Happy Birthday Tracy

Tracy had a little get together to celebrate her birthday!

That weekend we went to the BYU softball game and out to eat at Brick Oven to continue the celebration. 

This is the shirt I was wearing that day...

Upon leaving the restaurant... a man and his wife were walking along the sidewalk. The following conversation unfolded:

Random stranger (to me): "THAT is an UGLY shirt you have on."
I was taken aback? Not once had anyone ever told me what I was wearing was "ugly" (at least to my face). 
After a brief pause, my response was, "Hey now! That's not nice. Where are you from?"
The random stranger replies: "Salem Hills."
Me: "Oh... that it explains it!" 

And we all went on our way. We all burst into laughter. First of all, random. Second of all, who tells someone their clothes are ugly to their face and then just proceeds on their way?

Sidenote: Salem Hills is in our region. Apparently, the man does not like Springville very much.

Loving the Sunshine! :)

What a great weekend! And not a picture to show for it! Sad! I'm blogging from my phone? We'll see how that goes! :)

Brief recap so I remember...

Dinner (chili's) and movie (the lucky one), sunshine, baseball tournament, family, more sunshine, BBQ, reading for fun, caught up completely with grading, church, even more sunshine, family chit chats, relaxing!

The sun just makes me feel more productive and happy! Love it! :)

Updates to come: state basketball, spring break, and other odds and ends... Someday it'll happen! :)

Until then... Life is good! Enjoy the sunshine! :)

There's No Place Like Home- Spring Break 2012

I was able to go home for spring break this year! Dorothy had it right when she said... "There's no place like home." It's always enjoyable to go home and relax!

We started out the lovely adventure by towing Tandy's car, Cami, home, along with all of Tandy's stuff! It was quite the packing job in Salt Lake before we headed out. We were shameless passed by semi's along the way. However, we made it home safe and sound! It just took forever! :) 

 

We sincerely thought we were about to witness a train crash! There were two tracks... but it did NOT look that way!

Salute the cow! :)

Easter is one of my FAVORITE holidays! It is the first time I had been home for Easter since graduating from high school! So fun to celebrate with the fun activities, but more importantly a good time to remember the Savior and his sacrifice for us!

Dying Easter Eggs for the Easter Egg Hunt! 

The Easter Bunny came! :)

We had Easter Dinner at Sam and Jenny's, followed by an Easter Egg Hunt! 

Recovering from all the good food and festivities... 

Wade tried to bring back the mullet... (GROSS!)

Flying kites from the Easter Bunny!

Rainbow! 

Found this gem lying around the house... "Fun Fact: Oh wait... there is nothing fun about Wade!" :) Priceless! 

 Watched Wade's baseball game

 Wade's other game was cancelled, so we decided to go golfing with Aunt Linda! 

Waiting to tee off...

The WINNERS (by one stroke)

On the way home... all tuckered out! 

And finally... a little backyard baseball with the cows to end a fantastic week at home.

Dorothy really did have it right... there's no place like home!

The Wall 2012

My love of March Madness (previously expressed here) is pretty well known! "The Wall" has become a tradition! :) So... in all it's glory the step by step progression of this year's NCAA Tournament!

Before

 1st Round

 2nd Round

 3rd Round

 4th Round

I won 4 out of the 5 pools I entered... not a bad year at all! :)

Mesquite

Grandpa and Barbara came into town to visit. Uncle Steve and Aunt Patty invited us down to Mesquite with them!

This was our view the entire weekend... we laid by the pool, relaxed, watched some college basketball, ate yummy food, and enjoyed each others company! 

 First sushi experience... I tried it just for them. Never again. Gross.

 Tandy got to play chef for the evening. She didn't do too bad!

 It was a quick vacation, but extremely relaxing and enjoyable! Thanks Uncle Steve and Aunt Patty! :)

The Great Cup Adventure

We had some fun this basketball season... :) The Sophomore boys basketball team plays the game before us in the smaller gym, and they always practice in the gym we practice in right after us. With that in mind... they started the season and would always open the doors, peek their heads in, and see if we were done with practice. It was quite distracting. I may have yelled a few times, needless to say, they didn't come in our gym and distract us any longer. Continually after games, they would leave their cups all over the ground and who would get to pick them up? You guessed it, our team! I didn't appreciate it, so I told the boys that were on the team and in my English class to relay the message to PICK UP THEIR CUPS to the rest of their team. The next game... we came into the gym with all of the cups cleaned up... however, they were turned upside down along the bench where we all sit. HAHA funny joke! Wish I would have taken a picture. It was clever... but little did they know the war they started! :) We decided we had to come up with a plan for revenge! We decided we would buy 500 cups and spread them all over the gym after one of our practices, so they would have to clean them up and feel our pain! :) Supplies were purchased, however, we did not know when we would be able to execute the plan. The bleachers in the main gym were broken, the varsity girls had to practice in our gym, so we decided we would just watch game film. We figured the varsity boys would be in the G-wing and so we had to hang on to our fun little plan.

In the middle of watching film, one of the boys varsity coaches called to tell me they had stayed in the main gym, that the sophomore boys team would be in about 5:00 to practice in the G wing. We immediately began working on our plan. How perfectly everything was falling into place! :)

We rushed into the gym... locked the doors... and began to get to work! 

 Putting signs on the backboards...

 And cups in the nets...

 A nice cup pyramid...

We felt so proud of ourselves! And then... a sophomore boy poked his head in the door. Holli ran after him... and we held him hostage until the rest of his team got there. We couldn't let him ruin the surprise. Of course their coach was late to practice that day and so we had to wait a little longer... the girls booked it out another door, and we nonchalantly left practice (feeling quite pleased with ourselves might I add). We took the broom with us, so they couldn't just "sweep" them up!

The next morning I arrived to school, my window was covered with paper (which it never is!) and one lonely cup was placed on the handle of my door... I knew it couldn't be good! 

 I opened the door... and this is what I found...

 Cups EVERYWHERE!

 Apparently they had kept our 500... and went and bought 500 more...

 Along with some saran wrap... and went to town on destroying my classroom!

 Thankfully detention is held across the hall, and Binks sent some student's over to help clean it up!

 Random sophomore basketball boys kept popping their heads in my classroom to see my reaction and then running off. I would yell at them to get back here, and even chased after one of them to get some information! They had just rekeyed my classroom, and I couldn't understand HOW they got in! Apparently they had called the principal, and he was more than happy to let them in! He sold me out!

 So many cups!

I, of course, saved the two 20 gallon garbage bags full of cups for a later date. This meant WAR!!! We decided that we would wait until the very last day of the season to get them back! In the mean time, we saved as many cups as possible. Girls brought cups (used and new) into my classroom and we kept them in my closet. We had built up a collection come the last day of the season! :)

Our last game of the season was a girl's only game. The varsity played last. I came upon the sophomore teams locker combinations... my sources can't be revealed! After the game we headed down and began our revenge...

 All those cups... in all their lockers...

 The best part... was they had a game the next day! So we knew they would be in the locker room!

 The picture we sent to the coach wishing them good luck for the day! It's lucky that he and the principal don't have lockers... :)

A great way to end the season! So much fun with these girls! They came such a long way during the season! It was a privilege to be able to coach them!

State Tournament 2012

This was written back in February.... I'm glad I wrote stuff down when I did!

I'm going to start blogging about this now... I doubt I will post it for a little while... but I need to remember the good times while they are still fresh in my memory.

Monday... there was no school. I went out to lunch with Tracy, Mitch, Tandy, and Janna at Red Robin. Came home and got ready completing my "morning of" routine of getting ready. We played Cyprus. They were the #1 team in the state. We started out terrible and were down 10 in the 1st quarter. We came back in the 2nd to take a 3 point lead into half time. The energy was good. We played well throughout and pulled off the upset!

Wednesday... we played the late game. We were able to go through shoot around and then after collaboration and I finished a paper for my master's class we headed to the game. We played Sky View. We have played them the past 3 years. Not my favorite team to play. We knew they were good, but definitely beatable! It was a close game, back and forth the entire way. We got a few KEY defensive stops. Hit some critical free throws, and we were OFF to the semi-finals for the FIFTH year in a row!

Friday... we played Mountain Crest. In the preseason they beat us by 35. I did not have a good feeling. I was sick pretty much the entire tournament of nervousness. The game didn't start out too well. We kept it within distance of a comeback but they were clearly one step ahead of us. In the 3rd quarter we were down by 15 points. Then the comeback started. We switched defenses and before we knew it we had tied it up. We had the ball with 1:31 seconds left in the game, we called a timeout and stalled. We were playing for the last shot! Savannah had the ball, their girl fouled her with 27 seconds left in the game. She made both of her free throws so we were up two. They got 3 shots off and on the 3rd shot one of our girls fouled their best player. She was at the free throw line with 5.7 seconds left! She MISSES her first of two freethrows. She made the second. We inbound the ball to our point guard. She is fouled. She misses her first. Makes her second. We are up two... they inbound the ball shoot a half court shot and miss. WE WIN!!! The celebration ensued! So exciting!

 

Saturday... we played Timpanogos for the championship game. No one expected us to be there. It was a very rewarding feeling. The first quarter was tight. Their point guard hit a 3 pointer at the buzzer of the 2nd and 3rd quarters! That really was the dagger. We were playing catch up the entire time and cut it to 3 points at one time but got no closer than that. I wanted the girls so badly to win that game. At that point, I would have given up the previous two state championships for them to win that game. No one expected them to be there. It was supposed to be a re-building year. If you would have asked ANYONE if they would be playing in the state championship game this year, someone would have laughed in your face. The fact that they had made it, made me want it for them that much more! I think that's why I took the loss harder than most losses. Besides the fact that it was a state championship, it was that they were so close and just couldn't quite get it. We enjoyed dinner at Ruby River after the game. The girls were not happy, but they tried to make the most of the situation. I went home and cried. I took a nap, I was emotionally drained.

About 9:00 I received a text from one of the girls that said, "Jill! You still owe us ice cream!" Ironically, when we played Timpanogos during the regular season and beat them by 12, I told them I would buy them ice cream if they scored 70 points. They did. Obviously, I had to pay up that night. What better way to drown your sorrows than ice cream? They were all hanging out at Hannah's. Holli and I took them 5 different kinds of ice cream and let them eat their pain away. It was at this moment that helped me kind of take the loss a little less hard. The girls were still upset, but they were laughing and enjoying hanging out together. One of the greatest things about them was they were friends. I was grateful I was able to see that. It helped me feel a little bit better. Had I not received that text, I think I would still be miserable and depressed.

Now... I know that this next part might seem a little ridiculous to you all. But, it is what it is?! I'm superstitious!

List of superstitions:

• The night before... shower, blow dry hair, brush teeth, read 2 scriptures/general conference quotes from an app on my phone, prayers, and go to sleep.
• The morning of... wake up, brush teeth, do make-up, straighten hair, use the same 3 bobby pins, put on the same earrings and necklace, then get dressed, all while listening to the same playlist.
• Running shoot-around, sweeps, 3-2-1 shooting drill, free throws, 60 shots, free throws, 5 on 0. Every gathers and we read game plan. Nancy would send me the game plan previous to every game. Shoot around until we leave. 

Things that had to be the same:

• Seats on bus
• CD playing to and from EVERY game
• Conversations when we passed certain points on the freeway (Harley Davidson, JCW/hamburgers, Prison/Prison Break)
• Playing Scramble with Friends
• Counting of people as they entered the game
• Stamp on my wrist in the same place on the left hand
• Sitting with back against wall
• Handful of Holli's pistachios
• Gum right after the pistachios
• Pencil to keep stats
• Filling out the stat sheets the same way
• One empty seat between the last girl on the bench and us
• Standing by the same people for introductions
• Half time candy from Mindy

It was an incredible run! The girls overcame so much throughout the year! No one expected us to be there, which made it even that much sweeter!