Every February 1st, the girls have to renew their BYU scholarship applications, which includes a parent FAFSA for all unmarried students. So every year, around late January, we get together for a FAFSA night. Get out all the tax returns, W-2's, all that fun stuff to fill out what feels like endless screens of information for the program to later tell us that they do not qualify for any financial assistamce, but because they have completed this step, they are now able to receieve the academic scholarships they have already been awarded. It is a formality that we totally understand and support and do it willingly ...every single January.
I know these girls work really really hard for these academic scholarship from BYU and do not take them lightly. Each semester they write essays for the applications and later have a chance to write Thank You's notes to those who pay for the scholarships they earn.
I don't know if it's because I'm getting older, or because we have 3 children in college right now, but I just feel so grateful for the opportunites these girls have to receive an outstandingeducation at the university of their chooing, without having to get student loans or incur debt. It defintely sets them up for success as they move forward in life after college.
Some of the AZ cousins came to UTah for the weekend and they spent the afternoon swimning and then going to dinner before Michaley and Talon headed back to AZ.
And this UT cousin went to AZ to visit his cousins and got to go to Kenzington's big birthday party. It's not always fun to live far away from cousins, but it's fun to get together when you can.
It's one of my favorite times of the year.....time to read and score the nominations for Outstanding Educator of the Year for Jordan School District.
Every year we feel bad about how many trees it takes to print out our packets, but most of us love to write on and mark up the nominations as we going through them. It probably takes about 20 hours to ruberic all of them, but it so uplifting to read about these teachers who are doing such great work in their classrooms and schools. Going above and beyond to teach, lift, and help their students and fellow teachers. Mentoring, whether formally asigned or not, is so often a common theme in these nominations. As is kindness, thoughtfulness, and a love for teaching and learning. It is such a pleasure to get an inside view of so much of the good that goes on in the schools in our area.
Brenna often has to run from lacrosse back to Bingham for SBO stuff, just like Kayla did, She somehow seems to usually have everything she needs at the right place at the right time. Tonight, was close, just a slight miss on the shoes.
This evening's activity was the grand reopening of the Bingham Auditorium since its full remodel that began last spring. Brenna greeted guests and VIP's and Dr. Godfrey was the only person that mentioned/complimented her on her outfit and shoes. He is seriously the G.O.A.T.
As part of my new responsibilities on the Executive Board of the Jordan Education Foundation, I was asked to Chair this years Donor Appreciation Luncheon
I have to say, I literally have the BEST committee ever. They are rock-star amazing. We started pulling ideas together a few months ago, and the event went off actually better than I even imgained.
Our theme for this year -
LIFT:We Rise Together
Guests were welcomed by an beautiful hot air balloon tied down in the parking lot. (I was there when it was being set up, but never left the building again until after it ws gone)
We had a meet & greet in the Exhibition Hall with booths that showcased the different programs that the Jordan Education Foundation supports within our district:
-Principal Pantry's in all 67 schools with food, hygience kits, weekend packs, clothes, schoes, dance dresses, blamekts, coats, hats, gloves, backpacks, school supplies, etc
-Classroom Grants - this we we gave out over $375.000.00 in classroom grants to teachers in our district (I love to hear and see what they use the grant $ for)
-Wellness Rooms - provides a designated room within a school for students and/or staff to relax & regroup as needed throughout the day. These rooms have fully trained staff in them and we have found that every school with a wellness room has seen a dramatic drop in principal office visits.
-After School Programs including Unified Sounds and Unified Sports - which partners student mentors with speical needs students to partcipate in band, orchestra, soccer, basketball, or track.
-STEM Projects - the foundation is now offereing STEM scholarships in the form of my529 accounts for 8th grade students planning to pursue a career in Science or Technology; so happy to see this program added
-BED'R Home for Kids - Anothr new prgram this year; we can now provide beds, bedding & pillows to students & families in needs. Our goal is that every child in our district is able to sleep in their very own bed at night.
-Outstanding Educator Awards - We have been recognizing 1 outstanding educator from every school for many years, but the past 2 years we have really ramped things up to celebrate teachers by doing home visits or impromtu school visits and completely catching them off guard. We secretly invite their family, friends, collegues and surpise them with balloons, a beautiful crystal award, a check that that are not to spend on their students or classroom, andmost importantly the special people in their lives that love and support them in their teaching. We've had people fly in from all over the country to be apart of it, and it brings such a sense of unity and joy to the whole school.
-Student Scholarships - Principals nominate 1 vhigh school students who has overcome obstacles and challenges during their life to receieve a $2,000 college scholarship. The recipients of these awards are amazing and there is never a dry eye in the room when their families, teachers, mentors, & friends gather to honor them with this scholarship.
-Christmas for Kids - Each December we are able to give 500 students a chance to shop for Chirstmas gifts with a member of the community with a prepaid gift card provided by our generous donors. It is a huge event that takes place at a local Walmart store and it is baout the funnest 4 hours of the entire Christmas season, Santa is there givig out free donuts and bananas. Everynoe is shopping and looking for the perfet gifts. Community members love having a chance to shop 1-on-1 with a high school students and get to know them a little better. It is all around such a fabulous event!
ALL of these programs are made possible by those whosogenerouslycontribute to the Foundation!!!
This luncheon was a way to say THANK YOU and for them to see how their donations are used to benefit and bless the lives os so many in our area.
We had personalized stationary sets created for each of our 160 guests, and the quote printed on the bottom reads:
"There is no exercise better for the heart than reaching down and lifting people up"
-John Holmes
Everything we do with in the Foundation is to LIFT others, and what we've found is that LIFTING others lifts us up and the more people involved in that lifting the more able we all are to RISE together.
On most holidays, the youth in our neighborhod put flags up in everyone's yard. Today was our day to put them up and take them down. We're down to just 3 of us at home, so we decided to time ourselves and see how fast we could do it.
Started at 7:00am, unloading flags from the church shed to the car trunk. Put up 111 flags and finished in 63 minutes. New record for us.
Take down in 48 minutes. Flags back in the church shed, and we are off to grab dinner.
With all of the different roles and responsibilities Brenna has right now, she decided to add one more....being a Junior Jazz Assistant Coach. Last year she served as Team Mom for some of her friends Jr. Jazz team, and this year she moved up to Assistant Coach.
The team is comprised of boys that serve as Student Body Officers at Bingham. The head coach is her friend Marki, who is also a SBO.
Brenna schedules practices, arranges practice facilities (and back-up practice facilties - THANK YOU very much Ericson's), does the substitutinos during games, and usually brings treat (I think their team needs a Team Mom to bring treats??)
On Saturday they won against a pretty good team of boys from Mountain Ridge High School. It was a close game, but they pulled it out in the end. Their games are pretty fun.
and last Saturday their teacher/SBO advisor came to watch them play & coach. Love you Bridge! Thanks for supporting these kids in ALL they do.
Once they finished their clasees there were games, cards, and endless talking & laughing into the wee hours of the night.
cooking & eating endless string cheese and clementines
and fun in the SNOW. Lots and lots of snow.
Tate, Boston, Brenna & Charley
This is a good group of Bingham Miners right here. They take good care of each other. good care of others, and they always have a good time when they're together!
With Coivd #'s high right now, and this being a short school week, the district decided to have all classes be held virtually. That means you can do school from wherever with whomever.
Monday was Martin Luther King Day. Tuesday was a grade transmissal day.
Wedensday the kids did school at Boston's house.
Thursday they came here for school
And Friday it was online school from the cabin, atleast for Tate & Boston it was online school.
Charley and Brenna's teachers seemed to let them out early pretty much every class.
So they were chillin' while the boys worked during all of their classes. Defintely different levels of engagement and learning expectations when they are online, b ut fun to be able to get away for a day or two without totally missing school.
With Bingham doing online school this week, we decided to take Brenna & friends to the cabin Thursday night - Saturday. It was dark by the time we got to winter parking, and we took the higher road to where Russell is parked versus the lower road where we should have gone. Got stuck in a snow berm and even with all 6 of us trying to shovel the Infiniti out....nothing.
Lucklily Russell started right up and we got up to the cabin no problem. Played a bit, then about 10:00 pm we grabbed the extra shovels from the cabin and headed back to winter partking to make one final & futile attempt to get the car out of the snow. The kids were awesome to help shovel and pray, but that car was not moving.
Friday morning, while the kids did school, we called the HOA and the over winter parking coordinator up there to see if we could get some help. The maintainance worker that plows the roads was out on a Search & Rescue call, so he was unavailable. We called our insurance company about getting a tow. We tried multiple tow companies & Geico tried multiple tow companies that they have contracts with and no one was willing to come that far up the canyon.
While the kids were off having fun in the afternoon, we headed back to winter parking and prayed again. We sat on Russell for a few minutes and up drives a white pick-up truck. Maybe a rescuer? Maybe an answer to our prayers?
Yep. It ws Jody...the year round maintaince worker that had been on the rescue call. He just happened to pull up while we were sitting in the parking lot. He hopped on his tractor and had the car pulled out of the snow in no time. Super easy when you've got the right equipment. Super impossible when you don't.
Got the car out, moved it down to the lower portion of winter parking and shared a sincere prayer of gratitude to the Lord for providing a rescue for us. We know he is always there to rescue us spiritually, but this was a good reminder that he can also provide physical rescue, through the kindness and willingness of others. We hope we are always that willing to be instruments in His hands to step in and help others.
Then a little snowboarding fun once we got back to the cabin.
B's appointment with Dr. Treemarki, her Rheumotologist up at Primnary Children's got moved from in-person to virtual. Kinda weird.
Rheumotology appointments are pretty hands on - Dr Treemarki spends most of the appointment time banging on the bottom of Brenna's feet with her hands, pushing against her muscles, and pinching her joints.
This was a new one though - having her see how many fingers she could fit in her mouth with her hand turned vertically? We were both trying to not laugh. Not sure what she was looking for or learned from that, but B did it.
With the high # of Covid cases we are experiencing right now, we understand the need for virutal appointments sometimes, this was just weird. Looking forward to getting back to see all our homies over at Primary Chidren's soon.
This girl has taken A LOT of dance classes in her life. Years and years of ballet, contemporary, hio hip, lyrical, and even some tap in college. But in all those years, she's never taken a Ballroom class, so why not start with Mirror Ball champion from Dancing with the Stars.
Jenna and Val were teaching Ballroom at the 24/7 Convention this weekend. I had been with Tammy earlier in the week and she said make Em gets into one of Jenna's ballroom classes...and she did. Tammy happened to be watching that class and snapped this picture of them after they had finished. Em thinks she's found her love and passion......Ballroom Dancing.
It's been a good day for Lindsay. After 2 days of tryout, BYU released their Womens Lacrosse roster for Spring 2022 and Lindsay made the team. This means that Lindsay & Kayla will be teammates once again.
Crazy. We are super excited for them!!!
She has also spent the past few days applying for jobs and today she was offered a job with BYU Printing Servies. Yay! She's now a full fledge student athlete with a job!
This girl went to a Casino Night themed birthday party and came home the BIG WINNER. She's got a lot of George Washinton's to spend on something fun💸
