Second Cousins

Preston did his last range today. It was his test and he passed. Horray! Christine texted me today and asked if they could interview me for the testing coordinator job. I have an interview set up for Monday at noon. Ahhhhh! Jorja finished USULC. She absolutely LOVED being with Alta. The sophomore class president is related to Jorja. Jorja's grandma and his grandpa are first cousins. They were pretty close growing up too. So cool that they got to hang out here.

Jorja, Zach Lovell, Miles (the other counselor over Alta)

No idea why she sent me a picture of them in the bathroom. Or why they are there in the first place.

Jorja & Ethan Scott

Jorja came home late this evening. She then went to a 10:00 showing of Top Gun: Maverick with Nathan. That girl sure keeps herself busy!

Emergency at the Dance

Alta at Utah State Leadership Camp

Stockton sent us this picture from Texas. A boy had a seizure during the dance. That is some scary stuff. Glad he recovered and is going to be okay. The kids had to evacuate and wait until they were eventually told to go back to their rooms.

The big news that happened today was Jorja found out her mission date has been pushed back to September 5th. She is happy and sad about it. Lots of mixed emotions. I'm hoping with the later date she will be able to get her eyes fully fixed and I hope she will be less anxious. Even though she is disappointed, I really think it will work out for the best. She is going to be such an amazing missionary!

Green Machine

I worked today. I have been thinking a lot about applying for the job at Alta. Christine asked me today if I would like to interview for it. I decided I wanted to. I think I would regret not trying and always wondering. I don't know if I will get the job, but if I don't it will be okay because I really like the job I have now.

Jorja sent me a picture of Alta at the spirit bowl. Alta was assigned the color green if you couldn't tell. There are three kids from our ward there. Matthew Okerlund, Burke Staker and Ethan Scott. There are two more boys I our ward that are in student government that couldn't make it. Ben Johnson was in India and Luke Goins was in Thailand. Also, side note.... there are only six girls in student government this year. It is REALLY hard for girls to get in student government. Amazing that Jorja was in it all three years. There are even less girls now because this year they don't have senior senators or head cheerleaders in student government. Anyway, Jorja is having a great time and is loving being with Alta!

High Goals

Preston had another range today. I dropped him off on my way to work. Work was interesting. The person they hired to take Shannon's job decided she/he didn't want the job anymore. Shannon is the Testing Coordinator at Alta. Now Alta needs to find a new testing coordinator. Christine Astle, the head secretary, came and talked to me and asked if I would be interested in applying for the job. They don't know if I can even have it because it might need to be a counselor. I told her I would think about it. I don't know if I want to go full time and I have really liked working for Paula. Although if I was ever to go full time, now would be the perfect moment. Jorja is leaving on her mission, Preston still has three years left at Alta. I talked a lot about it with Megan Okerlund. If I got the job I would be working with her a lot. I'm not going to worry about it too much until they find out if I can even apply for the job. Should be interesting.

Jorja came home today from USULC. She was supposed to be over Jordan High this week, but her counselor partner asked if he could be over Gunnison. That is the school he worked with last year. They ended up moving him and Jorja. Jorja did not like that. She was really excited to be with Jordan. It turned out okay though. The kids made them these cute thank you signs.

???? & Jorja

Jorja, Hannah and Emily went to say goodbye to one of their ambassador friends named Miles. I think he is going to Atlanta, Georgia. That is pretty cool.

Emily, Miles, Hannah

Jorja

This is random, but the school always has seniors fill out a paper about what they plan on doing next in their life. The stack has been siting by the printer for awhile now. This one is on top. I didn't look at any of the others, so I don't know how many have such high achieving goals as this student.

Elon Dusk

Jorja and Hannah did a presentation at USULC. It was a 30 minute presentation and they had to do it 6 times. They were assigned the topic of diversity, which Jorja thought was hilarious since they are two white girls. They made the presentation more about including people that have different personalities than you. The theme of the week is space. They were Elon Musk and Elon Dusk, or something like that. I wish I could have seen her. She is dynamic as a presenter.

Hannah & Jorja

Small Shirt

I went downstairs to get church clothes for Preston and saw Stockton's two white shirts on the bed. What the... I texted Stockton and asked if he brought church clothes. He answered that he accidentally brought Preston's old church shirt. Whoops. Luckily his roommate had a shirt he could borrow.

Stockton

Jorja left to USULC today. Her roommate is Hannah, so she should like that! I hope she has a great week. She has loved USULC so much. What a great program. Lucky Jorja can be involved as a counselor now. USULC is Utah State University Leadership Camp. It is the camp that high school student government goes to. Jorja was only able to go once, but absolutely loved it. Junior year she couldn't go because she was in Taiwan and senior year covid cancelled it. Anyway, now that she is an ambassador she gets to be a counselor here. What a lucky girl.

Parrydise~Logan~Sandy

I spent the day alone. I got lots done, so it wasn't too bad. Mike spent the morning on the lake with the kids. He was in his sailboat while they were on the jetski. I think the kids liked having a spot on the lake to rest. Maysen did the kneeboard and then they spent the rest of the time tubing. Stockton took a picture of Mike's boat while they were on the jetski. Mike's living his dream.

Mike's boat

Mike fixed the dog fence, so Bear had access to the inside and outside of the cabin while they were gone. Bear found a new treat spot. When they came home Mike found a loaf of bread, a bag of sour patch watermelon and a bag of Swedish fish. I wonder how sick Bear is going to be. Mike spent some time cutting down trees so he would have a better way to park the boat. It's not finished yet, but it's a good start. On the way to the hardware store Mike was being a truck that was painting lines in the road. He ended up being behind them on the way back too. Talk about luck!

Preston & Bear

Fallen trees

Bear shocked and appalled that Mike would leave him.

Jorja has had a blast at Utah State Leadership Camp. She has absolutely loved it. I don't know who any of these people are though. She did text me today that she needs to be picked up at 8:00 tomorrow instead of Thursday morning. Welp, we will have to reschedule our bishop appointment. Mike took care of that and got it for next week.

Utah State Ambassadors ~ Jorja is in the middle

Why does she stick out her tongue? I don't get it.

The different schools are given a theme and song and have to make up a dance to perform at this conference. The ambassadors did one too. You can hear how much the kids adored them. How fun!

The best part of my dad was watching Jazz win game 1 against the Clippers. It was awesome! Conley is still out which puts Jazz at a major disadvantage. Gobert had a monster block to win the game. Amazing!

Mario Ducks

So.... Mike got ducks. They arrived in the mail today. The post office called him. They thought he had ordered turkeys.

Mike's ducks

Mike leaving the post office

Unboxing

Here they are! The kids are smitten. We have two girls and one boy. They decided to name the ducks Quackletta, Princess Peep and Waddluigi.

Ducks

 Ducks eating out of Preston's hand

 Maysen

 Jorja

 Madison & Jorja

 Jorja

 Madison, Jorja & Grace (Madison's sister)

 Maysen

The ducks

Eating from Preston

Jorja came back from leadership camp today. The ducks came a few hours before she got home. Jorja was waiting for me at Alta with Mr. Packer and Traven. Everyone else had gone home. I came the second she called though. Jorja was so tired. She got a total of eight hours of sleep while she was gone. She left on Monday. Today is Thursday. Oh boy, she has some catching up to do. Except, ducks. Anyway, I tried to get her to sleep for a few hours before she needed to leave to Addie's house. Addie was doing a voice lesson with her before she moves up to Provo. When I scheduled this I did not realize Jorja wouldn't have any sleep while she was gone. She seemed to do fine though. I gave Addie Michael's number. I gave him Addie's number when I saw him at Aimee's wedding. Hopefully they can hang out together and not be lonely. Addie gave Jorja a picture booth picture that Carter had taken home. They took it at the Pepperwood party. She was excited to get it. Carter is in student government and is so nice to Jorja.

Hailey, Jorja, Carter

Jorja got a bit of sleep before I woke her up to go to the church for a trek dance practice. She did not want to go. She was so tired. And grumpy. She came back with Madison super happy though. Being around people perks her right up. It is the opposite for me.

Coaching

Stockton was able to coach his first dive meet today. It ended up being the weirdest dive meet ever. It was up at Northcrest. The pool was tiny and dirty. The board was loud and awful. They didn't have score cards or parent helpers. (Parents usually add up the scores and with the correct degree of difficulty.) The coaches were the judges (that's normal), but no one knew what scores were given. They had their own kids dive sheets and the judges would just tell the other people what the scores were. Still, it was cool to watch Stockton with these kids. He has done such a great job. This pool was downtown Salt Lake. Only two of Stockton's divers showed up. Cameron and Aiden. After the meet they were playing on the three meter. Aiden chucked a 2 1/2 and Cameron chucked a double.

Cameron & Stockton

 Stockton with the other judges/coaches

The only thing I got from Jorja today was Alta's dance. Each school was required to put together a dance to Cotton Eyed Joe. Alta won 'best reaction'. I'm not sure how many prizes were given.

Jorja and Traven are in the back all the way to the right. Jorja's wearing a white hat.

Aimee's Wedding

Mike took the day off because Aimee is getting married today! Her wedding isn't until the afternoon, so he had time to play this morning. Mike and Preston set up the movie screen the kids got him for Father's Day. They wanted to see how big it is. Wow. It is quite big. That should be fun watching movie while the kids swim! Hopefully we can figure that out.

Mike & Preston

Mike and I went to the Salt Lake Temple this afternoon. It is so nice to be around family in the temple. It feels like we haven't seen the Hodson's in a long time! Still wish they lived five minutes away from us. Aimee and JJ are officially married. His name is actually John Jerome, but he goes by JJ. Jorja goes by JJ sometimes too. Anyway, the wedding was beautiful and the weather was perfect.

Aimee & JJ

 Nova, Aimee, Stephanie

During the giant family/friends picture, Mike and I each stood on one of those side pillars. In one we were reaching out our hands subtly, giving high fives. I hope those turned out fun, and not awkward. Haha!

 Scoop, Cori, Elizabeth, Frank, Nathan, Lisa, Aimee, JJ, Taylor, Michael, Melissa & Leo, Derek & Nova

Meanwhile, Jorja was having fun up in Logan. She sent me her schedule for the day. It was fun knowing what she was doing at different times.

 I asked Jorja to send me pictures of Josh and Carter. She sent me one of them together.

 This was from Josh. Jorja is in the middle.

Jorja sent me the next pictures around midnight. She was so tired by that time, but they were still up having fun. She was with the other girls in their dorm when she sent me these. Looks like she is having a great time.

Jorja & Bode

 Sophomore class officers. Missing: Joe ~ secretary

Carson ~ Vice President, Marshall ~ Historian, Jorja ~ President

Bode ~ Public Relations, Shafer ~ Senator

 Jorja & Shafer

 Lexi, Jorja, Traven

Aimee's reception was beautiful. It was at Heritage Gardens. We arrived about an hour before it was over. We waited for Stockton to get home from diving. Preston was sad that the eclairs were gone by the time we arrived. We got there right as Sherry, Matt and Miah did. It was fun to hang out with them tonight. Aimee had her line outside. Lisa looked beautiful too, but I didn't get a picture of her. Michael sang with his ukulele. It was great.

Back of Aimee's dress

 Front of Aimee's dress

 Maysen meeting JJ

 Michael

 Aimee & JJ

Matt called shortly after this. I took his family to the airport. When Matt asked me to do that weeks ago, I said yes. I thought their flight left at 11:00 am, plenty of time with the afternoon wedding. Whoops. It was pm. Matt and Sam were nice enough to drive to the reception so I could stay as long as possible. Matt called when they arrived. Miah walked me out and took the keys back to Mike. (I had left my drivers license in our car.) Matt and Sam are taking a red eye to Florida with three little kids. Good luck to them! I hope they sleep the entire flight! They are going to see Brett and Rachel. John and Cassie are already there. Wish I could come too. If we had all the money in the world, I'm sure I could have pulled it off. Sadly, that is not the case. :)