Special Olympics Basketball, Valentine's, Driving Frustrations, Snow, Faucet

 Things have not been quite as crazy in the past two weeks. Here's some of what has been happening. Matthew had his Special Olympics Local Basketball Tournament on Valentine's Day. He played two games a few hours apart. Matthew is in the green #9 jersey, Here's a few pictures:

Matthew's team won both their games and got gold medals which means they get to go to the State competition in a few months.

Matthew was super excited this day not only for his basketball games, but to be able to hand out the medals and awards to everyone in his role as Mr. Awesome.  We did have to have a talk beforehand to make sure Matthew didn't steal the spotlight from the athletes getting the award. Here's Matthew getting ready to hand out the awards with his Mr. Awesome Crown and sash:

Here's a few pictures with Matthew and the other people that helped hand out awards:

Mr. Awesome also did a spotlight on Matthew. Here's what they said:

They also interviewed Matthew and here's what he said about everything:

I came home from work a few days before Valentine's Day to find our front door had been 'heart attacked'.  I LOVED it!  It made my day seeing all the hearts and reading the messages from the Activity Day Girl's in our ward.

We didn't do anything to crazy for Valentine's Day. Sarah and Josh worked and Noah went with friends. Aaron and I picked up some steaks to make at home. It was great!  We could only get through part of the steaks so the kids got to finish them off when they got home. They tasted awesome!

After that we watched a Dateline. We know how to keep the romance alive--haha!

President's Day we all had the morning off of work so we went and did our usual activity-Top Golf and lunch at Costco. Here's everyone taking a turn:

We had a fun time!

Noah had his driving test coming up. He couldn't fit Driver's Ed into his school schedule so we did private Driver's Ed instead. He did all his course work and then did three different driving practices with an instructor. After that we have to get a driver's test done with a different private driving test instructor. He had already completed his 3 driving practices so we still needed to practice driving with him before his test. Aaron took him out to practice driving around the area. When they drove past the high school, Aaron saw that the driving range had left their orange cones out already set up to practice parallel parking in the high school parking lot. Wahoo!  Aaron took him over there to practice parallel parking. I guess Aaron was 'talking too much' to Noah while he was trying to parallel park. Noah asked Aaron to get out of the car so he could concentrate better and try parking by himself. Aaron was a bit annoyed, but then got photo proof that Noah still needed some more practice and instruction with parallel parking--haha! Even with this picture Noah still argued he didn't hit the cone because there is a space between the van and cone so therefore if it would have been a car parked there he would have been fine...***sigh***. 

Aaron asked me to take Noah out driving next time--haha! When it came time to practice parallel parking again, Noah also asked me to either stop talking or get out of the car so he could parallel park on his own. I stayed in the car, but watched almost the same thing happen again with the cones. Ugh! Let's just say I hope Noah doesn't have to parallel park in the near future--haha!

Noah had his actual driving pass off test last week. Unfortunately with the way our work schedules and Noah's school schedule is the only time he could do it was in the evening which meant driving in the dark. What made it worse was that it was supposed to storm--rain/snow the night of his test. We just hoped for the best as we drove Noah down to the meeting the testing guy.  It was raining, but not too bad when we got there. Before the test began Aaron, Noah and the testing guy talked for a few minutes. I stayed in the warm car and just watched.

Then Noah got in the test car driver's seat and the test began.  It was just Noah and the instructor.  Aaron came and got back in the car with me and we watched Noah drove past us on his way to the first stop sign and I grabbed this picture. We prayed he would do okay. 

When they got back Aaron went and spoke with Noah and the driving instructor while I stayed in the car. When they got back in the car they both told me that Noah failed. It wasn't until I looked up and saw their faces, they have terrible poker faces, that I saw they were teasing me. Noah passed, but not with flying colors. He needed less than 20 points/mistakes to pass and he got 15. Hey, we will take it--but we will be practicing some more before he turns 16 in April and actually gets his license.

We had a pretty big snowstorm the next day after Noah's driving test. I was so glad it happened after his test!! Anyway, we got a lot of snow in a short amount of time.  Josh sent me this picture of the car he drives as he was getting ready to come home after school:

It was then it occurred to me that I had no ice scraper in my car since we had just gotten it. DOH!! I had to scrape all the snow off with my arms making my sleeves all wet. What makes it worse is that in the office I work in, most people like the temperature very cold so I am already freezing before I even step outside. Needless to say I had my car heater on high the whole way home and as soon as I got home I put a window ice scraper in the car so this wouldn't happen again. 

Unfortunately, Josh didn't make it out of that storm unscathed. He went to a grocery store to run an errand. The parking lot was very icy and Josh ended up sliding into a truck. DOH!! Luckily, the driver of the truck got out and saw his truck had zero damage and drove away. Josh's car--my old white Camry--wasn't as lucky. The fender is now dented, scraped and loose. Boo!! I guess nothing some duct tape won't fix, right?!

Good thing I still love him is all I can say!!

Aaron got to go to a Weber State basketball game for a young men activity last week. Here's where their seats were:

Aaron said it was fun.

Daniel called us on his P-Day yesterday. Aaron joined from a business trip in Washington DC, Josh on his way home from YSA FHE activity at Crystal Hotsprings (he is there even though his screen is dark. Someone else was driving, too, so Josh was a passenger and it was safe to talk), the rest of us at home, and Daniel in Winter Quarters in Iowa. Daniel does not have great Wifi in his apartment, so he does better if he turns his screen off. Having the video on makes it break up while we talk so we can't hear him very well. Anyway, I love that we were able to join in even though we were all in different locations. 

Daniel is doing well. We are able to see his Google photos and happened to see this picture. Let's just say he seems to be a ruthless Uno card player that hoards wild cards--haha!

He got a big snowstorm that came through his area. The Mission President grounded all the missionaries since driving conditions were too unsafe. Daniel was on splits with another missionary at the time so to pass the time they build a sledding run at their apartment complex:

Looks like it was fun:

We finally got our fluff ball groomed. She was so scraggly. She hates being groomed, but looks and feels so much better afterward. I don't think she can go every 4 months. I think it can we can only do every 3 months max because she gets so scraggly.

Josh's bathroom faucet bit the dust last week. The handle broke off which is never a good thing. When Aaron went to change it out, he discovered the plumbers who plumbed the house went cheap. He had to change out some water lines before he could change the faucet. It ended up being a lot bigger project than he had planned for, but it turned out well.  Too bad Sarah's bathroom faucet is on its last legs, too. Boo! I hate spending money on things like that. We also had to get new tires for the van last week as well. Oh well, what can you do?! I am just glad we were able to take care of those things.