Jan. '24- Week 2- Anna started Jr. Jazz, Hosted Book Club, Choir School, Kim Ulmer's Funeral, Webster Girls San Diego Trip

8th- Monday: I subbed in Ms. Alexander’s class. She called out because she had emergency gallbladder surgery. Overall, it was a better day than I expected. Once I got home, I snacked, changed the laundry, then tried to listen to the rest of my book club book. I napped a little. Dan took Anna to gymnastics, then came home and made him and Anna grilled cheese for dinner. He picked her up and took her to her first Jr. Jazz game! I ate and fed the other kids, then joined Dan watching Anna. She’s definitely one of the shortest girls in the team, but she did great and had fun!  I came home and finished setting up to host book club. We had a little bit of a smaller group. We discussed the book “Room” which was written from a 5 year old’s perspective about a girl (his mom) who was kidnapped and held captive by a man. Dan folded laundry with the kids and got them to bed. They started going through stuff in Ben’s room and cleaning out his closet.

9th- Tuesday: I drove the Junior High kids to school and then exercised when I got home. I ate and then changed to go to the temple for an initiatory session. I came home and showered and had lunch. I took the van to Burt Brothers for emissions and tire alignment. Brynn drove me home. I wasted time on my phone, napped, then worked on the blog. I blogged more once the kids got home. I found out Choral practice would be canceled due to bad weather forecasted. I made dinner and Bethany and Anna played outside in the snow. Both Bethany and Alice had pretty bad coughs. McKenna worked on homework. Ben worked on his goals. I stain treated a few things, tidied up the laundry room, and then we ate dinner. We watched some Book of Mormon videos before bed and then I worked on mending. Ben worked on homework and Dan watched a show. 

10th- Wednesday: I subbed in Ms. Alexander’s class again and there were no plans at all since she’s been recovering from surgery. I was more frustrated with the kids' behavior than on Monday. We had more problems with humming and kids not being quiet when I was trying to teach. Thankfully it was an early out day. Anna and Bethany had piano and Alice went to Hazel’s to play. I napped and then picked up piano and Jr. High kids. I chilled and talked with McKenna. I started dinner. Anna and Bethany and Alice played in the snow. Ben went to Taggart’s after piano and Dan brought him home. We took dinner to the Jarvis’s during some heavy snow. We ate and then Ben and McKenna and I went to the church for our YM/YW planning meeting and I had a presidency meeting before. Dan and Ben lifted weights and did Legos and cleaned out more of his closet.  McKenna did homework.  I worked on moving pictures to Dropbox and the external hard drive.  

11th- Thursday: I subbed in Ms. Alexander’s again. This time, I had prepared a few things the day before, but they had to cancel reading groups, which threw me a little. Overall, the day went better than Weds. I even prepped a few things for the Friday sub. Once I got home, I prepped my new choir bag and started making dinner. Desi came over. Dan had a meeting with Laura Bramall about Western States and Utah Foster Care. Dan and I ate. McKenna went to piano. Dan and I left for a Tabernacle Devotional about the architecture which was super interesting.  Dan left and I stayed for choir school. We did a listening exercise where we critiqued a couple choral pieces. Sis. Wilberg lectured on breathing. Breathing and posture are the two fundamentals like pray/read your scriptures. We sang “I Need Thee Every Hour” using different vocal colors (bright or dark) and different vibratos. We even got a homework assignment. I got home and cleaned the fishbowl and packed for the Webster girls San Diego trip. 

12th- Friday: I got up at 4am to shower. Dan drove me to the airport by 4:50. I sat by a cute 18 month old girl and her mom on the way down to Phoenix. I worked on a grocery order. We left Phoenix a little late. Brynn and Swa picked me up at the San Diego Airport! We went back to the hotel. I ate some snacks and talked. Grandma’s stomach wasn’t feeling very well. We toured the USS MIDWAY ship. We ate at Cheesecake Factory. We went back to the hotel and napped! We went for a walk along the water. We played Skull King and Golf and talked till about 10:40.

13th- Saturday: We had breakfast at 9 and then checked out of the hotel. We drove to Coronado and walked around the hotel and surrounding properties. One of the houses had been moved 800 miles... We saw a sand sculpture artist.  The weather was beautiful! We got ice cream there. I started to feel a headache coming on. We drove to see the Temple, which was under renovations. We had lunch at a grilled cheese place called the Melt. It was delicious!  We went to a paper store called Paper Source. I got some cute pens for the kids.  We were only able to drive by La Jolla because there was no parking, so we didn't get to see the sea lions.  We tried to go to Sunset Cliffs next, but it was kind of tricky.  We got there and looked around for a bit, then we headed to the airport. Lara had a great time using a "photo shop" app and putting our group pictures in different places!  By this time, my headache didn’t feel good and my stomach was a little nauseous. I sat by Lara and Sophie on the way home. We had some rough turbulence on the flight home. Jake Winegar picked us up from the airport. We made it home by 10:45pm. I said good night to McKenna and Ben, then talked with Dan. He had had a busy Saturday with a baptism for Abigail Pugsley, a funeral for Kim Ulmer, basketball practice and a play date for Anna, hanging out at grandpa’s with other family, and getting groceries. *When I got home, I told Dan I was glad I was able to go for San Diego for some of the time, but my heart was definitely being pulled back to home since I missed the baptism and funeral and bonding with neighbors we love so much!   

14th- Sunday: We barely made it on time for church. I got released from my calling in YW. I was sad, but excited that Katie Brown replaced me!  Ben got set apart as 2nd counselor in the Decon’s quorum presidency and he is going to love having 6 boys total in the quorum now instead of just him and Henry.  We had lunch, did our Tender Mercies poster, and watched Line Upon Line. We napped and then went over the spreadsheet for the Summer Yellowstone and Glacier trip. I had my conference call. My mom was stick and still not eating very well. (This started with Covid in December, then she got a UTI, and the antibiotics messed with her gut and she’s been nauseous, barfing, and diarrhea for about 2+ weeks now. Poor thing! She said she's going to call her doctor on Monday.) We had Hawaiian Haystacks for dinner. The kids practiced piano. We watched the live action Book of Mormon videos and Relative Race. The three little girls had a sleepover in the A-team’s room since there was no school on Monday for MLK Day. I practiced some stuff for choir. Ben helped me a little. Dan worked on his new calling, organizing his list of all the young adults in the ward.