how much longer it would be. My order was just sitting there in the 'preorder' section. So weird. The divinity was delicious though. I usually hate divinity, but this was super good.

 Jorja's been singing this song lately.

 Hot chocolate tree! I loved the top.

 Brazil! I took this picture for Mike.

 Of course I couldn't pass up the Gingerbread Village.

 There is a BYU Milbourn House every year.

Too bad they spell Millburn wrong. Milbourn just looks weird!

 Kalani's Surf Shack was pretty cool.

 So was Cosmo's Cottage

 I sent this picture to Jorja and told her I got a new bedspread for her.

I didn't, but I miss the days when frogs were her world.

Hailey and I were sending messages on Snapchat back and forth. At the bottom of one I wrote, "Sorry for using periods. Jorja says using periods makes me sound angry. I just can't help it." Hailey sent this back. I had to save it because my Porge is with her!

Jorja & Hailey

I brought these divinity pieces home. Preston loved them the most. I also brought home Preston a chocolate covered strawberry kabob and Jorja a chocolate covered cinnamon bears kabob.

 Preston

Jorja's throat was hurting worse after school than when she went to school. I had her gargle with a sore throat concoction hoping it would help the pain. She had five white spots on the back of her throat. I'm worried she has strep. Preston has had a sore throat for about a week. I made him let me look in his throat. He has at least one white spot. We decided he shouldn't go to diving. We didn't want to get any of the divers sick before the state championship on Saturday. Jorja drove her bug to Target to get some Christmas lights for it. She came back pretty happy with her purchase. We sat on the couch together and she kept sending me pictures in Snapchat. I got some cute ones. I didn't save the weird ones she sent.

Jorja

 Jorja with her Christmas lights bug

Jorja and I decided to go to Zupas to get soup. That sounded good to her. Madison wanted to come over. Jorja told her how sick she was, but Madison said she didn't mind. We picked up Madison and took her to Zupas with us. Jorja drove the entire way and did great. Once we walked into Zupas Jorja started feeling awful. She felt dizzy and like she was going to throw up. I had her go find a booth. She was able to eat her soup, but her throat was getting worse. I drove home for Jorja. When we got to the gate I smelled something weird. Like something was burning. As we pulled up into our driveway there was a ton of smoke coming out of Jorja's hood. What the heck? I ran to get Mike and told the girls to get out of the car! Her car definitely overheated. Hopefully this will be an easy fix. Jorja loves that car and has just started feeling comfortable driving it.

Jorja and Madison went downstairs for about an hour. Jorja was just miserable. After Madison left Jorja wanted to cuddle with Kiki. Too bad Kiki was not cooperative. Jorja was so sad!

Jorja & Kiki

 Kiki does not want to stay.

 We put Quacky Chan next to Kiki to see if that would calm her down.

 Quacky Chan kept nibbling at Jorja's neck.

 Kiki just kept climbing, wanting to be anywhere but with Jorja.

Jorja was feeling absolutely awful by the time she finally got to bed. She asked me if I would sleep with her. She was miserable. Mike tried scheduling a doctor appointment online, but the website wouldn't let him log in. We are going to have to call as soon as they open in the morning. We are pretty sure she has strep. I'm not sure if any of my kids have ever had strep before. I'm planning on just letting Jorja sleep until it is time to go to the doctor's tomorrow. Hopefully she can recover quickly. She has a huge student government service project thing on Saturday. They are supposed to go to houses to do small tasks. I think they are supposed to work for about five hours. Jorja really wants to do that! Then she is planning on going to Jonas' concert with Hailey. Fingers crossed her body recovers quickly. I stayed with Jorja until I was sure she was asleep, then I snuck out into my own bed. Jorja's been sleeping in the guest room lately, which is just across the hall from me. At least I'll be able to get to her fast if I need to.