...Coach Jill...

Christmas Break 2011

2011-12-31T19:01:00.000-08:00

WARNING: Be prepared for the longest post in the history of posts! :)

I had a fabulous Christmas Break this year. Started out with a 6 am flight to Redding. Wouldn't recommend such an early flight! I survived. The family picked me up in Redding and we headed to Wade's tournament in Hamilton City. They lost in the Championship game, but it was fun to watch him play.

Home Sweet Home

Soon after we arrived home... the baking began! Pinterest will be the death of all of us... but we enjoyed making a few of the "Thackeray's favorite things" to give to people.

Troy and I with the "elf" hats... you can see all the craziness happening in the background!

We got to see Troy's Christmas play at the school.

We also helped make treat bags for the Ward Christmas party.

Making the Popcorn Balls

After the popcorn balls were finished... we made graham cracker houses!

Getting ready to begin...

Decorating

My "Barn" (that Wade later used for an FFA project)

And ~~during~~ after the cake decorating...

We crashed!

Cooking wears you out! :)

Next big event was... CIDER PONG!

Watching the action...

The supposed "champions"... apparently they talked a little too much trash prior to the event!

Game Faces!

Tracy and Tandy had it... and then we won't talk about the ending... Tracy claims to have not known the rules. It was a tragedy.

Before you knew it... Christmas Eve was upon us! We pretty much had everything finished prior to that day, so that was nice to have a relaxing Christmas Eve!

The boys enjoyed a game of basketball!

Getting ready to go to Grandpa Berry's

Cozy in the back of the car

Annual family picture

Christmas Eve Tree

Entertaining ourselves

Just Dance

American Idol

It was a great evening at Grandpa's. The nightcap consisted of watching "The Grinch" and a rousing game of Phase Ten that went until all hours of the night... We determined three things that night....

1. Phase 10 Hates Christopher (as Troy so kindly pointed out)

2. (We already knew this... but it was just reaffirmed) Jill WINS Phase 10! :)

And last but not least... with no picture attached...
3. Santa does not visit houses unless everyone is asleep. Santa, I'm sorry if you had to circle the house a few times to wait for this game to be finished... I know you are a busy guy! Especially on Christmas Eve! But clearly you weren't too upset because you hooked us all up the next morning! :)

Opening our stockings before Church.

Mitch "Tebowing" before opening presents

All the loot! Santa and the family never disappoint!

The grandparents and Aunt Janene and family came over for Christmas dinner. Normally we do "brunch" but we decided to do dinner. It was delicious.

It wouldn't be a successful Christmas day without a little basketball... (and the Lakers getting beat!) :)

Finished the night with the extended Thackeray family! Ate good food, enjoyed good company, and had a wonderful time!

Blair was fast asleep and this is how Jane was holding him... so sad! But yet... kind of funny! :)

Jane and I

We spent the rest of the week lounging around, watching movies, playing games, and relaxing. One day Wade had a game. We were able to watch all four teams play. I miss the days of four games in a night! :)

Staci and I at the games

New Years Eve they branded cows... love this picture of Wade. What a nerd...

We had another family get together... this time at Sam and Jenny's.

Fireworks to bring in the New Year!

Well... if you made it to the end of this novel of a post... Congratulations! It was a great end to 2011! Here's to an even better 2012! Happy New Year!

Thanksgiving 2011

2011-11-28T21:05:00.000-08:00

I have very fond memories of Thanksgiving over the past few years. I have spent a majority of the Thanksgiving's since graduating from high school in Southern California with the Rainville family.

2005

2006

2008

I've ventured to Wyoming to visit Uncle Dale and family. (2009)

Last year I headed home. (2010)

This year, Tandy had a tournament the Friday and Saturday after Thanksgiving, so we decided to have our own "cousin" Thanksgiving here. We were cooking all the food! I was nervous! It turned out to be a fantastic week! Who knew we could do it without the "adults".

Wednesday, everyone arrived. We headed to the BYU vs. Wisconsin women's basketball game. After the game we got pizza and hung out at my apartment.

Thursday we woke up and began dinner preparations. The Park's so kindly offered their home so that we would have more room to accommodate everyone! There were fourteen of us total! So a pretty good size.

Yes! We used paper products! Would you expect anything less from me? The best part about it... NO DISHES! :)

It wouldn't be Thanksgiving without NAME cards! :) And trail mix... in Dixie cups! :)

The food...

And dessert...

Prior to dinner... we sang the traditional "We Gather Together"...

And thoroughly enjoyed our feast! We played cards, watched football, relaxed, and ate dessert afterwards!

Here are some pictures with those in attendance :)

We attempted some sibling pictures... with our past history of family pictures... we were lucky to get out with a semi-decent picture! :)

Friday, we enjoyed sleeping in, and then headed up to Tandy's basketball game! We dropped her off so she could warm up and then headed to do a little bit of shopping. We did NOT brave the craziness of early morning Black Friday shopping.
(However, Mitchell and Tandy did on Friday night when they went to grab a Red Box from Walmart... this is the pictures they sent us!) SOOOO many people!

We headed back to her game after our afternoon shopping trip. They won by a lot! Fun to see her play in college! She's the one with the dark hair... #32. :) We kept looking for the blonde...

The cheering section...

That night we did a little bit more shopping and then headed back to Aunt Janene's and enjoyed homemade Cafe Rio and watched the movie Red.

Saturday we went to Tandy's game, they lost by ten. It was quite a memorable experience. One of the members of her team passed out and had multiple seizures on the court. Thankfully we were warned ahead of time! It was still completely traumatizing and apparently happens frequently. Crazy! I probably shouldn't have taken a picture... but I had to send one to Mom. So why not document it? Tandy... don't tell anyone!

After the game we headed to the Pizza Factory (much to the disdain of others)... but all in all had a pretty enjoyable time!

Free breadsticks... for our wait! Well worth it...

Mitchell made us stop at Cabela's on our way home...

Sunday, we went to church, came home, enjoyed Thanksgiving leftovers and everyone was on their way home! It was a completely enjoyable week! Weird to actually be in Utah for a holiday! Enjoyable nonetheless.

I love Thanksgiving because it causes people to reflect and truly be grateful. I wish it happened more frequently than just around Thanksgiving. I know I'm guilty of it. But I truly am so blessed and so grateful for the wonderful people and opportunities that I have in my life. It was a fantastic week and I'm grateful that I was able to spend it with my family!

Fall Break 2011

2011-10-20T13:48:00.000-07:00

I headed home for Fall Break this year. Before heading to the airport, we watched Hayley's volleyball game.

It was fun to be home and just relax for a few days. Wade had a football game in Fall River.

It was fun to see him play.

The color of the sky was so pretty.

Fall River's mascot was a ginormous dog! He looked like the dog from the Sandlot.

The cheering section!

Saturday... we went and cut wood on Grandpa's ranch. Troy wasn't very excited about it... :)

Cutting the wood!

The wood pile.

Wade was finally wearing pants (as opposed to shorts that he wears all the time)... it had to be documented!

Stacking all the wood!

Always enjoyable to take a trip home! It was a nice break from the grind! :)

Girl's Weekend

2011-10-15T22:43:00.000-07:00

Right before Fall Break, we were able to have a little girl's/sister's weekend. Tandy, Genna, and I went to the BYU softball games!

Then we met up with Tracy, Janna, and Jess and went and saw "The Help" at the movies! Such a great movie! Then on Sunday we made our own little feast! After the feast we played cards and watched movies! It was a nice relaxing weekend! :)

Thieves!

2011-09-26T22:37:00.000-07:00

My classroom was broken into this year! I came in Monday morning and my entire window was shattered. The closets were somewhat opened, and the hinges were completely bent and the wall dented from someone trying to break into the closet! My heart sank as I walked into the room. I immediately called the office and was calm until the assistant principal and campus supervisor came, and then I lost it a little bit. They managed to take ALL of the prizes from the prize closet (200 dollars worth of candy, chips, drinks, etc.) and all of my nice pens and binder clips from my desk. They didn't take the computers or anything else of value! The police were called, they took pictures. But the security cameras were not working near my classroom. OF COURSE! Still no suspects or confessions! It had to have been someone from my class because they knew exactly what they were going for based off of what was stolen! I realize the things they took were just candy and food, but this was the SECOND time that it has happened! I have not replaced any of the items. Sad that the actions of one or two people affected the entire class! I may have wished cavities and root canals upon the culprits! Hope it worked! :)

Shattered window! (Entry point)

Attempting to break into the locked closet!

Everything missing... boxes left behind... and the bottom row of stuff. Seriously people... I would have given you the candy! You didn't have to take it all! Frustrating and annoying! Thieves!

Service

2011-09-25T21:45:00.000-07:00

Well, it's official! The likelihood of the updating from the summer may have to wait until Fall Break, Thanksgiving Break, or Christmas Break! I figured I had better keep up with other happenings or I may just have to quit the blogging thing all together!

This weekend was really good!

Started off with the BYU vs. UCF football game! While it's not the same as the good 'ol college days, it's still extremely fun to be able to experience the atmosphere every now and again!

Celebration after a touchdown!

Thanks for inviting me Genna! :)

Saturday morning we woke up bright and early and headed over to Rosemary's to help her lay sod in her backyard! It was an extremely enjoyable morning getting to hang out with cousins and enjoy one another's company while helping Rosemary! She is the prime example of service and does so much for us! For once it was great to be able to do something for her for a change! :)

Before

The 8 pallets of sod!

After

During

Our Project Manager (Blake) was questionable at times. The Quality Control Manager (me) had to keep him in line! Everyone had an enjoyable time bantering back and forth!

Rolling the Sod

Gina Thackeray said it best, "You kids are the cream of the crop by a long shot. Your grandparents and parents have taught you well and they should all be extremely proud of your work ethic and your senses of humor. :) You rock -- and I'm proud to share your last name. :)"

I thought that was a nice compliment! Definitely proud to have the Thackeray name! It was great to be able to do a little service!

The funny thing was I had about a BAZILLION papers to grade and things to do and I didn't think I was going to be able to get it all done! I was stressing! Amazingly I got everything finished! That night when I got home, Genna, Holli, and Tandy helped me grade a huge majority of those papers. I was grateful for their service in helping me to get everything finished! The entire day was a huge testimony to me of the importance of service! Even when you think you don't have time to do something! Just do it! :) You will be blessed in the long run!

Rah, Rah, Rah, Rah, Rah.... GOOOOO COUGARS!

2011-09-17T14:23:00.000-07:00

Big game tonight! GOOO COUGARS! :)

In other news... an update on life! On the verge of a breakdown! It nearly happened a couple of weeks ago! Thankfully I had a little weekend away for a wedding in Portland to rejuvenate! :) (another blog post for another day). I'm finally feeling somewhat caught up?! Hopefully one of these days I can update from the summer! Maybe that's what I'll dedicate tomorrow to? In the mean time, school is in full swing! I am teaching 3 regular education English 10 classes and 3 resource English 10 classes. I am the special education advisor for 15 juniors. Coaching volleyball. Half way through another class for my Master's. Oh and in my spare time, doing some work for the company in Arizona. Some day, life will go back to being boring or somewhat normal at least! Rest assured, I am still alive (barely)! Updates to come soon!

Ben and Carly's Wedding 09.10.11

2011-09-10T20:50:00.000-07:00

I was able to take a little weekend get away to Portland to celebrate Ben and Carly's wedding! I'm sooo glad I did! It was a much needed break! I left Friday after school and practice. BARELY made my 4:50 flight! I was going through security at 4:30. Yah, that was a little stressful!

Ken and Theresa picked me up from the airport and we were off to the rehearsal dinner! It was at a cute little Italian place called Ernesto's and it was so much fun to see everyone and catch up!

The cool "kid" table! :)

After dinner everyone went to a karaoke bar. That was quite entertaining! :) The only picture (phone pic) from the whole night... although some video footage could be posted! I'll save some people the embarrassment! :)

The next morning we slept in (that was great! Hadn't done that in awhile!) and hung around the hotel and chatted! Christopher had gotten in early that morning and Kari got in a little bit later as well! So everyone was there! :) We ate lunch, did a little dress shopping for Kari's big day coming up, and then got ready for the wedding!

On our way to the wedding!

Waiting for the wedding to start!

Ceremony (Instagram style!)

Post Wedding Pictures

Waiting for the dinner to start... (Instagram style)

It was a great dinner and night of dancing and hanging out! :)

It wouldn't be a wedding without a little car decorating to end the night! :)

That's all the pictures for the weekend! We spent the rest of the weekend, hanging out, watching them open all their presents, moving presents to their apartment, and catching up! The trip was too short! It was great to get together with everyone! What I love is that even though we haven't seen each other in forever, it feels like no time has passed! So fun to catch up and hang out! It definitely needs to happen more often! :)

Fairview

2011-09-05T22:25:00.000-07:00

I'm going out of order! Because if I don't tackle this and start somewhere... I will NEVER be caught up!

Labor Day weekend the Brown's invited us to Fairview! After attending the blessing of Blake's baby, Tandy and I drove to Fairview. It's always a good time... riding four wheelers, playing games, and relaxing out in nature! :)

Thank you Brown Family for making me feel at home... away from home! :)

Beginning of the School Year

2011-08-25T20:02:00.000-07:00

I wish the blog updates were a little more exciting. It's more for journaling purposes for me! So SORRY if you're bored! :)

This summer FLEW by! School started out smoothly, well... as smoothly as juggling teaching, coaching, advising Special Ed students, and taking a class myself for my Master's Degree can go I suppose! :)

Tandy got a full ride to play basketball at College of Eastern Utah at the last minute. So Mom, Tracy, and Tandy all caravaned out to get everyone settled for the new year! We all met up in Grantsville to watch Greg play some football! We brought him the good luck! He played very well!

The next day I had a volleyball tournament. It was a long day... thus the face! :)

Tracy and Tandy got moved into their new places. Saturday, we had planned to make a day out of hanging out with Aunt Janene and family, except my volleyball team kept winning, and we took 2nd in our tournament! So we only had time for a delicious dinner at Texas Roadhouse with Aunt Janene and Katy. That night we stayed in a hotel in Salt Lake.

The next morning we headed to Dugway, for Shannon Thackeray's farewell. It was fun to see some Thackeray's we don't see all the time! Soon after the farewell... we were off to Rosemary's for our beginning of the year cousin's dinner! Sadly this is the only picture of the trip to Dugway! (I'm sure Tandy will appreciate this!)

Rosemary's was AWESOME as always! I'll let the pictures do the talking! She made delicious food as always! And we had quite the crowd with all the visitors in town! Love our family!

Girls in Our Family

Dessert!

Daylin was LOVING her some ice cream!

Three Finger Smile (Elsa's face is PRICELESS!)

Vogue... or something like that... picture frame?

Love our family get togethers!

It was a fun weekend! I was glad that Mom was able to come out! I'm sure Tracy and Tandy appreciated it as well! :)

Demolition Derby

2011-08-13T22:46:00.000-07:00

Nephi has a Demolition Derby every year. Aunt Patty invited me to come down for it this year! I was able to go to lunch with Jodi and Mason before the Derby! It was so fun to see them and catch up!

I don't quite understand the entertainment factor of watching cars crash. In fact, I don't really enjoy it at all! But something about it is somewhat entertaining! :)

Last Day of Summer Vacation

2011-08-04T23:07:00.000-07:00

It was a bitter sweet end to a fantastic summer at home! It always ends too soon! Aunt Alana, Mom, Wade, Troy, and Tracy all drove me up to the airport. We hit up the Family Fun Center before my flight left! Love my family! It was fun to be at home for an extended period of time for the summer! Grateful for the summers off! :)

Happy Birthday

2011-08-02T14:49:00.000-07:00

Turned the big 2-6, this year! We had dinner the Sunday before to celebrate.

Mae and I had a grand time jumping on the trampoline! :)

A little pillow fight... :)

Traditional "cake" picture! The cake was a joke...

Making a wish...

Opening presents... new iPhone... hooray!

Opening more presents...

iPhone picture... back

iPhone picture... front

Hanging out on my actual birthday... we went swimming and watched home videos... good times!

Pictures by Amanda Thackeray the day of the birthday dinner...

It was a great day! :)

Old Timers Rodeo

2011-07-29T22:50:00.000-07:00

We hit up the Old Timers Rodeo this summer! Jack and Calvin rode calves!

The boys after their rides!

Mae and I taking in the view! :)

Cabin

2011-07-26T15:07:00.000-07:00

We took a few trips to the Cabin this summer! One of my favorite vacation spots. :)

The "rapids" were extremely fast this year!

Playing the rock game...

Trying to get Amanda to jump off the rock... flashback to ten years ago? :)

Floating the river...

Poor little Calvin had something in his eye...

Homemade Cafe Rio! :)

A few morning card games...

Fun on the new hammock!

One of my favorite places to be! :) Good memories!

Wade and Troy Swim Meets

2011-07-23T22:57:00.000-07:00

As much as they claim to hate swimming... I think they secretly LOVE it! I think swimming is on my list of favorite sports to watch. I mean, it's not at the top! But I sure do love a good swim meet!

And Troy loves winning! :)

Berry Family Reunion

2011-07-15T15:49:00.000-07:00

We had a Berry Family Reunion this summer! It was a blast! I drove out with Uncle Steve, Aunt Patty, and Greg in their motor home. That is the ONLY way to travel! So fun! We split the trip into two days. We got to Reno the first day!
Scamp and Rascal enjoyed the trip out...

We did some golfing that night at the driving range...

The next morning we took off for home. When we got there we celebrated Mitchell and Tandy's birthday's and we had a big dinner with all the family.

We had dinner at Aunt Linda's one night... We enjoyed chatting by the campfire and the wildlife! Haha! :)

The next day we went to the lake... Grandpa rented a patio boat! We left at like 6 in the morning!

Finding a spot...

Hanging out on the boat...

Tubing...

Synchronized Swimming Sisters...

Mitch "pretending" to drive :)

A very fun day on the lake!

Packing up...

The next day we left for a few days at the Oregon Coast.

Our housing for the trip... way better than a hotel! :)

Went to the beach... it was FREEZING!

Had delicious dinners...

Played a little golf...

Went to the beach some more....

It was a very fun trip!

Can't wait until next time... :)

Trip #2 Home for the Summer with Aunt Janene

2011-07-04T20:35:00.000-07:00

Trip two home for the summer was with Aunt Janene and her family! We had a good week at home! It started off with an Etna Ward Reunion! (No pictures from that!) It was fun to see people that had come and gone from the Etna Ward over the years!

We enjoyed a campfire at Uncle George's and playing the game Sevens. It was a hit!

4th of July was enjoyable as always! It is one of my favorite holidays! I have so many good memories from 4th of July's at Uncle Stan's! I'll let the pictures do the talking! :)

Parade

Posting the Colors and National Anthem

Listening to everyone sing their patriotic songs, read their patriotic poems and stories, etc.

Our little John Wayne poetry reading

Family Picture (mom and Tandy didn't get the whole Red, White, and Blue memo...)

Picnic (Look at all that delicious food!)

Swimming (many good memories of 4th of July swimming... Marco Polo, the Color Game, Sharks and Minnows, the list goes on)

View from the pool

Playing on the tree... you know what makes that tree special... the TREE SWING!

Nap time while the kids are all swimming! Uncle George... priceless! :)

I can only imagine what story they are telling here... :)

Story Telling: (in a Southern accent) "Rhett, did you get your haircut?" "No grandma!" "Yah, ya did!" :)

Watermelon!!!

Everyone chatting!

FLAG COOKIES!!!

Everyone was happy for their return this year! The one year hiatus without them was UNACCEPTABLE!

Fireworks in the Spencer's field... with the cows! :)

Watching the Fowle's fireworks, before we started our own!

Janey loves taking pictures almost as much as watching the fireworks! :)

Sparklers!

Fourth of July is one of my favorite holidays! For all of the reasons above! :)

We made a trip to the cabin! (Pictures to come under the "Cabin" blog post).

We had a few dinners with the extended family!

Calvin's outfit HAD to be documented here! Plaid shorts with the striped shirt! Classic! :)

And of course... we made time for a game of Dollar Store Bingo!

Yet another enjoyable trip home! :) Too short as always! Luckily I was able to go back one week later! :)

Good Day

2011-06-29T22:11:00.000-07:00

No pictures for this post. No real point to this post. If I gave you a day to day recap of my life, you would be BORED out of your mind! The only point... it's nice to have a good day every now and again! It was a crazy busy day and I didn't even get HALF of the things done that I needed to!This is how it went..

Woke up
Volleyball Open Gym
Ran to Provo to pick up a prescription for Tracy
Since I was in Provo, went to the temple real quick (except... real quick turned into longer than expected! Which wasn't a bad thing!)
Got home started writing a paper! (Of course it was due TODAY! Plan ahead? Who does that? Certainly not me!)
Went to dinner at Uncle Lynn and Aunt Susan's
Came home and finished writing paper
Went to the Averett's and played some Phase 10

Still haven't packed to go home. We're leaving tomorrow. Maybe I should go do that? :) See... nothing out of the ordinary. It was just a good day! Gotta love those!

Dixie Basketball Camp

2011-06-26T21:38:00.000-07:00

We headed to St. George for a week for basketball camp! We caravaned down with 4 cars. 28 total people! We were in for an adventure.

We all stayed in this house! It was gorgeous! And the perfect place to stay for a week! It had plenty of room for all of us and a swimming pool and hot tub!

Between three teams we played too many basketball games to count. We usually had a little downtime at the gym before the games would start. Enough time for some picture taking...

A little hair braiding...

Mindy created this poem for me while braiding:

I have this coach named Jill Thackeray,
Beaughbillion's her middle name, it's so fun to say.
She's really fun to talk to and she's pretty chill,
But sometimes she can be a pill.
Wait! I was only JUST KIDDING! Please don't cut my playing time.
Don't be offended, it was only a rhyme!!!

This is what the girls looked like when we would get home...

And then they would get their second wind... and all sorts of shenanigans would happen...

Savannah hiding under our beds trying to scare us... jokes on her! She got stuck and we had to lift the bed off of her!

Rooms all sticky noted

Skits/Video Making... here is their inspiration...

And then their version... quite similar actually! :)

I am still trying to recover. It was definitely a LONG week! But a very fun week! Lots of good memories! :)

Happy Father's Day

2011-06-19T18:45:00.000-07:00

Happy Father's Day Dad! Thank you for all you do for our family! You work so hard! We appreciate all of your hard work and sacrifices for us! Love you!!!

Other Odds and Ends

2011-06-12T20:54:00.000-07:00

There were of course sporting events to attend while home.

The day after graduation, Tandy was supposed to play in an All-Star softball game. It was in Chico so as soon as Grad Nite ended at 6 am, we were hopping in the car and heading down. I was the designated driver since everyone else had been up for 24 hours! We got to Redding and they got a call that the game had been cancelled because of rain. We went out to breakfast. Did a little bit of shopping. Then headed home. Sadly, no pictures to document.

Wade and Troy had multiple baseball games. I had to steal this picture from Ray, because I didn't really take any pictures and this was the only one that showed Wade.

Troy was the bat boy. He's on his way to ask me for some money for the snack shack! Clearly we can see his priorities and that he takes his job seriously! :)

Jane and I enjoyed ~~taking pictures~~ watching Troy and Calvin's games.

The only baseball pictures of Troy this time are after a game... here he is feeding Lucky Liz.

Here he is on Sunday before church... after throwing a fit because he didn't want to feed poor Lucky Liz. He stormed outside to feed her... but forgot to get dressed. Tracy took a close up for blackmail at a later date. :) Next time Troy Boy, get dressed! :) It will be less embarrassing for you in the future!

I read the entire Hunger Games series while home. It was addicting. I have been putting off reading them for an entire year. I shouldn't have waited so long! I thoroughly enjoyed them.

Overall a very successful trip home! Although it was busy it was nice to get to relax a little bit! A great way to start the summer!

Graduation Festivities

2011-06-03T20:44:00.000-07:00

The main reason for the visit home was to help with Grad Nite and enjoy the graduation festivities.

It began with graduation preparations. Had to get the house ready for Tandy's party. Had to help with Grad Nite decorating. It turned out fantastic as usual. I spent far too many hours cutting letters out on the Cricut. But it was worth it in the end! Always nice when it all comes together! Good job mom and decorating crew!

Wade graduated from the 8th grade. Hard to believe he will be in high school? Um... you're still five.

Tandy graduated from high school. Hard to believe she will be in college? Um... you're still ten!

Thoroughly enjoyed all of the graduation festivities. During Tandy's graduation one of her classmates stood up and decided to give a speech of his own without prior approval from anyone. It was hilarious. More hilarious was the fact that no one knew whether to stop him or to let him just keep going. People's faces were priceless. I was crying I was laughing so hard!

Tandy's Graduation Party

Congratulations to both graduates! :) Love you guys!

Memorial Day

2011-05-31T20:07:00.000-07:00

I have some catching up to do! As soon as school ended, I hopped on a plane and headed home for a couple of weeks! First on the agenda, Memorial Day!

Sunday afternoon we went and visited Grandma Berry's grave.

The boys enjoyed some rolling down the hill. Very respectful.

Don't you love the hat?! :)

Monday, we had a picnic at Uncle Bill's.

Horshoes and Baseball

Always a good time when we have a little get together! Good food, good company, good times all the way around! :)

SCHOOL'S OUT FOR SUMMER!

2011-05-26T19:06:00.000-07:00

Last day of school today! Not a single person came to class. In fact, I didn't have more than 4 people attend one class this entire WEEK! Pointless! I got things organized and cleaned up, grades all done, and mentally prepared myself for SUMMER! :)

Yesterday, a couple of the girls on my softball team came to my room to play some Phase 10. I told them they could get a treat out of my "Prize Closet". (I give the students tickets for good behavior, turning assignments in, etc. and then they put their tickets in their class jar and we draw for prizes on Friday's.) Well they opened the cupboard and they were like there's nothing in here. I was like haha! Funny joke. But no! There was nothing! Someone had cleaned out my ENTIRE closet. They took ALL of the candy! I was ticked! My classroom door was LOCKED and it didn't happen in class because I stand by the cupboard when they choose their prize! Our campus security guy is doing some investigating! He's looking on the hallway camera's to see who went inside my room that day. The thing was I know it was still stocked 3rd period the day before because I watched people take stuff out of the closet! So it happened somewhere between 1:00 pm the day before until I got their that morning and found nothing! I realize it's just candy! But I'm not a fan of having things TAKEN from me! Plus, if you saw the amount that they took, you'd be appalled yourself!

Today, I did the necessary teacher check out, then some of the teachers went out to lunch at Brick Oven! And that kicked off my SUMMER! :)

I'm headed home on Saturday for a couple of weeks! Tandy is graduating! It'll be good to be home! Then I'll be back to Utah for volleyball camp, basketball camp, softball tournaments, back home for a week, back to Utah for more coaching... and before you know it the summer is going to be over!

But before we get that far... I'm going to enjoy the break from school, enjoy the time with family and friends, and enjoy some sunshine! Here's to an eventful and fun summer! :)

Back Patting Moment

2011-05-24T13:27:00.000-07:00

My Grad School GPA... 4.0

Did it again! :) Excuse my back patting moment! But all the procrastination and juggling of a bazillion things has paid off! Had this been a normal occurrence back in the high school and original college days (getting a 4.0 that is... not the juggling of a bazillion things... that is the story of my life), I don't think I'd be as willing to pat myself on the back!

Now off to high school graduation! I get to sit up on the stage... while 500 people's names are read and receive a diploma! You think that's an exaggeration? You think I'm kidding? I'm not! It's going to be a LONG night!

Time for an Update...

2011-05-20T09:21:00.000-07:00

Time for some updates! :) Reasons I have been preoccupied... (nothing exciting mind you!) and in no particular order... Grad school! Trying to finish up the first year of teaching! Renewing my teaching license. Finishing softball season. Word processing jobs. Trying to figure out my future/job situation for next year. Friends. Family. It seems like it's never ending.

More specific details...

Grad School- I just finished my second class of grad school! I am now waiting for a background check in order to continue on with my third class. Little frustrated by the whole situation, 1) because I received the email to get it taken care of a month ago, but it was at a crazy time and the email remained in my inbox... so it's kind of my fault for procrastinating. 2) because I AM A LICENSED TEACHER, don't you think I would have to have a background check if I'm currently teaching? 3) because it TAKES FOREVER! But... instead of complaining I'll be grateful for the nice little break of no school for a couple weeks! I'll have nothing tying me down when I go home for a nice little visit soon!
Finishing up the first year of teaching- ONE MORE WEEK OF SCHOOL! Graduation is on Tuesday and we have school until Thursday! This year teaching has been such a blessing and I've really enjoyed my job! I can NOT wait for summer! Kids are punks the last couple weeks of school! They are just as ready for summer and complain about anything and everything they have to do! One more week... that's all I have to survive!
Renewing teaching license- Just another thing to add to the to do list. A bunch of paperwork to fill out and meetings with people. Nothing major. Crossing the t's and dotting the i's.
Word processing jobs- As if I don't have enough to do, I'm still doing work for the company in Arizona! It is one of the many blessings that I have in my life, and they are great to work for! It always seems that there is work whenever I have a bazillion things to do! Convenient... BUT! I'm grateful for the job! It helps fund my plane rides home! :)
Figuring out the job situation for next year- I was hired this year as a ONE year position. I knew that going in, but was confident that my contract would be renewed. I received the letter in March saying that my contract was NOT being renewed. I knew it was coming, but it still caused a little uncertainty. I finally received word that my contract WAS being renewed and I DO have a job next year! So that was great news! The time in between waiting... NOT so fun!
Coaching- Lots going on with coaching. Softball season came to an end. More details on that in the post below. It was an extremely fun year as always! Now that it's over I'm getting everything planned for the summer and softball. Getting registered for tournaments, getting money, it's been quite the process! But it'll be worth it! :) Someone's gotta do it... right?! :) During softball season I was approached by the administration about coaching volleyball. After lots of meetings and talks, Suzette and I decided to come back and coach volleyball again this year! (I know I never said I was leaving... but I was.... and now I'm back!) I'm excited for the upcoming year! My summer schedule is absolutely craziness! Three sports will do that to ya! We have lots of fun tournaments and camps planned so that will be fun!
Friends and Family- Look at other recently posted posts. I'm extremely grateful for family and friends that provide a little break from the hectic and craziness of my daily schedule!

So... that's what's been happening in the life of Jill. Nothing exciting. But I am alive! :)

Softball 2011

2011-05-13T21:20:00.000-07:00

I haven't really blogged about softball this season! It was a crazy year! It flew by so extremely fast! And it was awesome! My sophomore team did fantastic! We were 19-3 and after the first game of the season there was NO way I thought we would win that many games! The girls improved so much over the season and it was such a privilege to be able to coach them!

Sophomore Team (minus Malia)

JV Team (minus Kinsley)

Varsity Team (minus Kinsley)

Coaches (minus Robyn)

Everyone (Minus Kinsley and Robyn)

We had another "Book" this year. I just die laughing every time I read it. It is a great reminder of the good times! There are things that I would NEVER remember if it wasn't written down! And some of them are DANG funny! Others... you had to be there! Without further ado...

"Pause for Laughs" Italicized words are my added remarks! :)

2/28/11- Tryouts

- The “.27 mile” mile (At tryouts we had them run the mile… all of a sudden Karl disappears and we just see him driving around the parking lot in his car? He comes back and says he’s clocked how long the mile is. "This many laps around the parking lot is a mile"… the girls all ran 4 minute miles! It was incredible!)

3/1/11- Tryouts

- When you have to tell someone, “Now don't let this ball hit you in the face” at tryouts, maybe they should go home.

3/2/11- Tryouts

- Caitlyn fell in the snow

- “That __________ girl is taking over 3rd base, she can really move!” (Name left out for anonymity purposes)

- “Hey Shayne, get your bat!”

- “I have a pink helmet, is that okay?”

- That ___________ girl tried to hit Lindsey with the bat. (Name left out for anonymity purposes)

3/3/11- First Team Meeting

- Allie: He read it wrong, I didn't write 'a bumpy'! (Karl had Everyone write about their “scar” and then we had to guess who’s scar it was).

- Karl: Would this person who got screwed please stand up.

3/9/11- Practice

- Caitlyn pitched from behind the screen and then waited for the throw back.

“Caitlyn, you have to move to the side”

- Allie and Kinsley both ate it running the bases

3/10/11- St. George

- Jentry: A. L. L. I. E.?

- Does Jentry know how to spell “Quesadilla”?

3/11/11- St. George

- Robyn got some from the bucket

- 14 pt turn in the Brick Oven parking lot followed by 4-wheeling around the roundabout (Thank you Jamie!)

- (While hitting baby whiffles and after hitting Christina with one) Kinsley (to Christina): Sorry, I was just trying to do that!

3/12/11- St. George

- The umpire awkwardly told Robyn to have Kinsley zip up her pants because he could “see everything”. (Her zipper was broken and we all knew it!)

- Lindsey: Kins, did you trip?

Kinsley: Yep, I yelled so loud I almost fell.

- “Allie, be a deer”

- “Allie, what are you doing?” “My feet need a rest”

- (To Aliza going for a foul ball close to the fence) Jill: Liza, you got room. WHAM! (Apparently… she didn’t!)

- Karl: Jenn, you played any first base? I’m thinking about putting you in?

Jenn: You just keep thinking about it.

- Miranda got out of the circle and got a standing ovation. (This was after an entire tournament of not backing up third or home!)

- Miranda: Did you see what she brought me? Low calorie Gatorade! It's the sugar I need! (Miranda’s diabetic! She needed some sugar!)

- Aliza: You know who is funny? Lela!

3/14/11- Practice

- Allie “tripped” SydB

- Caitlyn cut it right (Caitlyn cut the ball correctly while doing first and third situations and as she walked back to her position she shot her first in the air. Had to be there).

- Allie shoved Jenn so she could be first in line

3/15/11- Pleasant Grove

- After sliding, Alexis fell on second base

- Nobody (except Allie) knew how many outs there were

- Lindsey and Robyn somehow missed the entire first inning of the JV game

- Jenn: What is the score? I can't see the scoreboard

Malia: Jenn, the scoreboard isn't on!

3/16/11- Lone Peak

- Shelley Foster: This hood drives me nuts, but the rain hitting my face drives me nutser.

- Aliza: I waited 13 batters to get hit in the butt?!

- Aliza, SydB, and Jenn all waited 13 batters to get hit, then Jenn picked up the ball and handed it to the catcher

- Karl imitated Lindsey's run

- Alexis tried to catch a ball, but it hit her in the stomach instead

3/17/11- Bingham

- Aliza's mind was boggled! (After seeing Allie field a bunt! She’d never seen her move so quickly!)

- Karl fell off the bucket!!! (Karl always sits on his bucket when we’re on defense. A foul ball came straight at him and in slow motion he fell off his bucket!)

- Miranda has never “diven” in her life

3/21/11- Practice

- Allie fell walking through the nets

- Allie hit herself in the nose with her bat

- Allie smashed her own hand with her bat

3/23/11- Union

- Aliza: Do those shoes give you blisters in the roof of your mouth?

- Jennyjuiah

- After rolling a double, the entire team left the field after two outs. (It was such a great double play!)

3/24/11- Maple Mountain

- SydS hit a triple but got out at third because her ear warmer fell over her eyes and she couldn't find the base.

- ___________________________ (If you think it is funny, put it in your book!) (Something about getting ten runned by Maple Mountain. I don’t think it’s funny! So I’m not putting it in my book!)

3/28/11- CLEARED

- Allie: Sarah, tuck in your shirt!

- Allie: Jill, you're in violation of code 747, not having your shirt tucked in.

- Aliza: Sometimes don't you just want to punch yourself in the face?

- Aliza: It's weird, if you're nice to people, they're nice back!

- Aliza: Allie, YOU LOSE! Get off the court!

- Caitlyn: Anything? (Trying to get some Cleared points!)

3/29/11- Payson

- Jenn: Do they usually end a game in the middle of an inning like that?!

Allie: Jenn, we're home team

3/31/11- Uintah

- The bus took a hit. (Rock or a bullet? Either way Allie was scared) (The windshield shattered)

- Alexis finally found a cart her size

Apparently we took a break from comedy from the end of March till the 19th of April

4/19/11- Maple Mountain

- Jenn threw dirt at the umpire after getting called out at home

4/22/11- Payson

- Jill got on the wrong bus. (In my defense I was talking on the phone and trying to get a million things done before we left! There were three buses lined up and I just got on the first one!)

- (After a terrible call by the umpire when clearly the girl was out but the umpire called her safe) Karl: Blue, can we have help?!

Blue: No!

Karl: Why?

Blue: Because she was out! (Then why are we having this conversation?)

- SydB (on catching a fly ball): “I just closed my eyes and went for it” (Yes! This is what we teach our girls!)

4/23/11- JV tournament

- Lindsey: Aliza look at Syd

Aliza: Syd, you have spit on your face

- Other player: I would have called tails

Kinsley: Well yeah, since you already saw it land on tails!

- Lexi: Can I bat left handed next time?

Karl: You haven't hit right handed yet!

4/26/11- Uintah

- Malia hit a long fly ball to center field. The center fielder fell over the fence, but the ball stayed in.

4/27/11- Mountain View

- Lindsey: You know if anyone was watching the game that foul ball would have been a lot less surprising.

Kinsley: I...we...uh... Touché.

- The ball got lost after the other team tried to throw Christina out at third. (They threw it, it hit the back of her helmet and landed in the hood of her sweatshirt! I've never laughed so hard!)

Christina (Scared like it was going to hurt her): “It's in my hood!!”

- Umpire: Safe… Out. I saw the right call but my mouth said the wrong thing.

- Lindsey: How did you hurt your ankle?

Allie: I don't think I want to tell you.

- Miranda: I was born on the May 18th of June. I mean April.

4/30/11- Softball Camp

- Rubber Chicken!!! ugh

- Mauri Ashman (while throwing a hit stick at Allie): Atalatl!

Little Lister: What is an Atalatl?

Lexi (disgustedly): a hunting tool.

- Lindsey: What do we have to do?

Mauri: Get Chelsea out!

5/5/11- Salem Hills

- Allie: Your mom said you wanted to lay down and cry

Liza: I did!

- (After an interesting trip along the back roads) Caitlyn: We can probably make it to Murray faster than Spanish Fork.

- Allie: Tell her to go straight or I'll hit you.

5/6/11- Murray (what a trip)

- Karl: Let me preface this. She gave me one once that tasted like a concoction of grass clippings and pond water. (In regards to one of Robyn’s homemade shakes)

- Karl: It's a mell of a hess

- Lindsey (to Caitlyn as she smashed my finger): Could you please not do that, that hurts.

- Random Girl from Murray (RGM): Who are you playing?

Lindsey: Murray

RGM: They're playing Murray (Uh, where are you from?)

- Jenn: I think they are over there calling me big head (After she turned a fantastic double play!)

- Malia's Grandma: She doesn't have a mom, and her dad isn't answering.

Karl: Christina, who are you talking to?

Christina: My mom. (And they have always been married!)

- Aliza (with head hanging out of bus window): I'm sweating!

- Allie: Utah Trax! ...we rode next to a lady with a mustache!... and she was going to build a ship and SAIL THE SEAS!!!

Aliza: What does that have to do with Red Robin?

- Aliza: Hi, I'm just trying to get your restaurant. Is it anywhere near Jordan High School, the home of the Beat Diggers?

- Aliza: Then we'll exit at Bangerter and find you!

- Team (singing): I love to see the temple.

Yelled: Verse Two?

5/10/11- Sophomore Team night

- Cami: All I’ve ever wanted to do is impress Aliza!

5/11/11- Grantsville

- Caleb: Where is that big lover boy? (In reference to Karl and why he wasn’t on the bus yet!)

- Caitlyn: This is the longest bus ride I've ever been on with the fewest miles traveled. (As we sat in the parking lot and waited for Jenn and Alexis to finish their AP test!)

- We waited 40 minutes for the girls to take their AP test, then Alexis had to run home “real quick”.

- Cami: Are you going to do it?

Amber: Do what?

- Jentry: Jenn's not sharing

Alexis: Jenn, share!

- Karl: Is the pen no good?

Allie: NO GOOD!

- Jill: Just keep watching up here to your right (Looking for the sail boats at the Great Salt Lake)

Caleb: Which way is right?!

- Caleb got hit by bus doors.
- (Before Lindsey started her final reading of the book... it inspired the title this year!) Aliza: Pause for laughs.

What a year! So grateful for the opportunity I have to coach! :)

State Championship Rings

2011-05-09T21:17:00.000-07:00

We got our state championship rings a couple weeks ago! THEY ARE HUGE! The girls love them! So that's all that matters! But a little large for my taste! Still fun and exciting!

Happy Mother's Day

2011-05-08T11:49:00.000-07:00

Happy Mother's Day to all those mothers out there! Especially to mine! Love you Mom! Thanks for all you do for all of us! You are the BEST!

Women's Conference and a Celebration

2011-04-30T20:50:00.000-07:00

Aunt Tammy was a speaker at Women's Conference this year! I was very thankful that she shared a ticket so that I was able to attend! I've never seen so many women in one place! I sure was glad I had a "fast pass" to the front of the line and was able to sit front row! That's the only way to do it! :)

Aunt Tammy and her speaking partner did a fabulous job! I was very touched by the stories that she shared and I was glad I took the afternoon off to go and listen!

We also had a celebration of Aunt Elsie's life for those in Utah! It was great to get together with friends and family and tell stories and reminisce! I truly am so grateful for the plan of salvation and know that we will see our families again someday! So grateful for that knowledge! It is a definite comfort to me!

Family

2011-04-20T21:28:00.000-07:00

I just love all of my family... immediate and extended! I have really come to appreciate them over the last few years and love any and every opportunity to get together!

Aunt Elsie passed away this past Monday and this really put in perspective for me how important family is! I have some great memories of Aunt Elsie and am grateful that I got to grow up next door to her and her family! Monday night, Rosemary invited us over for dinner. One of Aunt Elsie's sons (Mark) was there, and he told some very touching and humorous stories of the past week when all of their family was able to be together and spend some of Aunt Elsie's last moments with her! This reaffirmed to me the importance of family and the gospel. We had a great time reminiscing and remembering the good times!

Three Finger Smile

"Vogue"

It was a special night, and I'm so grateful that we got together, and that Mark was there to tell us stories! :) Love my family!

Spring Break 2011

2011-04-17T21:13:00.000-07:00

Home sweet home! It was a fantastic spring break in Etna! Mitch and I drove out so we could make it home in time for the Marble Mountain Scramble! It was clearly worth our time since we got to watch a lot of softball... they were the CHAMPIONS... and Tandy was the tournament MVP!

Tandy Pitching

Hitting

Champions

Butch and Kenny (my high school coaches)

We'll forgive the fact that they are wearing Yreka gear and coaching there now! It definitely brought back some memories of the good 'ol days! (Good and Bad! Haha! But mostly Good!)

After the tournament, some of mom's side of the family went out to dinner! It was fun to be together! Love family!

Troy boy was in desperate need of a haircut! Good thing he got one that night!

They were quite entertaining with Just Dance 2.

Next on the agenda was some Little League baseball! 8-10 year old's are surprisingly entertaining. Especially when they run off the field in the MIDDLE of a pitch. When the coach asks, "What are you doing?" They respond by saying, "I have to go to the bathroom." When you gotta go, you gotta go! Except in the middle of a pitch! Come on! :) I don't know if Troy appreciated his fans and their friendly advice... too many coaches in the family! But it was still fun!

Troy and Calvin getting ready to go to their game!

Wind Up

And the PITCH!

Base Running

Post Game pictures after watching the replay of the 2nd baseman running off the field mid-pitch as well as Troy's game-winning hit! :)

The last event of Spring Break was the Pinewood Derby! There were some very creative cars! I was in charge of the bracket!

Not the most professional looking...

Troy won Consolation! Mitchell and I made the trophies! Well... Mitchell made the trophies! I decorated them! They turned out cute!

Also got a couple of naps in :) and helped Mom with practice a few times! It of course went by WAY too fast! It was great to be home! I thoroughly enjoyed myself! However, it made me wish that it was SUMMER! The countdown is on! Can't wait!

March Madness 2011

2011-04-04T23:14:00.000-07:00

Last year I expressed my love of March Madness (see previous post). This year was fantastic as well, especially with Jimmer and my BYU Cougars and Duke Blue Devils.

The March Madness "Wall" was reinstated. I devoted an entire wall in my classroom this year. It turned out GREAT! Thanks to Ashley and Ashli for the help! :)

Before

After

The National Championship was quite the disappointment! However, the road to the Final Four was quite exciting. My bracket was busted way early on, so I was ALL about the upsets! By the time all my teams were out (and after I recovered from my severe depression), I decided to start cheering for the team I really wanted to lose... since every team I really wanted to win (and was cheering for) lost! See my reverse psychology? It worked... until the Final Four! Beside the point! Regardless of my favorite people and teams losing... it was still a fun month of madness!

One Shining Moment... I tear up every time! Pure awesomeness! Watch the video! Until next year...

100th post... 100%

2011-03-29T00:20:00.000-07:00

What a coincidence?! My 100th post is about me getting 100% in my first graduate class! I am loving the classes I'm taking! It's been a struggle to find the balance between school, teaching, and coaching. BUT clearly I was successful with the first class! Here's to hoping it remains that way! One class down, nine to go! :)

This is the clipart the teacher added to my final grade report! :)

Basketball Banquets

2011-03-22T23:33:00.000-07:00

We had both of our basketball banquets (one for the Sophomore/JV teams and one for the varsity team) to celebrate the seasons! It was great to see everyone again and to reminisce on the good times!

The Sophomore/JV teams made me this adorable blanket! School colors and has all their numbers on it! So freaking cute!

Soooo many good memories! What a great season for all the teams!

Mesquite

2011-03-18T23:46:00.000-07:00

The weekend after the softball tournament, Aunt Patty and Uncle Steve invited us to their new house in Mesquite! Grandpa and Barbara were visiting so it was a fun family weekend away! Two weekends in a row in the sun! Fantastic!

On the drive down. Max sure enjoyed his view.

I enjoyed my view that weekend! Gorgeous!

Stacey and I with the family of dogs! :)

It was a great weekend with family! We enjoyed the scenery and the view. Watched some exciting college basketball games! And I was finally better from my sickness! It was too short of a trip! I wish we could have been there more than the weekend!

**Random side note for my journaling purposes. On our way back home, we stopped to eat in Cedar City. We ran into the Averett family! Small world! Back home you run into people you know all the time. In Utah, I never run into people I know. It was a first for me!**

St. George

2011-03-14T23:41:00.000-07:00

I was in need of a vacation! St. George was just the solution! We headed down for a softball tournament and it was definitely a fun weekend!

We got a game of Phase 10 in on the bus ride down... I was the winner! :) No picture to document it... sadly! And it was really the only game we got in the entire weekend because of our game schedule!

The girls played great! It was a great way to start off the season!

Varsity Team

Coaches

Sunshine, Sunflower Seeds, and Softball! What a great weekend!

Survived

2011-03-07T23:10:00.000-08:00

I survived the sickness!
...........................................................................................................................................................................
3 weeks later!
...........................................................................................................................................................................
I am a BIG believer in Delsym! Disgusting... Expensive... but worth EVERY penny! It worked like a champ!
...........................................................................................................................................................................
Warm weather, softball, family, and March Madness also could have been the cure!

Blah!

2011-03-06T14:55:00.000-08:00

Ugh! I have been sick this whole entire week! The stress of last week, plus the stress of softball tryouts this week all came crashing down and I have been coughing up a lung since Tuesday! I sound quite lovely really! Shout-out to Tracy for doing a little grocery shopping for me last night! It was a hugeeeeee help! :) Here's to hoping this dang cough goes away! I am on a blogging ROLL!

Back to Back 4A State Champions

2011-03-05T10:23:00.000-08:00

I wrote this last week right after we won! I don't know that I would have remembered as much detail so I'm glad that I did! :) Here's the recap of the week!

Well… it’s currently 1:42 in the morning and I just can’t fall asleep! Too much excitement thinking about the past week and all the fun experiences we had in the state tournament! It was definitely not easy, but the girls played so hard and it truly was a team effort!

I got made fun of multiple times throughout the week for my ridiculous superstitions. Quoting the hilariously funny Van, from the show Reba, “You can’t mess with the mojo!” I was willing to accept the ridicule if it meant winning another state championship! So while I don’t really take credit for the win… I will take some credit for NOT losing. Because, if one of these superstitions would have been broken… who knows what would have happened?! :) I'm glad we didn't have to find out!

Superstitions:

Same pajamas every night (don’t worry I washed them!)
Same jewelry.
Same hairstyles.
Same routine of getting ready in the morning. Waking up, pressing snooze twice. Before the second snooze alarm goes off read a couple verses in Joseph Smith History, get out of bed and get ready for the day.
Everyone sitting in the same seat on the bus.
Same people riding the bus! (This changed a little bit throughout the week. Thankfully we were okay!)
Going to Subway EVERY day this week and everyone getting the exact same sandwich! (Well... almost everyone!)
Carrying my backpack with computer in it, every single day!
Asking Chris how he's "feeling about the game today?"
Grading papers on the way to the game. Inputting the graded papers into the grade book while waiting for the game to start with somebody reading me the scores to enter in!
Same people doing the score book the entire week.
No one writing with window paint on the bus the day of the Championship game!
Nancy giving me the stats sheets at a certain time, filling them out, and waiting to hand Holli her score book and stats sheets til the right moment.
Using the same pencil and clipboard (but this was all season long…)
Standing in the same places during the national anthem and team introductions.
Same seating arrangements on the bench!
Fist bumps coming out of half time.

Don't ask me how I remembered to make sure everyone was doing all of these things? Well a lot of them were my own... and I'm sure I missed a few! But... like I said, I'll take being superstitious if it's going to mean positive results! Like a REPEAT State Championship!

Week Recap:
Tuesday- vs. Bonneville: started out SUPER strong and played extremely well! Result: 61-23 Win!
Thursday- vs. Mountain View: HUGE game! We've been ranked #1 all year, Mountain View #2. Unfortunately we had to meet in the quarterfinals (should have been the state championship game) and I was EXTREMELY careful about each of my superstitions! Mountain View beat us in the state championship game two years ago, we beat them in overtime last year, we knew it was going to be an extremely tough matchup. We started the game down by 12. Fought back. Then we went up by 10. Then Mountain View came back and was up by 1. Our player made 2 free throws so we were up 1 with 28 seconds left. Mountain View calls a time out, sets up a play. The girl shoots... misses, gets her own rebound... shoots... misses again... another Mountain View girl gets the rebound... dribbles around the 3 point line, drives shoots misses. We win by ONE! Result: 48-47 Win! Craziness!
Friday- vs. Sky View: it seems as though we see the same teams in state every year. One of my favorite coaching memories is beating Sky View in the semi finals 2 years ago. They were the defending state champs and we BEAT them! Anyways... they are a VERY physical team and we knew it would be a battle. We were always leading throughout the game, but it was so physical that anything and everything was happening. One of our girls ended up with 5 stitches after the game! Brutal! Result: 53-49 Win!
Saturday- vs. Mountain Crest: STATE CHAMPIONSHIP GAME! We played Mountain Crest in the preseason so we had an idea of what to expect. The atmosphere for the game was fantastic! There were a ton of fans and our student section was fantastic! It gave me goosebumps just being there! Once again we got a big lead, but Mountain Crest fought right back and tied it up. Our girls never quit and finished til the very end! Result: 44-40 Win! BACK TO BACK STATE CHAMPS!!!!!!

Wait for it... we know it's coming....

Seeing the girls celebrate is something that I will never forget! Seeing that all of their hard work paid off and seeing them achieve something that they worked so hard for is incredibly rewarding as a coach. When we got on the bus to head home, one of the girls who didn't play as much said, "We deserve some credit too, we practiced against those girls every day in practice!" She was so right. The fact about a State Championship team is that regardless of who did or did not play a certain game, or who did or did not score in a certain game, every single person on that team contributed in some way or another! I think that is what is so awesome!

After being presented the trophy and thanking the fans

cutting down the nets

taking a few pictures

post-game locker room talk/celebrating some more

We continued the celebration and headed to Magleby's in Provo and had a delicious dinner to celebrate!

Upon returning to Springville we were met on the road by a fire engine and police escort. They took us down the streets of Springville as "We are the Champions" played on the radio and people honked their horns and the girls heads stuck out the windows screaming "We're number one!" Did I mention it was snowing as they were doing this? I sure do love the snow!

At the high school we were met by many people on the front steps. The students made a tunnel into the school that we got to run through. We had a nice little welcoming party at the school and everyone said their thank yous and congratulations!

It was an amazing day! One that I will not forget. To be part of one state championship was awesome. To be a part of TWO state championships in TWO years is incredible. The girls made history and it was so awesome to be able to experience that with them!

Other highlights of this awesome day:
BYU beating San Diego State
Being the ONLY team to repeat in the girl's state championship classifications! There was an opportunity for another school to be BACK TO BACK state champs as well, but they were upset! Nice to be the only ones to REPEAT! :)

One horrible down side to this day (okay I'll go with two):
The stupid snow.
Duke losing. Apparently it is a CURSE to be ranked #1 right now! Well.... NOT for Springville I suppose! :)

What an AWESOME day! So thankful I was able to be a part of it!

REPEAT!!! Back to Back 4A State Champs!

2011-02-27T00:31:00.000-08:00

Well... they did it again! BACK TO BACK 4A State Basketball Champions! More details to come! Until then enjoy the videos!

Surprise Trip Home!

2011-02-20T22:45:00.000-08:00

Over President's Day weekend I made a surprise visit home. I have never seen Tandy play a basketball game in person and it was senior night that Friday, so I thought why not make a surprise trip home?! No one knew I was coming except for Pam. I made arrangements for her to pick me up from the airport in Medford and then I would figure out from there what to do.

It was a CRAZY week before I left trying to get everything taken care of! We had parent teacher conferences Wednesday night and after Nancy drove me to meet up with Aunt Janene so she could take me to the airport. Parent teacher conferences didn't get over until late and we were driving up in the middle of a blizzard! I was so grateful for Nancy and for her driving me up!

Thursday Aunt Janene took me to the airport in Salt Lake and I had an uneventful flight to Medford. Dan and Pam picked me up from the airport, we ran to Costco, and then we headed home. I could not decide how I wanted to surprise everyone and I finally just decided to show up at the house. Conveniently, Tandy was home when I showed up. So I grabbed my stuff and just walked in the door. Mom from the computer said, Tandy go see who is at the door. She looked around the corner, saw me and came running! Tandy then said, "Mom... look." Mom freaked out and was like "What is wrong?!" And then said, "Oh my gosh what are you doing here?!" Troy came out from playing the Wii, and just stared at me, then gave me a hug. It was a nice welcoming party. They were all surprised and excited!

I watched Troy play the Wii for a few minutes (he kept coming to get me insisting he had to "show" me something). After swearing Troy and Tandy to secrecy about me being home, I went to softball practice with Mom. Then Troy had his Blue and Gold banquet for Scouts that night at the church, so I helped Mom set up for that. As we were setting up, Dad and Wade came in. Dad said, "Hey! I know you! What are you doing here?" And Wade looked at me, looked away, and then looked back, came over and gave me a hug. I sure do love surprises. Staci came over to visit that night! It was nice to chat and catch up before she headed out of town!

Troy getting some kind of award...

Friday, there was no school, so we slept in. Tandy, Troy, and I headed into the high school and helped Tandy put up signs for senior night. Did some grocery shopping and got ready for the games that night.

The Signs

I miss the days of everyone playing in the same gym all in one night! It was so fun to be able to see all of the games! It brought back lots of memories and I was so glad I was able to be home for the games! I kept book for the JV girls game and then enjoyed just watching the other three games! Tandy played well! They lost! But I was still glad I made the trip! It was definitely worth it!

Saturday we did a little cleaning (gotta love Saturday chores) and just hung out. Dad & I went over and visited Grandma & Grandpa. That night Mom, Dad, and I went to the Lion Pride Dinner. It was a fun night with good food and lots of prizes (none of which I won... but bought tickets for and was feeling lucky about winning.... but was not so lucky!).

A little before bed time reading

Sunday was church as usual! Love going home to the Etna Ward! :) Good times! After church came home and watched The Princess and the Frog with Troy and took a little nap. That night we went to Sam & Jenny's to celebrate Jenny and Uncle George's birthday. It was fun to chat with everyone.

Monday Mom drove me to the airport. We went out to eat before my plane left and then it was back to Utah! Aunt Janene and Katy picked me up from the airport and drove me back to Orem. We met Tracy at Texas Roadhouse, and after a freaking ridiculously long wait, ate a delicious dinner. It was a great weekend! I was so grateful I got to go home and have a little break! What a way to start off a great week of state basketball!

JV/Sophomore Team 2010-2011

2011-02-16T23:05:00.000-08:00

This season went by soooo incredibly fast! I sure do love this team! It was a great year!

Baby Blessing

2011-02-14T09:57:00.000-08:00

Kim and Shane's baby was blessed! It was fun to be a part of that!

Valentine's Dinner

2011-02-13T09:47:00.000-08:00

As always... LOVE our cousin parties! This one did not disappoint! We played a new game called Curses. We sure did laugh a lot! Good times!

All about the heart-love

Sporting all our Valentine's gifts! Ring Pops and Fun Dip.

Three Finger Smile was brought out of retirement. If Brett Favre and Michael Jordan can do it... so can we! :)

Rah, Rah, Rah, Rah, Rah GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Cougars!

2011-02-06T20:43:00.000-08:00

I barely missed a BYU sporting event while I lived in Provo. Since I've graduated, I've barely been to a BYU sporting event! Okay, that's not entirely true! But it's definitely not as frequent as it was in the past! Saturday was full of BYU sporting events! I forgot how much I enjoyed them!

It all started out with the BYU vs. UNLV Men's Basketball game. Rosemary was kind enough to sell me her ticket to the SOLD OUT game, because she was going to be out of town! The seat was great! The game was exciting, and seriously, there is nothing like being there in person! With JIMMERMANIA surrounding Provo, it was definitely way more CRAZY than when I went to games! Kind of hard to describe but it was sooo fun!

Jimmer in warm-ups!

Warm-Ups

GAME TIME!

The game was exciting! UNLV played extremely good defense on Jimmer, so it seemed like he really had an off game, but he finished with 29 points. I wish my off night was 29 points! He was still super entertaining to watch! It was fun to be able to go to a game again! Brought back lots of memories!

After the basketball game, I met up with Ashley and we went and grabbed some dinner and then headed to the BYU Men's Volleyball Game! Tracy met us at the game! Men's volleyball is ALSO entertaining to watch! They hit the ball so freaking hard!

Waiting for the Game to Start

Game Time

Is there a cooler mascot than Cosmo? I say.... there is NOT!

The volleyball team swept UCLA 3-0. It was a fun day of BYU sports! Go Cougars!

Other noteworthy happenings:

I survived my first week of graduate school! It really wasn't too bad! I've become much better at time management and prioritizing and organizing!
Teaching is still going well! I am really enjoying my classes.
We had our BYE week this week for basketball. Traditions started since I've been coaching at Springville:

One day of practice consists of different games (shooting games, dribbling games, relays). The girls started out practice running lots, and I'm sure they thought it was going to be hell! But then we told them we were going to play games and they got so excited. Too funny!
"Hoosiers Practice" consists of eating food and watching the movie Hoosiers. Most of the girls have never seen this movie, so of course I have to introduce them to that awesomeness! They walk out of there wishing they could shoot underhand free throws like Ollie! It's always a good time!

Basketball season is almost over! It has seriously gone by soooo fast! We have like three more games left! I don't know where the time goes?
There was a parent meeting for softball last week. It's going to start before I know it!
We had a cousin get together at Brick Oven this past week. We didn't document it with a picture. But it was fun to see everyone! Sure love all my cousins.

Life really is good! In church today a kid said, "I feel like I am God's favorite child because of all the blessings I am blessed with." I feel that way a little bit right now! I am definitely blessed!

Happenings of 2011

2011-01-30T18:53:00.000-08:00

Once you hear what's been going on as of late, I think you'll realize why there has been a lack of blogging. It's nothing exciting... just LOTS of stuff! So in no particular order... some happenings of 2011 so far!

We had an end of the year Spider party. It was fun to see all the girls again! Here we all are! I will miss coaching them during the summer! It was such a fun group!

We had a baby shower for Kim! The hostesses did a fantastic job and we had a great time!

Been to a few BYU women's basketball games. Finally going to get to see Jimmer and the men's basketball team in person this season on Saturday! Thank you Rosemary for the ticket!

Today was Hayley Friden's farewell. She is off to serve a mission in Richmond, Virginia. She gave a great talk and we had great food at her house after! Good luck Hayley! You will be an awesome missionary! Thanks for being such a good example!

And drum roll for the most recent (and most stressful) happening of 2011...

I just recently started classes for my Master's degree in Special Education! Everything is online, so I can continue to teach and coach. I take one class every eight weeks, and take a total of eight classes. I am learning valuable lessons in organizing and prioritizing! Pray that I survive these next eight weeks. By that point, we'll know whether or not I'm going to be able to handle teaching, coaching, and going back to school!

2011 has treated me well so far! I've definitely been blessed!

Jimmer... You are my hero!

2011-01-18T20:52:00.000-08:00

Uh.... YES. He made this shot. Look how freaking far out he is! Money. Go Cougars!

Here's some video footage. He's so entertaining to watch!

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

Blessed

2011-01-12T11:15:00.000-08:00

I’ve been kind of negative lately and coming up with WAY too many “things I hate right now” lists! :) Not literally… but in my head! Lots of things have been annoying me! So I decided I should try and be positive and start making a “Things I loved about last year list!” Maybe that would take my mind off of the “I hate everything” attitude! So… things that I loved from last year (broken down by month).

January-

A full time subbing job at Springville High School while Nancy was on maternity leave. Loved teaching health, and got to teach some awesome kids!

February-

Family Parties/watching Rosemary speak at BYU devotional.
Undefeated 4A Girls Basketball State Champions! It was an exciting day! And so fun to be a part of!

March-

March Madness! :)
I got hired as an assistant softball coach at Springville! Three sports in one school year!Ah! Loved every bit of it though!

April-

Spring break! Good times going home for a few days, then flying to Oklahoma to watch Ashley play softball and hang out with the Harris’!

May-

Waking up to fish on my doorstep and other softball adventures!
The end of another school year!

June-

Volleyball, basketball, and softball camps/summer stuff!
Tandy’s visit to Utah! We got to do a lot of fun things for a couple of weeks!

July-

Spending a month at home with the family! Trips to the cabin, to the lake, to the coast! Enjoying the summer time! I miss the warm weather!

August-

FINALLY getting a full time teaching job at Springville High School teaching resource English, Reading, and Study Skills. It was well worth the wait! Love the new job!

September-

Trying to survive coaching, teaching, and working for the company in Arizona! I have great friends who helped me survive with encouragement, dinners, hanging out, and the best book I’ve read in awhile “The Race.”

October-

A trip to Texas for Fall Break to visit Mike and Katelyn! Great to see them after so long!
Harris’ dropping off a pumpkin from my mother, having dinner, and watching the Giants quest to win a World Series!

November-

Thanksgiving at home for the first time since like my freshmen year of college!
Duke vs. U of O basketball game in Portland! Sooooo awesome!

December-

Christmas with the family! Nothing like being home for the holidays! It was too short!

I had a very good year and was definitely blessed! I didn't even mention a quarter of the good things that happened! These were just a few of the highlights! Too often, I fail to remember the many things that I’m blessed with everyday! Here’s to being a little more positive, even when things aren’t going how I want them to! :)

Baseline... Suicide... GO!

2011-01-05T20:03:00.000-08:00

At practice yesterday we got to the "conditioning" part of practice! Everyone is on the baseline. We say, "Suicide... GO!" They have to wait for "GO" before they can start running! They all run their "suicide" (free throw line, baseline, half court, baseline, other free throw line, baseline, other baseline, baseline). Everyone knows what A suicide is right? Others might call it a ladder? (After yesterday... maybe that's what we'll start calling it?) ANYWAYS!

After they run their first suicide, they're all waiting on the baseline for us to tell them what to do next. After a quick break (because we're not totally heartless :) haha) we say, "Suicide... GO!" In sync, all at the same time, they make a gun with their fingers and shoot themselves, and fall to the ground. Holli, Britt, and I look at each other, and are like, "Did they really just do that?" We are so dumbfounded that 1) they did it. 2) That they were all in sync! 3) That they did it at the same time without acknowledging (at least that we could tell) that they were going to do it! We had no idea when they could have planned it? Apparently the planning went down during Christmas break, but they forgot to do it before the first suicide, and somehow remembered while running!

Anyways... appropriate? No. Probably not. Funny? Totally! They didn't mean anything bad by it and they thought they were just SO clever and funny for coming up with it! I went home that night and couldn't stop smiling about it! Too funny! But, we of course had a nice chat about suicide, with me being the health major and all. I of course reminded them that "Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem."

After their little dramatization they all quickly got up and ran their suicide! One of the funniest moments of practice thus far this season!

Christmas 2010

2010-12-25T18:09:00.000-08:00

I am failing at the whole blog thing these days! Here is a quick update with pictures from Christmas break! It was GREAT to be home, GREAT to relax, and GREAT to be with family! It of course was TOO short, like always!

It started with the Thackeray Family Hallelujah Chorus (see video below) at the Etna Ward Christmas Party.

Then came Christmas Eve! We always spend Christmas Eve at Grandpa Berry's. This was on the car ride over.

We ate DELICIOUS food, chatted with family and friends, played a little American Idol on the Wii, and opened presents! It was a very enjoyable time!

Christmas Day was fun as usual!

We woke up, looked at our stockings! Then the present opening began! I have had a pile of old t-shirts from high school sitting in a garbage sack for a few years now! Mom finally made me a quilt out of all those shirts! I LOVE it! Lots of fun memories! I also got a Cricut (paper cutting machine). Those were the big presents. And I got lots of other things as well! Also pictured below is a game of Ticket to Ride. Pretty much, we played every day! It was a little out of control! I was definitely very blessed! Lots of awesome friends and family that are very kind!

After we opened presents, the Grandparents from both sides and Aunt Linda came over for "brunch". Tracy, Dad, and I were the chefs. Notice the matching BYU aprons, another one of mom's creations! I sure love me a good apron! :)

We played lots of games! Another hit was The Game of Things! There were some funny moments. Example: Things a cat thinks, Things you should not title a children's book, etc. Pure awesomeness!

Christmas night the extended Thackeray's that are in town get together for games and food. Linda brought her XBOX Kinect and that was definitely the hit of the night! We always have a good time when we get together!

The kids went sledding a few times! Mom made Tandy and I go up one day, much to our dismay! But we had an enjoyable time! I think I can handle one hour of sledding a year! That is the ONE and only time I will enjoy and not have a disdain for snow! :)

It was fantastic to be home hanging out with all of these people! In my old age I look forward to it more and more! :) Sure do love the holidays! Good times for sure!

Thackeray Family Hallelujah Chorus

2010-12-23T22:30:00.000-08:00

Well... I obviously haven't had time to update! I should be able to throughout the next couple of days! Until then... stay entertained with this! It was performed at the Etna Ward Christmas Party yesterday by a combination of Thackeray's from different families! Enjoy! :)

And another version from a different angle :) you know... to help you get the full effect!

Basketball

2010-12-20T00:49:00.000-08:00

State Volleyball was November 5th and 6th. Tryouts for basketball were November 8th! One sport done and on to the next! :) Coaching has been extremely different this year! Not in a bad way and not in a good way! Just different. I know this sounds like a bad thing... I still love it! It's extremely fun, and I can't imagine my life without it! Like I said, it's just different. (Must be that full time teaching thing getting in the way, making my feelings change a little bit. HA!) The one thing that I love, that never changes, is that the group of girls I get to coach are such fun, good girls! They definitely keep me laughing! The season has started off really well! Let's hope we continue with that pattern! Coaching really is the best!

Mormon Tabernacle Choir Concert featuring David Archuletta

2010-12-17T00:42:00.000-08:00

The Brown's invited me to go with them to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Concert, featuring David Archuletta! Not a huge fan of David Archuletta, but he was REALLY good! It was an awesome concert that sure got me in the holiday spirit! It was way fun!

Duke vs. U of O

2010-12-13T23:29:00.000-08:00

My love of Duke basketball began in about 7th grade! I have been a dedicated fan ever since! Some people say I jumped on the bandwagon! To them I say, look at the pictures of dedicated awesomeness!

The entire men's basketball schedule goes in my planner every year. Date, time, and television station it's broadcast on. One year, I even made a slide show of pictures about them, I was that obsessed. I can't believe I just admitted that! But, bandwagon? I think NOT!

Anyways! On the bucket list... attend a Duke basketball game at Cameron Indoor Stadium. While I didn't make it to Cameron Indoor, I was able to see the Duke basketball team play in person, and it did NOT disappoint!

Earlier in the year I had made plans to spend Thanksgiving in Portland. One of the reasons would be to attend the Duke game the Saturday after Thanksgiving! I was super excited that I would be able to see a game in person! Mom said that she wanted to take Tandy and Wade and that they would meet us up there! Plans fell through for Portland, and I was sad I wasn't going to see the Duke game! Mom to the rescue. She had already bought three tickets. Once I decided I was coming home for Thanksgiving, she bought me a ticket, and we were able to all go up to the game!

We left the day after Thanksgiving and drove all the way to Portland to beat a snow storm! When we got to Portland, we checked into our hotel, and then went to eat and shop for Duke T-shirts. After eating we checked every store in one of the main mall's with no luck! We decided we would look online and find some in the morning before the game!
Wade is a nerd. He enjoyed himself.

After a good night's sleep, and rising anticipation for the game, we were determined to find some Duke apparel. Mom called around to a couple of places to see if they sold anything. Every store we tried calling did not have anything?! SERIOUSLY?! Kyle Singler is from OREGON! They are the defending National Champions! There has got to be something! Kohl's was our last chance. The following is the conversation that occurred in a last ditch effort to find some Duke gear.

Mom on the phone with a person from Kohl's.

Mom: I'm wondering if you sell any Duke apparel and if you carry any in your store?

Kohl's Associate #1: Let me put you on hold, and I will check for you.

After about a minute of being put on hold.

Kohl's Associate #2: Hello, can I help you?

Mom: Hi, yes. I'm looking for some Duke Blue Devil apparel, someone is already helping me and looking for it.

Kohl's Associate #2: Okay, did they give you their name?

Mom: No they didn't. They said they were going to go check in the men's department.

Kohl's Associate #2: Can you tell me what they look like?

Mom: (literally laughing out loud as she answers in a baffled, confused, did you really just ask that question voice) Um... what who looks like?

Kohl's Associate #2: The person helping you find your stuff.

Mom: Um... no I don't know what they look like, I AM ON THE PHONE!

Kohl's Associate #2: (After a pause) You mean you're not in the store?

Mom: No, I'm not in the store, I am on the phone, talking to you.

Kohl's Associate #2: (Still clearly confused about what is happening) Well let me see if I can go and find the person helping you. What is it that you are looking for again?

(Laughing so hard she is crying, the rest of us laughing because she is crying and because the girl asked what the person looked like, while talking to us on the phone! Are you kidding me?)

Mom: Duke Blue Devil t-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, anything with Duke on it. Do you know what Duke is? It's the name of a college.

Kohl's Associate #2: (Probably not appreciating the fact that she is getting laughed at) I will go and check for you.

Another couple of minutes pass, everyone trying to get a hold of themselves.

Kohl's Associate #2: Ma'am I'm sorry, we do not carry any Duke Blues.

Mom: DUKE BLUES?! (Bursts into laughter once again). Thank you. Goodbye.

So much for finding any Duke apparel. We laughed the rest of the day about that! We wanted to run into Kohl's so we could meet this girl! Clearly, we would know what she looked like from a telephone conversation? Right?! :) If only they would have had some Duke Blues for us to go pick up!

Before we headed to the game, we stopped by the Portland, Oregon Temple and took a couple of pictures there!

After a little bit more shopping, we headed over to the Rose Garden (where the Portland Trailblazers play). We wanted to see warm ups and see as much as we could! Hello, we had driven six hours! We had a six hour drive home later that night! We were getting our money's worth!

After finding parking, and riding the elevator up and down a few times :) trying to figure out where we were supposed to be (those people on the 3rd floor probably wondered why we were not getting out of the elevator!) and waiting for a good thirty minutes to enter at a door that had "no admittance" for the game that night, we made it to our seats! We sat by the Smith's. The Rimmer's were also in attendance, but we didn't get a picture with them! I also saw Ben and Carly! Wade loves pictures!

It was a fun game because the Singler brothers were playing against each other. Kyle for Duke, and EJ for U of O. Duke dominated and it was so fun to see them play in person! We all felt bad for EJ because he clearly was the "bad" brother! Haha! Even though he wasn't really even that bad. Kyle and Duke are just THAT good! We enjoyed watching the game and after it was over made the long journey back home!

It was a great experience! So glad I was able to go! So glad I got to see my favorite team play in person! Next up... a trip to Cameron Indoor! Then the Duke experience will be complete! Go Devils! :)

Thanksgiving 2010

2010-12-11T23:16:00.000-08:00

Since I graduated from high school, I haven't spent very many Thanksgiving's at home! It's been fun to venture to other family's house's and be a part of their traditions! But there's nothing like being at home for the holiday's! I was grateful I was able to spend some time at home! I took Monday and Tuesday off from school and drove home with Mitchell and Tracy the weekend before!

It was great to spend time with these fun people! :) The older I get, the more I like to hang out with them! It didn't use to be that way!

Lots of Thanksgiving preparations! The name tags are a tradition! Hello! Everyone needs to know where to sit! Mitchell has a "smoking" fetish and has to "smoke" everything and anything that can be cooked that way! So naturally we had to have "smoked" turkey! There were quite a few of us (not our biggest, but definitely not the smallest). We had two tables full of people!

Dinner was delicious! We had quite the variety of food!

So delicious, we of course had to take a quick nap! Troy didn't approve of my napping.

A Thackeray family get together/holiday would not be complete without some game playing! We had intense games of Five Crowns and Apples to Apples! Good times!

It was great to be able to spend Thanksgiving in Etna! It was fun to see family and friends I hadn't seen in awhile!

Volleyball Banquet 2010

2010-12-10T22:33:00.000-08:00

Volleyball season came to an end and we had a very nice end of the year banquet. The girls were very sweet and had this awesome blanket made for me! It has all 3 of the sports that I coach on it, and it was very nice of them to get it for me! It was somewhat sad to see volleyball end, I will miss those seniors that graduate. They were freshmen when I first started coaching! Time sure flies!!!

Grandpa's Visit

2010-12-08T00:31:00.000-08:00

Grandpa and Barbara came to Utah to visit at the beginning of December! They took us out to eat at Texas Roadhouse. It was DELICIOUS!

Then I went down and spent the rest of the weekend in Nephi hanging out with them, Aunt Patty, Uncle Steve, and Greg! It was a fantastic and much needed break!

???

2010-12-06T12:40:00.000-08:00

Where did the month of November go? All of a sudden it's December 6th! AH! Hopefully I will have a little time in the next week to catch up! Things are going great! Just super busy, as made apparent my incredible lack of posts! The blog was a good idea when all I had to do was sub and coach! I realize now that I was living the life! :) If only I would have realized it then! Haha! Don't get me wrong... LOVE LOVE LOVE the new job... just uh... wish I had a little bit more time to do other things as well!

Team Night

2010-11-04T11:06:00.000-07:00

The end of the season is nearing... not quite sure where the past three months went? I won't talk about anything specifically, because well... I'm freaking superstitious! And in the words of Van (from Reba, the TV show), "You can't mess with the mojo." But we had a fun little team night last night! We sent the girls on a scavenger hunt with clues around the school! We also made them take pictures along the way! We concluded with our Athletic Director giving the girls a little inspirational speech, and then we ate dinner! I think everyone had a good time! Love team activities! Here are some of my favorite pictures from the night!

"GO TEAM!" :) ("Go team... how original...")

Halloween

2010-11-01T12:04:00.001-07:00

Even though I despise the holiday of Halloween (I know, I know, I've heard it from everyone... sure it's cool when you're a kid, but for me, right now, uh... not so enjoyable), we had an AWESOME little family get together at Rosemary's. She just had her house remodeled and it looks fabulous! We enjoyed delicious food, fun games, and the best company (you're all jealous you weren't there and able to hang out with us all)! :) Here are the "unofficial" three pictures:

The "Three Finger Smile" has officially been retired. It had a good run with some great memories.

Our attempt at being scared.

One little happy family of cousins! Love you all!

Fall Visitors :)

2010-10-28T08:47:00.000-07:00

I came home from practice yesterday to some visitors! Sooo glad they stopped by on their trek across the country!

They even brought me a delivery from my cool mom! :) Every bad thing I've ever said about you never sending a care package I take back! :)

We had a lovely little dinner and were able to watch the Giants win game one!!! It was too short of a visit but we had a great time!

Here is the pumpkin in all of it's glory! Thanks Mom!!! And thank you Harris' for hand-delivering the thoughtful present! :)

It was my facebook status this week, and I'll transfer it over here: I have some of the best friends and family in the whole world! :) No... but really I do! Love them!

Random Thoughts on Winning and Losing

2010-10-23T18:14:00.000-07:00

Get ready for some quotes and stories! I'm mostly writing this down for journal purposes! But just a warning, it's going to be long! :)

This volleyball season has probably been one of the most difficult to coach. Don't get me wrong there's been plenty of good times and lots of really good memories, but I feel like I've had to deal with a lot more than I normally have in past years. I think part of that might be a full time job on top of coaching but that's beside the point. :)

I am not a good loser and it's something I wish I could have a better attitude about. :) I'm trying. It's been kind of a blah week. The change of weather must have been getting to me or something! Anyways! Whatever it was, I was definitely in a funk! I get these weekly emails (quotes of the day) and I had got this one awhile back.

"It is important to know, when you feel down, that many others do also and that their circumstances are generally much worse than yours. And it's important to know that when one of us is down, it becomes the obligation of his friends to give him a lift." - Gordon B. Hinckley

How grateful I am for good friends who lift me up when I'm down. During this blah week I got a couple of random texts from people. These texts were just what I needed to help me get out of my little funk. They went something along these lines:

"Hey Jillian. I just wanted to let you know I love ya and thanks for everything you do for us."

"Just know that there are girls on that team who look up to you as a role model, even though you may not see it, there are girls who love you and follow your example. Your effort as a coach is making a difference in some girl's life. I know that cause I was one of those girls three years ago! Don't ever forget that."

Simple texts that changed my whole week! Little did these people know that their simple words at random times made me feel a million times better! So the next time you think you should thank some one or tell them how much you love them, DO IT, you never know how much of a difference you can make in their day, week, or life!

Towards the middle of this season, the varsity team kind of went into a little slump, and we were having a hard time finishing games. We would start out great but then we couldn't finish and it was really discouraging. We spent countless hours as a coaching staff figuring out how to solve this problem. During this time I found this quote:

Don't Quit

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you're trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest, if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about,
When he might have won had he stuck it out;
Don't give up though the pace seems slow--
You may succeed with another blow.

Often the goal is nearer than,
It seems to a faint and faltering man,
Often the struggler has given up,
When he might have captured the victor's cup,
And he learned too late when the night slipped down,
How close he was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out--
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far,
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit--
It's when things seem worst that you must not quit.

Loved the message that it portrayed! On Friday after practice Suzette (volleyball coach) gave me this book to read called, "The Race" by Dee Groberg. She said that it would help me feel better and might give me a different perspective on things. It's actually a poem that they turned into a book. I immediately ordered myself a copy as soon as I finished reading! Here is the poem:

The Race
By: Dee Groberg

"Quit, give up, you're beaten!"
They shout at me and plead.
"There's just too much against you now.
This time you can't succeed."

And as I start to hang my head
In front of failure's face,
My downward fall is broken by
The memory of a race.

And hope refills my weakened will
As I recall that scene,
For just the thought of that short race
Rejuvenates my being.

A child's race, young boys, young men
How I remember well,
Excitement sure! But also fear.
It wasn't hard to tell.

They all lined up so full of hope
Each thought to win the race,
Or tie for 1st or if not that
At least take 2nd place.

And fathers watched from off the sides
Each cheering for his son,
And each boy hoped to show his Dad
That he would be the one.

The whistle blew and off they went
Young hearts and hopes afire
To win to be the hero there
Was each young boys desire.

And one boy in particular
Whose Dad was in the crowd
Was running near the lead and thought,
"My Dad will be so proud!"

But as he speeded down the field
Across a shallow dip,
The little boy who thought to win
Lost his step and slipped.

Trying hard to catch himself
His hands flew out to brace
And mid the laughter of the crowd
He fell flat on his face.

So down he fell and with him hope
He couldn't win it now...
Embarrassed, sad he only wished
To disappear somehow.

But as he fell his Dad stood up
And showed his anxious face
Which to the boy so clearly said:
"Get up and win the race!"

He quickly rose, no damage done,
Behind a bit, that's all
And ran with all his mind and might
To make up for his fall.

So anxious to restore himself
To catch up and to win.
His mind went faster than his legs
He slipped and fell again.

He wished that he had quit before
With only one disgrace,
"I'm hopeless as a runner now.
I shouldn't try to race."

But in the laughing crowd he searched
And found his Father's face,
That steady look that said again,
"Get up and win the race!"

So up he jumped to try again
Ten yards behind the last,
"If I'm going to gain those yards," he thought
"I've got to move real fast!"

Exerting everything he had
He regained eight or ten,
But trying so hard to catch the lead
He slipped and fell again!

Defeat! He lay there silently
A tear dropped from his eye.
"There's no sense running anymore
Three strikes; I'm out; why try!"

The will to rise had disappeared
All hope had fled away;
So far behind, so error-prone:
A loser all the way.

"I've lost so what's the use?" He thought
"I'll live with my disgrace."
But then he thought about his Dad
Who soon he'd have to face.

"Get up" an echo sounded low
"Get up and take your place,
You were not meant for failure here,
Get up and win the race!"

"With borrowed will, Get up" It said,
"You haven't lost at all,
For winning is no more than this
To rise each time you fall."

So up he rose to run once more
And with a new commit,
He resolved that win or lose
At least he wouldn't quit.

So far behind the others now
The most he'd ever been,
Still he gave it all he had
And ran as though to win.

Three times he'd fallen stumbling
Three times he rose again,
Too far behind to hope to win
He still ran to the end.

They cheered the winning runner
As he crossed the line 1st place,
Head high, and proud and happy
No falling, no disgrace.

But when the fallen youngster
Crossed the line last place,
The crowd gave him the greater cheer
For finishing the race.

And even though he came in last
With head bowed low, unproud,
You would have thought he'd won the race
To listen to the crowd.

And to his Dad he sadly said,
"I didn't do so well,"
"To me you won!" his Father said
"You rose each time you fell."

And now when things seem dark and hard
And difficult to face,
The memory of that little boy
Helps me in my race.

For all of life is like that race
With ups and downs and all,
And all you have to do to win
Is rise each time you fall.

"Quit, Give up, You're beaten."
They still shout in my face,
But another voice within me says,
"Get up and win the race."

AND ALL YOU HAVE TO DO TO WIN IS RISE EACH TIME YOU FALL.

I'll be the first to admit that I'm WAY too competitive, and often times focus entirely on winning and not necessarily the process that it takes to win. This story gave me such a different perspective on winning; one that I had never even considered before. The simple fact of the matter is that even if you do not "win" the race, or the game, you can still be a winner as long as you rise each time you fall! Don't get me wrong, that doesn't mean you accept losing. BUT, it does mean that the measure of your success doesn't always hinge upon wins and losses.

Regardless of what happens the rest of this volleyball season, I know that it will have been a successful year based on what some of these girls have overcome and the lessons they have learned. They've been knocked down a few times, and each time they have risen with renewed determination to be better and it has definitely shown!

What a week it's been! I'm grateful for the trials and the lessons that I learned throughout the week! I'm grateful for the ability to gain different perspectives on things as simple and unimportant as winning. I'm also grateful for nice people who send me random text messages and for good friends who are always looking out for me.

Remember... the next time you're feeling like a loser :) All you have to do to win is rise each time you fall.

TEXAS

2010-10-18T20:40:00.000-07:00

My love of Texas began here... Don't judge!

And then some of my favorite people moved there. So naturally, I had to take a trip out to visit them! :) It was Fall Break this past weekend and so we had Thursday and Friday off of school. I took Wednesday off and headed to Texas to visit Mike, Katelyn, and Daylin. It was SOOOOOOOOOO nice to relax and hang out with them! Here's some things we did:

Went to the park. Daylin loved the park! Here's a little montage of her :)

I experienced the MOST DELICIOUS snow cone I have ever had in my entire life from Bahama Bucks. Of course the flavors were Red Raspberry and Pink Lemon Sour (only the best combination!). But seriously, it didn't even taste like ice. I can't even really explain it.
We played some games! Surprisingly, NO Phase 10 was played. Shocker I know. We did get in a round of 5 Crowns, but for Katelyn's sake we won't talk about it! She calls it luck... I call it skill with a little luck involved! :) Other new fun games: Pandemic and Kingsbury! Seriously, I wonder who comes up with games sometimes!

We had a little Halloween night. This included homemade root beer (Daylin wasn't so sure about it at first).

Carved Pumpkins.

The finished products (Frank-en-Pumpkin, an Owl, a Haunted House, and a face on the back of the Haunted House... because well... I didn't think you could tell it was a Haunted House!).

We visited the temple.

Katelyn and Mike's friends threw Katelyn a baby shower! It was fun to meet some of their friends and to see the cute presents she got. I'm not a fan of "shower" games! But there were some fun ones played! (We didn't take any pictures!)

We did lots of shopping! Lots of relaxing! Overall, it was a great trip! Thank you guys for letting me come! It was AWESOME and definitely a much needed break! Oh... and I read 2 books in 2 days! It was nice to read for fun again! :)

The one bad thing... MY COMPUTER CRASHED! Blue Screen of Death! UGH! Of course not all of my files are backed up! Mike did his best to help me out! But it's not looking good! Hopefully I can recover those files! Everyone cross your fingers! One positive thing is, the company I work for in Arizona sent me a computer to use until I can get mine fixed. Seriously, they are the best! I feel so lucky to be able to work for them! They treat me way too good!

Anyways! NOW back to the grind! And I think I'm pretty much caught up! Volleyball is coming to an end! Only a couple more weeks! Crazy how time flies! But it's been quite the experience this year! Good and bad! :) I love coaching though! So, so, so grateful I am able to do it!

In the words of Rosemary, "Life is Good!" And that it is! Love it!

The Job

2010-10-10T14:17:00.000-07:00

Well here's the nitty gritty details on the job! :)

Two days after school had started, the principal came to volleyball practice and asked if he could talk to me? I thought I was in trouble. :) Not really... but I didn't know what he could possibly want? He explained that a teacher had taken disability and they were looking for a Special Ed English teacher. He explained I would have to go back to school to get my Special Education endorsement. He asked me if that was something I would be interested in? I, obviously said, YES! He said they were interviewing the next day and to come and talk to him and the assistant principal.

I was super excited, but was NOT going to get my hopes up, but because they approached me, I was feeling pretty good about it!

I went and interviewed the next day, and it went really really well. They explained what the job entailed, and they were also very appreciative of everything I had done with coaching so that was nice. After, I felt like either way, job or no job, I would be happy. They said they would let me know as soon as they were done interviewing everyone.

I went home. Went about my day. About 1:30 the school's phone number pops up on the caller ID. It was the assistant principal and he asked if I would come talk to him. I had no idea what to expect. It was the longest drive to school EVER!

We talked! He said that I was their choice and that they were sending it to the District Office for approval! :) He said he would call me later in the day after he had heard if it was official! Ah!!! So excited. It didn't really sink in! But I was way excited!

In the middle of volleyball, practice, he called, told me it was official, said that I could have Thursday as my prep day, and that my first official day would be Friday! I told Jodi and Suzette (the other volleyball coaches) and they started screaming and yelling. All the girls were like what is going on? Someone jokingly stated, "Jill's pregnant." UH.... NO! But thanks for starting the rumor, BROOKE, KINSLEY, AND HEATHER!

So... that's how it all began! It's been AWESOME! Extremely overwhelming, stressful, and busy! But I've loved every minute of it! I am teaching 2 Reading classes, 3 English classes, and 1 Study Skills class. They are all Resource classes and have students with mild-moderate learning disabilities. My class sizes are really small (I think my biggest is 14, smallest is 9). It has been awesome!

I even have my own nameplate now outside my classroom! (Fancy... I know!)

Does this look familiar Staci, Christa, and Jaclyn? :) Finally putting it to use!

I feel extremely blessed! And even though it took two years, it's been a whirlwind and totally worth the wait!

Oh... and here's my school picture for the year! :)

General Conference & Fairview

2010-10-05T15:22:00.000-07:00

Conference weekend is always ONE OF MY FAVORITE times of the year! This one did not disappoint! :)

I went with the Brown's to their property in Fairview. This is what we encountered on our way there! :) (Sheep scattered all across the road. A perfect day for a little sheep herding).

It was a blast! It's so pretty up there! And even though fall is coming WAY too quickly (goodbye summer, it was fun while you lasted!) the leaves were changing colors and it was so beautiful!

Conference was also amazing! I love it because no matter where you are watching you can feel the spirit that is at the Conference Center because of the power of the words that are being spoken! I just love all the feelings that come along with it! I love the feeling of hope and renewed commitment to do better and try harder. I feel like conference gives me hope that I can do better! And makes me actually want to try! :)

Some favorite speakers and quotes:

I LOVED Elder David M. McConkie's talk on teachers. Some favorite points:
- A teacher's attitude is not taught it's caught.
- Don't focus on your performance but how they are learning.

Elder D. Todd Christofferson-
- The two most precious gifts in life are freedom of choice and time.
- The happiness that we are striving for is the kind that does not fade with the lights and the sounds of the crowd.

President Dieter F. Uchtdorf- I absolutely loved this talk. And I really needed to hear some things especially with teaching, coaching, and everything that is going on. There were so many good things from this talk!
- What does this have to do with the airplane? He is so funny!
- It's easy to be busy. Don't over schedule. We have to forgo some good things because there are others that are BETTER!
- Slow down a little and see the importance of the things that matter most!
- What matters most? Our relationships with 1) God 2) Family 3) Fellow Man 4) Ourselves
- REFOCUS: What matters most?!

President Thomas S. Monson- loved his entire talk on gratitude. I was just thinking the other day how awful it feels when people don't appreciate the hard work that you put into things. It's nice to be appreciated. I need to remember to keep an attitude of gratitude!
- Do we remember to give thanks for the blessings we receive?
- Prayerful life is the key to possessing gratitude.
- EXPRESS OUR LOVE AND GRATITUDE- we will never know if it will be too late to tell someone thank you or that you love them! (I've been trying to do better at expressing this to those I love!)
- How often do others spend hours working on something so hard to have us be ungrateful for everything that they have done. I was very touched by the story of the mom preparing the jack rabbit for Thanksgiving dinner and the kids being ungrateful and saying it looked disgusting. It broke my heart to think of how hard she worked and how ungrateful they were. I'm sure we have all done it a time or two, but I hope to not be so insensitive in the future.

Other things I really liked:
- Are we practicing selective obedience?
- President Eyring prayed what he should speak about. He prayed to know each of our needs and what we needed to hear. I thought that was very touching.
- Loved Boyd K. Packer's analogy of the voting on the gender of the kitten. I know it has caused quite the stir in the media.
- We must show the youth how to strengthen their testimony by strengthening our own.
- "To become what you want to be, be what you want to become."
- "The Lord is voting for you. Lucifer is voting against you, but it is your vote that counts."

Conference is the best! I'm so grateful for everything I was taught and for getting to spend some time in Fairview! Love that place!

Thackeray Family Picnic

2010-09-08T13:57:00.000-07:00

Well... the answer is: YES! I'm still alive. Barely. :) It's Fall Break this weekend and I'm in Lubbock, Texas visiting Katelyn, Mike, Daylin, and Baby Boy Olsen! It's fantastic to finally have a break! And the weather is BEAUTIFUL here in Texas! So now... on to catching up!

To end the summer, we had our Thackeray Family Picnic! I love getting together with all the Thackeray cousins! It's always a good time!

Ladder golf was a hit! It was McKenzie and I, against the boys! We were so good, the boys were BEGGING to be on our team. You think I'm kidding? Totally not. Us girls have AMAZING ladder golf skills! :)

After the party, I spent the rest of the weekend at Aunt Janene's. Katy and I made cute little flowers!

As always, LOVE my family! Immediate and Extended! :)

Someday...

2010-09-02T14:48:00.000-07:00

Someday... I will be ALL caught up so that I have time to sit down and blog! I once again have lots to blog about. But until then, for those who haven't heard, I got a job at Springville High School as a Special Education English teacher. Put that on top of coaching and I'm about ready to have a meltdown! :) Let's just say I'm ready for the long weekend! Perhaps I will have time to get caught up then! One could only hope! I feel extremely blessed though, and life is definitely good!

Cuteness! :)

2010-08-20T21:55:00.000-07:00

I got to watch adorable little Charli today! :) Isn't she cute?! We had a great time! Good day! :)

BUNCO

2010-08-19T21:30:00.000-07:00

It's the new cool thing to do! :) I was first introduced when Mom hosted a BUNCO night one summer I was at home! I got to sub and play with them! It was a BLAST!

Then Tracy and all of her friends started a little tradition of playing every Christmas break. We usually get to join the fun.

There are always fun prizes for different things! And while I thought winning this goldfish was pretty cool...
FAST FORWARD to Wednesday when Jodi asked me to sub for her at her BUNCO group. I started out so so... and then the last couple of rounds... "I cleaned house" as someone put it! :) After all the rounds were over, I won the prize for MOST BUNCOS (The #1 prize)! Everyone wanted this bag for some reason? (I mean it's really cute! But you wouldn't believe how many people wanted it! haha) By the end of the night I was afraid I wouldn't make it home alive! ;)

Thanks Jodi for asking me to sub for you! I doubt I'll be asked back. Not everyone was a fan of the new person winning the best prize! :) Haha. What can I say... I'm a really good dice roller? Roller of dice? :) Vegas here I come.

Ropes Course

2010-08-17T22:09:00.000-07:00

FINALLY! Caught up! This is the last noteworthy thing to blog about for now! :) The varsity volleyball team headed to the ropes course yesterday to do some team building activities. IT WAS AWESOME! :) It was interesting to see the girls attempt to complete a task and have to try again and again. The great thing was that they were able to complete each challenge that was presented to them! It may have taken them a few times to do it! But eventually they got it done!
The girls really enjoyed it! And I think they learned a lot in the process! Hopefully they apply it this year! :)

"You may have to fight a battle more than once to win."

Spiders

2010-08-14T21:54:00.000-07:00

The past 2 years I've helped coach the Spiders during the summer. It has been a BLAST! Takes me back to my ASA playing days of getting to play with girls from all over. We had our last tournament this past weekend in Payson! The girls played great! There were some very exciting games! And I'm so grateful I was able to be a part of it!

Back to Utah!

2010-08-12T21:31:00.000-07:00

Well after a couple week trip turned into a month long trip home, I was beyond sad to leave home and come back to Utah. I mean hello, look at all the fun things we did! It was definitely hard to leave. I had a safe, but extremely boring trip back! A 12 hour drive in the car by yourself is not very fun! Mom sent me with some books on tape. It kept me entertained for a little while. I remember HATING when she would listen to them when we would go places. Funny how I THOROUGHLY enjoyed them on my way back! :)

I spent the rest of that night re-organizing my room to fit my new bed in!

Our Phase 10 group got together and played cards! It was fun to play again! It had been too long! I love our little group! :)

We had a little reunion with some of the basketball girls who had graduated a couple years ago! We went to Red Robin and it was fun to see everyone! Can't believe we didn't take a picture! But 5 of the 6 that graduated that year were there (Ashley, Genna, Holli, Brandi, and Sorensen). We missed Kenzie! We had fun playing with little Charli and catching up!

After dinner, Genna, Allie, and I went to an Owlz game! No free tickets this time. But we had fun! :) Later that week, Rosemary, Jessica and I headed to the SCERA for an outdoor movie. We played a little Ticket to Ride before the movie started. I won by ONE point. :) Love hanging out with these people!
My goodness! I'm STILL going! Only a couple more to go! Can't stop now! :)

It's okay. You can call me Flower if you want to.

2010-08-05T21:48:00.000-07:00

This will mean nothing to most of you! :) But it will help me remember one extremely long, productive, family meeting. :)

"It's okay. You can call me Flower if you want to." :)

Baseball and Tennis

2010-08-03T21:24:00.000-07:00

Troy begged us every day to go to the high school and play baseball. We talked him into Tennis one day. (No pictures from that :( but we had a good time playing a little tennis. Troy and I beat mom and Tandy!). Finally, a couple days later, we went up and played some baseball! Despite taking a hard shot to the knee off a hit from Tandy, I think he had a good time. :) We all did! Ice cream at the Drug Store after! :)

Happy Birthday to Me! :)

2010-08-02T21:14:00.000-07:00

I woke up to Troy screaming, HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Him and mom had made me breakfast in bed! :) Mom made this delicious cake! YUM! Wade and Troy had a swim meet that day. The afternoon was spent watching that. :)

The family came over for dinner that night. They are the best! Lots of presents! :)
My phone was going off all day long with text messages from so many people. Lots of people wished me happy birthday on facebook. I have the BEST friends and family! It was a great birthday!

Old Timers Rodeo

2010-07-31T21:08:00.000-07:00

Rodeo fun in good 'ol Scott Valley.

Cabin Trip #3! :)

2010-07-29T20:50:00.000-07:00

I'm on a roll. Can't stop now. :) We took another trip to the cabin! This time Jenny and the kids (cousins) came with us! Troy always enjoys it just a little bit more if he has some friends! :)

There was plenty of nail painting, hair do-ing, and things like that. Even the boys got in on the action! :) Jumping off the rock! Yes! Even I did it. Mom said she would pay me 20 dollars! :) Pictionary after breakfast.
A great time had by all! :)

Shannon's Wedding

2010-07-24T20:41:00.000-07:00

Right before we left to go to Shannon's wedding, Jaclyn came to visit and I got to see her for a little bit. We played games one night. (This is the only picture we took, and it's not very good!) Went to breakfast at Bob's, and went for a little ride around the valley.

That same day, mom and I headed to Sacramento for the wedding. We stayed in a hotel that night and then went to the wedding the next day. It was a fun day! Fun to see the Friden clan. A quick trip! Lots of driving! But definitely worth it!

Cabin Trip 2

2010-07-22T20:28:00.000-07:00

Slowly but surely I'll get caught up! :) Mom, Tracy, Troy, and I made another trip to the cabin with Grandpa and Barbara. It was a short one, just for one night. But as always, had a great time! :)

It was crazy all of the things we saw this trip! We were taking the chairs down to the river and a mouse popped out of one. (I didn't take a picture). But then, we were setting up the chairs, and found a scorpion in another chair. We saw a snake kill a fish, and then drag the fish down stream. There were lots of butterflies. And then, found a dead mouse in the cabin. Too much wildlife for one trip I would say! :)

We played lots of cards. Is anyone surprised? :) Troy even got in on the action with some Skip-Bo. Troy and I also went on a little walk down to Mule Bridge. LOVE the cabin!

I.Am.So.Behind.The.End.

2010-07-21T20:31:00.000-07:00

I have lots of pictures and lots of things to blog about. Just not a lot of time to blog about it all. I had a great time being home for a month! I will catch up on all of the happenings as soon as I have time. I just finished the most HORRIBLE week of tryouts since I've been coaching. Cutting people from a team has got to be one of the MOST HEARTBREAKING things in the entire world. I'll survive. It was NOT enjoyable though! Last tournament of the year with the Spiders this weekend. Volleyball practice. "Word Processing" work. Hopefully I will have some time later this weekend or next week to catch up! I am alive. I'm sure you have all missed my exciting updates! :)