Past holiday update 2015/2016

    [Hey, this is just 2015/2016's holiday letter/family history that never got completed till January 2017...You can read it if you want, or file it away or whatever...it just helps get us to write up our family history!]--Well, well, it has been one of those years where I never got my holiday letter out for the 2015 Holidays, so now I end up doing one later on--in this case, delayed till past our youngest son Daniel's high school graduation half the year later or something! We also had our 4th son, David, graduate from Brigham Young University with his Bachelor's Degree in Mechanical Engineering just under a couple months before Daniel's graduation, so 2016 became a big year for graduations in our family (our last college graduate previously was Garrett in 2014 with his Bachelor's in Exercise Science).

     As far as for 2015, we had brought in the New Year with a fun celebration at church that I planned with help from our Young Women's group and we called it a Quinceañera (Sweet 15) because it was for New Year '15! People could dress up in faux formal fancy clothes and we had a faux formal fancy fashion show for people to strut their fancy outfits on the runway. It was quite fun! I even brought out my pink and ruffly floor-length "Sweet 16"-type gown to wear (back from the old "Gold & Green" Ball days, when they used to have those at church way back when...). And little did we know that about a year or so later, Daniel would get to be an escort in a real Quinceanera where the honoree had a similarly colored and ruffled--but newer and nicer floor length dress. Maybe the idea had come to mind because of Daniel's surprise "Sweet 16" party the previous year (or his 17 "magazine" birthday party also held more recently in Dec. 2015 at our vacation rental Pebble Beach house). And the same general idea continued on with a "Sweet 16" New Year's Ball to ring in the New Year 2016 at the church cultural hall, as well.

     Anyway--back at home, once the new year got started, Jim installed his new extra large big screen TV he felt we needed at home (the better to do "Google Hangout" with all the kids each week, and to watch General Conference with, right?) and then took the older, smaller big screen TV to our vacation rental. Daniel took some violin lessons which I traded teaching the violin teacher's daughter piano lessons for, and he also led a "Lord of the Rings" song at a high school Concert Band "POPS" performance and dressed up like a Hobbit, with his co-conductor dressed like Gandalf. A contingent of Japanese students from Tsunami-ravaged Takata High also visited our high school after our town found a boat belonging to them on our shores after it drifted all across the ocean after their Tsunami. They came to the Madrigal Choir class and did exchange singing with them--very touching! Daniel also continued on with his 4 AP classes for awhile, though it just about killed him (and me), and we finally decided he could do without last few months of AP Calculus, in the name of keeping up with all the other classes, and luckily he still was able to get a "4" out of "5" for a great score on the AP Calculus Exam.

     Daniel attended the school's Winter Ball with about 7 other students in a big group (after going through an elaborate invitation process Kira helped him design, to get a girl he wanted to date to go with him once he turned 16 and was finally allowed to date). He and his friend Jon went surfing sometimes at South Beach locally and when one day Daniel decided to try out one of his Dad's Go-Pro cameras on a makeshift PVC pipe stick he designed to catch their surfing action, unfortunately, he neglected to attach some kind of "float" to it, so yep, you guessed it...when a wave spilled them over, down sank the Go-Pro, and sadly no amount of hours of beach-combing along the surf line produced the camera, and he was also very sad to lose the "great" action footage on it. Meanwhile Jim and I joined up with a program called "The Healthy Games" again to lose some weight and get healthier. Not sure if we lost all the weight we wanted, but it did help us learn about healthier lifestyles. I ended up "winning" my challenge so got to enter the next one for free and got a rebate back as well. My brother Kendell and his wife Veronica got sealed in the Portland Temple and I went up for that special occasion. At the end of that visit, I gave Garrett's wife Chelsea and their little daughter Quinn a ride from the Portland airport to her family's home in Philomath, Oregon and got to visit with them for awhile, too. Also around that time Garrett took a trip to Indiana to check out a dental program possibility there. He had gotten accepted to a dental hygiene school in Colorado, but decided to wait for a different opportunity.

      Come February, the downstairs of our house was still getting remodeled back from the spring of 2014 when it flooded due to a burst washer hose, while we were on an overseas choir trip and to our son David's wedding, and we never realized how long everything was going to take and how long we would be living in a construction zone. To complicate the situation, we had decided as long as everything was getting torn up anyway we would redo the old drop-down fluorescent lighted-ceiling and make reflected-glow soffits like they have in some temples, and get refinished lighter wood cupboards and granite counter tops and a huge new center island...All great ideas, but it seems like everything dragged on forever...Our downstairs shower was being redone in tile by a self-proclaimed "Egyptian Mummy" (an "older" middle-Eastern man) who would come every once in awhile and lay a few tiles, then come back another day and take them out because they were crooked, and that went on for months, even over a year! The bathroom floor got all laid down with stone, then torn up because it "wasn't the right stuff for a bathroom floor" and tile went in instead...actually some details still aren't done...bathroom cabinetry not yet completely put back together for awhile, baseboards and moldings not put back yet in some of the downstairs, etc. But I do love the "new" kitchen which just barely got cupboard doors (kind of antiqued ivory color now) put back on the very same day that our son Mark was set to arrive back home from being on his Germany Frankfurt mission for 2 years on a mission (Friday 2/27/15) mainly because I was desperately pleading with the installer that we couldn't have our son come home after 2 years to find no cupboard doors in the kitchen (and since it had already been like 10 months since things started getting all torn up after the flooding!). The missionaries wanting to do some service helped us put back up the shelves in our family room so it started looking more like a real room instead of a storage and construction space. Our Relief Society president at church saw me just a short time before Mark was due to get back, when I dropped by for a meeting and must have thought I looked stressed because she asked if they could do anything to help out, so I took her up on having help to load up some storage boxes we'd had packed and stacked from the ever ongoing remodel/flood repair project from our living room and got them over to our vacation rental garage where we could have some no-cost storage...and then we finally had a living room back, along with the re-done cupboard doors on in the kitchen, so the house could actually look pretty when Mark arrived back home after 2 years! What a huge relief and of course we were so happy and excited to have him home, and even more so when we could welcome him home to what finally felt like a real house again, and new and improved at that! Happy day, indeed!! Mark had a long layover in San Francisco before getting to our hometown of Crescent City, so our friends, the Allens met him there with a cheery "welcome" sign, visited with him, texted us some photos of him arriving there and let us FaceTime with him before he left (after another extra hour delay) for the final leg of his journey home to us. Friends and family here met him at our Crescent City airport, including his Dad, Jim, who had handmade a sign in German to welcome Mark back (since he'd been on a German mission himself previously). Our stake president made the trip up from our Eureka Stake offices in Humboldt County to our town just to release Mark from his mission that night, and Mark also talked on FaceTime or Skype or Google Hangout with his various siblings that weren't here, so that they could share in his joyous homecoming! Then he got to take a "tour" of our "new" changed downstairs of the house! Daniel was so excited to have a brother back home with him again, so he didn't have to feel like an "only child" at home anymore! Mark seemed a little in a daze and and somewhat "culture shocked" to be off his mission and back into the reality of home life again. He didn't remember how to use a dishwasher (because they didn't have them anywhere he was in Germany) and he didn't remember how to drive our cars or the way we answer the phone--it was all rather amusing! Soon after Mark got settled in, Jim had him helping finish some projects at the house including helping put a new granite countertop in the downstairs bathroom, which Jim had learned to cut by himself after watching some installers do it with the granite for the kitchen countertops. (We had picked up the granite ourselves at a wholesale place in Oakland that the shower installer had told us about.) The bathroom also has one of those cool "vessel" sinks with a "waterfall" faucet like we saw in a restaurant once and decided to install. The following month, we got some new designer cupboard door handles to go with the newly redone kitchen cupboard doors, so that really completed the new look.

     Daniel went to Nor-Cal Honor Choir where he's gone every year of high school and this year it was at Chico State University. He also played "Powder-Tuff" guys volleyball (the girls team coached them) at our high school. I did some substitute teaching on days off from my regular part-time speech therapy job, and sometimes even substituted in Daniel's classes at the high school--even if he didn't know I was doing that until he came into the classroom! So "fun" to be surprised like that for him, I'm sure! I also sold some clothes to an upscale second hand store, which is better pay than doing it at yard sales. I went a whole week (a really long time for me) without my video and still shot camera when I thought it was lost or stolen, and it turned out someone had put it in their car for "safe-keeping" for a week, and only remembered they had it when I happened to ask for an announcement to be made at church and they happened to hear that I was missing my camera! I was so relieved! Jason (up in Tacoma, WA for his medical residency) started doing some sports medicine practicing, so he got to go to some of the basketball games up there.

    In March, Mark got more settled into working at his Dad's dental office to earn some money, and he substitute taught in seminary and began attending our nearest institute of Religion which was about an hour and a half commute down to Humboldt County. We held a "German Mission" pictures night for him to show his photos and invite others to view them. Daniel played more volleyball, and track season began with him returning to Pole Vaulting, Long Jump and Triple Jump, as he had done in previous years. They had their season's first meet in Brookings, Oregon. In March, he also got selected to go to All-State Choir for his 3rd year, which occurred in Pasadena for 2015. Since housing for our school's all-state attendees was going to be so pricey in Pasadena, I had the idea to suggest to our director that I try to find a vacation rental exchange house to stay in, since we are owners of a rental, too, and have done the exchange program for our own vacations quite a few times. So we did that and found a beautiful place not too far from the music practice location and our director could cook us gourmet meals in the well-appointed kitchen to his heart's content, and we could barbecue and watch the southern California sunsets from the deck. It was wonderful and we as chaperones loved it, too! Our director said, "Why didn't we start staying in vacation rentals like this a long time ago?!--We're going to stay in places like this from now on!" On the way down to Pasadena, we also had stopped at his hometown of Santa Barbara and stayed at his house and met his parents and sister. That was fun, too! The All-State choir concert was in a gorgeous cathedral and was amazing to hear! Spring break this year was immediately following the trip, so some people's families picked them up afterwards to head out for vacations. Kira had flown into Oakland where Jim and Mark (whom she hadn't seen in person since before his 2 year mission) picked her up and brought her with them to see the concert and stay with us at the rental house. On our way out of town, I took my carload on an excursion to see the famous "Hollywood" sign before leaving the area! We then drove to Jim's Mom's (Grama Standring's) to stay for a couple nights. We had dinner at Downtown Disneyland's Jazz Kitchen restaurant one night, inviting Grama and Grandpa to come along with the director and his family and the All-State kids that were with us. Kira had to fly back to college at BYU, but then our group, along with Mark, continued on to the Channel Islands Harbor and stayed with an uncle of one of the student's, who lived on a yacht and let us visit, have snacks and took us on a cruise around the harbor and vicinity. We even saw some dolphins swimming alongside us at times! Then he let us try stand-up paddle boarding. Very fun! I think Mark and Daniel decided they were loving the yacht life and made it a goal to do more boating in the future, if they can, especially if it's on a fancy yacht like that one! Some people stayed overnight there, but we took off and headed to Utah where it was to be April General Conference that next weekend, and we got to attend at the Conference Center in Salt Lake City with some of our family that's living in Utah--Kira, David, AmberLee, along with Mark, Daniel, Jim and me. We even got to see church President Thomas Monson heading into the meetings on a golf-type cart shuttling him in through the tunnels from the underground parking areas where we got a place to park, courtesy of our daughter-in-law, AmberLee's job working for the Church History Library in Salt Lake. He waved and smiled and I think said something like "Hi people!" to us as he passed by on the cart. We were happy and surprised to see him and I didn't even have time to whip out my camera for a quick photo or anything before off he went--too bad! And Jim also got to go to the men's session in person with 5 of his sons (except for Jason up in Tacoma). While we were in Utah, we had the idea to have a "banana split" party for all the college kids (nieces & nephews, plus our own--all grandchildren of my parents) at my parents' house. Very fun seeing everyone--Seems like most of the kids of my siblings are all there, along with our own kids, too!

    On our way home from Utah, we got a flat tire near Winnemucca, Nevade (doesn't every episode of car trouble happen around Winnemucca??--It must have a car trouble "force field" around it--it's kind of like the "Bermuda Triangle" of car trouble, or something. So, we had an unexpected overnight stay in lovely Winnemucca at the "Winners" Motel! Ha!

     Kira turned in her mission papers for her own mission in April at BYU, now that girls can go at age 19, which she will turn the end of July. Jim's dad, Sam came to visit us and Jim wanted to arrange for him to do something he used to really like, so he signed his Dad and Mark and me up for a guided horseback ride around the dunes and Kellogg Beach, a little north of where we live. (Then Jim himself ended up having to work and didn't come with us.) it was pretty and a nice ride, but they didn't want the horses to over-exert themselves, so they didn't let them go too fast--(which I thought was alright)!

    Mark interviewed and got a job as a youth counselor with BYU's Especially For Youth summer programs--a job he ended up really loving and had him traveling around to lots of locations around the country, including Virginia.

    Near the end of April, Daniel and I traveled with the high school jazz band (Daniel plays trombone with them)--right from one of his track meets--to the Reno Jazz Festival to perform. We stayed in 2 different vacation rentals that I helped the group find--one was a trading situation--and we had the girls stay in one and the boys in the other, with the chaperones split between them. The girls' house had a huge basement that all our group used for playing and romping around, and during one tag/tackle-type game, Daniel ended up getting yanked on as he leapt and his head hit hard on the concrete floor and knocked him out briefly. People were worried about him acting strangely afterwards (like doing random Calculus problems on a paper plate--he said later it was to make sure his brain was still working alright!)...Later at home they made him sit out from some track practice and go to a doctor plus get a concussion re-test before returning to practice with the team. About the same time, BYU finished their winter semester, so since Kira was finishing and was going to come home, we had her ride the Amtrak train to meet us in Reno, and the idea was that Mark would come to Reno from Crescent City and meet up to visit with Kira along with us for a bit, before heading out to Utah himself to start back into continuing his college work in BYU's spring term. Mark was going to take a separate car so he'd have one in Utah, and Jim wanted to drop his NSX sports car off in the Bay Area to get repaired at a specialty shop there, so they arranged for Mark to pick Jim up at the shop and then they would both head to Reno to meet up there with the rest of us. A problem arose though due to some lack of communication. Mark still didn't have a cell phone yet after returning from his mission, and unfortunately instead of caravaning down to the Bay Area, Jim took off alone apparently thinking Mark had left already and wanted to catch up with him, but Mark hadn't actually left yet, but then discovered he'd been left behind, so had to leave in a rush...and they never actually caught up with each other, and we didn't know where Mark was or how to get ahold of him, and we didn't even know if he really knew how to get to the places he was supposed to go! When I found out Mark was out there probably lost and with no way to be contacted, I was really worried and upset (already in Reno chaperoning with Daniel) and when he didn't show up for hours into the night to get Jim at the Bay Area shop, I started to get so nervous in Reno that I called the highway patrol and hospitals to see if anyone had seen him or knew where he was or if he'd been found in a ditch somewhere (not even knowing if he had been heading to the Bay Area or maybe deciding to go directly to Reno or what??)--And I couldn't believe Jim would let Mark travel with no communication plan or without at least a temporary phone or something! Jim just gave up on Mark ever getting there and went and checked himself into a Bay Area Marriott hotel and was planning to just go to sleep, and I was going crazy in Reno with worry and in tears for my missing son! It was horrible! Finally, after some wrong turn adventures, apparently Mark found his way to the Bay Area place, and even though they were closed, there was miraculously someone around there that knew Jim had gone to the Marriott, so Mark was able to make his way there very late at night, and find Jim! I was so relieved to finally hear they were back together. Once Jim and Mark drove to Reno early the next morning, then I got Kira at the Amtrak station and then she and Mark and Jim and I spent a bit of time (including lunch at a 50's diner there) visiting and then off Mark went to continue on to Utah for BYU Spring term and then Kira went home with us when the Jazz Festival finished up. Once at home, we heard messages that Kira's mission call had arrived in the mail to Utah, but since she was now in California, we had to have her brother David there pick it up and Fed Ex it to us, so then on Tuesday, April 28th, we invited some friends over, and Kira opened up her mission call which said she was to report on August 26th to the Mexico City Mission Training Center for 6 weeks of intensive Spanish-Language training and then be sent to the Arizona Tempe mission to serve for the rest of her year and a half time using the Spanish language! She was excited but perhaps surprised, since she hadn't taken any Spanish in high school (instead took Sign Language as her "foreign" language) and only had studied it for a year or a semester or something in junior high! But 2 of her brothers had gone on Spanish-speaking missions, so that was good! Jim finished out April by flying down to Southern California again for the California Dental Association convention.

     In May, the high school music department had a welcome day for new incoming students for next year, and since the marching band had picked a field show theme of "Harry Potter," the students got small brooms and went out on the sports fields and split into teams and played "Quidditch" and had such fun doing that and getting to know some of the new students-to-be. Kira came along, too, and being last year's band drum major she had many friends there in band who were excited to see her again, and she jumped right in and joined in on the fun! The next night, Daniel and Kira and some friends went to an anti-prom of their own design, since some of them didn't like the idea of going to the prom this year. I continued teaching piano lessons but since I had been having to do it by making house calls, since our living room had been under construction for awhile, it was nice to be able to do them back at my house now, though I still kept up the house calls for one family who had difficulty getting out and about with young children at home. On May 8th, at 7:05 a.m., David and AmberLee's first child was born (at Utah Valley Medical Center, where I had delivered my 1st baby, too). Theirs was 8 pounds and 4 ounces--and they named her Eliza Jane Standring. She was born by emergency C-section after a regular labor and near-delivery, but the due to a prolapsed umbilical cord, they realized that it required an immediate C-section to get the baby out since the cord was pinched closed with the baby's descending head. Normally they would have had to call together a C-section team, losing precious seconds and minutes waiting for the personnel to get there and get ready, but as a huge and life-saving blessing, there was a C-section team that had just gotten ready for another scheduled C-section about ready to happen, so instead, they rushed AmberLee in there first so her baby could be safely delivered as quickly as possible! When David told us the news of the birth, he just gave us the statistics and we didn't actually hear it had been an emergency C-section until days later! The very next day in our town of Crescent City, California, I ran in the 2nd annual "Mother-of-all-5Ks" race (named in honor of nearby Mother's Day) down by the beach and through part of downtown. (Actually I sort of walk/ran it.) Another significant thing about that race and it being only 1 day after David and AmberLee's baby's birth is that the previous year for the 1st annual race, David and AmberLee had been in town for it and run it with me and David had even won the race with the overall fastest time of 20 minutes! (It probably took me around twice as long to finish as David took last year--but I finished and did it in their honor!) He wasn't here to defend his title this time, but had a great excuse since they were at the hospital in Utah with their newborn baby (also a great Mother's Day present for AmberLee)! And Daniel's Steel Drum band from the high school played at the finish line, so that was nice! :)

     On Mother's Day the next day, Kira gave a very sweet and wonderful talk in church about Mothers--brought tears of joy! :) We realized that for awhile now, our ward will have no missionary out serving from here, since Mark got back the end of February, and Kira won't be leaving until the end of August. Our ward held an additional meeting that day down in Klamath, about a half hour away and had talks and it was special for them, especially for those who would not normally be able to travel up to Crescent City for meetings, and we saw a lot of members from the local Yurok Native American tribe, many of whom reside in the Klamath area, near the river there, so that was good, too. On May 11th, my own mother and father came to visit us, and stayed over at one of their favorite places here--our upstairs Pebble Beach ocean view studio apartment that they've stayed in quite often over there, and they typically do some handyman or fix-up projects while they are visiting, which have helped out a lot!

     On May 13th, 2 days later, it happened to be "Mother-Daughter" Personal Progress  night at Young Women's meeting, and since I was one of the leaders in YW, I invited my mother and my daughter, both in town, to come with me, and share in some reminiscing, etc., and our friend, Jenny, also took some mother-daughter professional-type photos, and in our case, we got to have a 3 generation photo, so that was very special that we all got to be there together and do that! :) 

     When it was time for Daniel and the high school band to take a trip this year, they didn't have tons of funds saved, so instead of a super long-distance trip they opted to go up to Portland, Oregon and have some exchange playing with Oregon school(s) and see "Phantom of the Opera" on stage. My brother, Kendell, and his wife Veronica were able to join us at the performance, since they live there in the Portland area. Our daughter Kira, newly home from BYU, and her Crescent City friend Jade were able to come along on the trip, also, since I drove as a chaperone and there were a few extra tickets to "Phantom" available for them. After the performance and exchange concert the next day, the 2 girls and I parted ways from the high school students and Daniel, who went back on the bus, and we girls continued having some fun up in the northwest. We went to another play in Portland, "Grease" that starred a talented friend from Crescent City (Kylie Johnson who graduated with Jason) in the main role of "Sandy" and that was a lot of fun! Then we drove up to Tacoma, Washington to visit Jason & Kendra and their kids and got to attend their daughter, Noella's ballet class at the YMCA there (the kids also have great fun at the "open gym" there where they can romp around and try out the gymnastics equipment and foam pits, etc.). We then headed over to the Seattle temple and the girls took some fun photos on the grounds and by the statuary there. Then, we drove over and took a car ferry so we could see sites and drive around on the Olympic Peninsula, including sites made "famous" by the "Twilight" movie series. Some of the places on the way were so beautiful that Kira said she could see herself living there in the future! And some of the Twilight locations were rather dark by the time we found where they were, but we got out and looked and took some pictures all the same! 

    Back in California a few days later, our family went down to Santa Rosa for the North Coast Section Redwood Empire track championships for which Daniel had qualified. Daniel was able to reach 12 feet high in Pole Vault and also competed in long jump, triple jump, and even hurdles (which was a surprise to us, since he hardly ever does hurdles in the league track meets!). Anyway, we were happy for him and his 12 foot vault height! 

    Also in May I started giving some beginning harp lessons to one of the girls that goes to our church. Daniel and I drove up to see a play in Brookings, Oregon--"Mary Poppins" that had some Crescent City people in it, but it was sold out, so we went to a beach up there with a new visitors center to explore around and take some photos instead. It was nice! :)

    On May 30, (the day before my parents' anniversary), Kira, and we as her parents, went up to the Medford, Oregon temple for her first time (with me as her escort), in preparation for her going on her mission. Some former Crescent City residents, the Puentes, who are now in the temple presidency, got to be the ones to orient Kira, so that was really a special time!

    In June the day after school got out, Daniel got orthodontic braces for some minor teeth corrections they said should just take about a year. Mark finished up his Spring term at BYU and started traveling around to do his EFY youth program counseling. He loves it! 

    Our family also left (with Kira and Daniel) after school was out, on a trip back to Garrett's mission areas in Montana and he and his wife Chelsea and their little nearly 2-year-old daughter Quinn met us there from Utah to show us around. On our way, we stopped in Tacoma, Washington first to visit with Jason and Kendra and their 2 kids there where he's been doing his medical residency. We went with them to IHOP for pancakes that next morning :) and then headed east and made a stop off to see some friends in Moses Lake, Washington, the Earl Family, that we had known back in Loma Linda, California when Jim was in dental school and his friend, David, was in medical school there and we were in the same ward. It was so fun to finally see "Moses Lake" that they had talked about so much, and they have a beautiful home right on the lake there, and we loved the quick visit to see them again. 

     Then we continued on our journey and got lost in the dark woods of eastern Idaho or western Montana trying to take a shortcut that ended up being a deserted dirt road along a river...kinda scary! Crazy GPS! We finally got there late at night, just after Garrett, Chelsea and Quinn had arrived and they'd stopped along the way to get us groceries. Even though it was dark and way through lots of woods, we could tell the rental house we had found through the I-Travex vacation rental owners exchange site was a jaw-dropping, amazing, huge cabin mansion! We had our pick of lots of rooms to stay on the 3 levels, and they had a movie room set up downstairs, plus a hot tub, and also once we woke in the morning we could see it was on a breathtakingly beautiful and pristine woodsy mountain lake (Ashley Lake)! Heavenly! And the owners had left us huckleberry jam and treats and maps and info of the area! We went to church in Kalispell that next morning on Sunday and to our surprise, when we were introduced as guests, the owners of the house, the Wallaces, came up to us and were members of that congregation there! (We had kind of guessed they may have been members of our faith by the decor on the walls and the books, etc.) When we found out they had checked into a hotel (they had recently just returned as missionaries in Africa and hadn't known quite when they'd get back) to allow us to be guests in their huge house, we suggested they come back and stay in their own master bedroom suite there, since there were lots of rooms for us to use to stay in, and they were so nice to have agreed to the house exchange program for us for 4 nights! We had a lot of fun getting to know those great people and they took us out on their waterski boat on the lake twice for some unexpected but hugely fun experiences! They had wetsuits in all sizes and all the water fun equipment you can imagine to tow behind their boat and we were thrilled with the fun times and generosity they shared with us! I was surprised and happy to find I could still get up and around on waterskis and have so much fun doing it! Daniel, Garrett and Chelsea did (like a pro!), too, and Kira joined in with some of us riding on a "biscuit" inflatable towed at high speeds with crazy fun! Jim even tried flying his drone above the lake from the boat, but when the drone tried to return to "home base" I guess the boat had moved and it landed itself in the lake! I think it was Garrett that quickly dove in the lake to retrieve it before it sank all the way to the bottom! Submerging in water isn't very good for electronic devices! They managed to eventually get it to go again, but then another accidental dunking kind of put it out of commission for awhile. Nice soaks in the hot tub for us followed the lake water fun--Little Quinn especially loved that!--She had cried out on the boat if one or both parents were out being towed behind!--And  s'mores roasted over the fire pits or lounging on the viewing deck really topped it all off! We also viewed the interesting and touching movie "Meet The Mormons" down in the movie room (some of us had also seen it at its premiere at BYU Education week previously).

     Garrett knew some of the other members of the church there as well, that he had met while on his Montana mission (like the former bishop and his wife, etc.), so some of them came over to the house and shared huckleberry cobbler and ice cream for Monday Family Night with us and the Wallaces. We couldn't believe how fortunate and fun that all worked out to be! We were also invited over to visit at another member's house that had known Garrett on his mission there about 7-8 years previous to that. It was so nice meeting people Garrett had told us about and that remembered him fondly (and told us how he was such a good missionary!) from his time serving there.

      After that adventure, we were on to the second part of our trip--to see Glacier National Park more east in Montana! We lucked out on another great exchange rental cabin (very large and beautifully appointed and with lovely garden landscaping yet surrounded by woods) very near the entrance to Glacier, and adjoining a KOA campground, so we had all the amenities of the campground (pool, gift shop, ice cream store, etc.) and yet were pretty secluded off in the woods behind the rest of the camp guests, in our luxury cabin for 3 nights. While in the Glacier National Park area we drove on the "Going to the Sun" Road (breathtaking and surreal views!--and Jim flew another drone over some of the rushing rivers and scenery), and we hiked to a gorgeous mountain lake Garrett and missionaries had also hiked to on a "P-day" activity, that had multiple waterfalls falling into it all surrounding it, and on our final day there we got to try ziplining above the tree-tops, while Jim babysat Quinn in the car and drove her around the parking lot. It was thrilling fun! We stopped at a local taco place to eat and enjoyed that, too. Then Garrett & Chelsea took Daniel to the Kalispell Airport on their way out of town (with a pre-paid cell phone that I got for him, because I didn't want a repeat of a son getting lost with no phone like Mark a couple months back), so he could fly to Sacramento (well actually to Oakland, then by bus to Sacramento, as a delegate to California Boys State (a spot he had earned by application and interview, along with 2 of his best longtime buddies from high school--Nick and Saige). He got picked up in Sacramento to be taken to Sacramento State University (where the California Boys State week-long convention was taking place) by a former Crescent City/Del Norte High student that had recently moved away to there. (And his cousins/aunt/uncle helped get him from airport to bus station and back again after the amazing week of learning about government and politics and visiting at the state capital was over--plus he got to play trombone in the Boys State Band while there.) 

     Then for Daniel's next adventure, he flew from there to Utah to attend an Especially for Youth program in Salt Lake on University of Utah campus where his older brother Mark was an EFY counselor that week, too. There had been just one boys' spot left to sign up for when we found out Mark would be counseling there, so it worked out great for Daniel to get to go to an EFY session along with Mark. 

      In the meantime, we finished up in Montana, and we Californians drove back to Washington state to see Jason & Kendra's family once more and then headed back south for home after church with them.

      When Mark & Daniel finished up their EFY week, they went down to Provo and attended the big 4th of July spectacular celebration they have there called the "Stadium of Fire" at BYU stadium. Meanwhile in Crescent City, Kira and I dressed up as Snow White and Maleficent respectively and joined some other "princesses" and "princes" with a group called "Princess Perfection" and walked in the Crescent City 4th of July parade. It was fun greeting children and adults along the parade route! We had a "fairy tale life," at least for that day!--and then of course enjoyed the huge fireworks display at night that they always have here on the 4th of July.

     Then Daniel stayed on in Utah and went to a week of BYU soccer camp (he said he scored at least 2 goals in games there), then BYU track camp--including pole vaulting where he got 12' high--and Mark got flown for that week by BYU to Bowling Green in Kentucky to do EFY counseling there, I helped Garrett out with some professional applications, and Kira and I went to Girls' Camp with our church young women's group at Lake of the Woods in Oregon that week--I was a cabin leader and Kira worked at the waterfront as a lifeguard. Then Daniel stayed another week to go to "Remix" Vocal Academy at BYU for training in acapella singing that he had auditioned for. (Back in Crescent City, Kira had her 19th birthday and had a big party with friends at our Pebble Beach vacation rental.) After that, Daniel's oldest brother Jimmer who's the young men's president at their church ward in American Fork, Utah told Daniel about their week-long (and over 100 miles) bicycle trek down to Southern Utah, like through Manti and St. George, that their age 16 and older young men were taking and invited Daniel, and Mark too, to stay and go with them. Even though we hadn't planned for that in the summer itinerary, it worked out fine, since he was already there! Then afterwards, we had Daniel take a bus from Utah and meet up with our Boy Scout leaders for their week at Camp Baker near Florence, Oregon. We sent up his uniform, scout book and camping gear with the scout leaders so Daniel could have his things there he needed. That way he could go and have to the opportunity to win the "Baker Games" they have there, and be "Iron-Scout" like he often has. (While he was at camp, I went up to Tacoma, Washington and helped out Jason's wife Kendra who was pregnant with their 3rd child but having complications and had to be put on bed rest, and when I had to leave to go back, then her Mom was able to come stay with her for awhile.) Finally when camp was done, Daniel arrived back home with us again after his many weeks of adventure! By then it was August, and just about time to pack up on our annual family trip to Utah for Education Week, Academy of Dentists, and getting Kira ready for leaving on her church mission at the end of August! Daniel got a few days at home and we had our county fair, and Daniel got to go to some of the days of high school marching band camp, before we turned around and headed back out to Utah!  

     A few days before we left for Utah, my brother Kendell's son Torin was having an Open House up at Kendell's house in Beaverton, Oregon to celebrate his recent wedding to Brie in the Oquirrh Mountain Temple in Utah, that I hadn't been able to get to the weekend before (when Daniel was coming home), so I decided I really wanted to go up to Oregon for the Open House, but since we were going to be doing the long drive to Utah just a day or so after that, I opted to ride the bus up and back so I wouldn't have to drive so much, for so many days in a row. That worked fine until on the trip home,  while stopping in Roseburg, Oregon the bus left while I was in the bathroom at the gas station stop! I tried not to panic (luckily I had my purse, though not my luggage!) and tried to find a car rental place but had no luck finding any cars available. So then, I had to think and get creative and managed to sort of bribe a person at a gas station with some room in their car (or camper) to take me down the highway a few hundred miles for $20 to get to Grants Pass (or as close as they were going) where I had caught the bus and parked my car on my way up--sort of "selective hitchhiking" :o  (I hadn't revealed that part of my adventure before now because I felt so dumb to be in that situation!)...but I got almost to Grants Pass until the driver had to take her exit off the freeway, and then I managed to find one more nice person (with a couple of kids in her car) to get me the last several miles into Grants Pass and to my car at the station, where I could pick up my luggage that had been on the bus that they left for me there. Not a very desirable experience, but I got there in one piece at least. Then I drove home, where we pretty much had to turn right around and pack up again and leave for Utah once more. 

     Once there in Utah, Kira and Mark ran in an "Escape Ogden" 5K (and Jimmer and April had done a half marathon at the beginning of the summer) and David and AmberLee had a baby blessing for their little daughter Eliza while we were there, on August 16th, which was so nice!  Mark ended his EFY counseling weeks with a "retreat" that I think was up in the canyon somewhere. Also while there, I visited several Utah doctors about my right foot that had been bothering me and apparently had a torn ligament that never healed right and was making my toes do funny things, so I finally decided to go ahead and have surgery done there on Tuesday, August 18th, by an orthopedic surgeon who specialized in foot surgery. One thing I remember before being put out by the anesthesiologist was he told me they were going to use propofol, and I said isn't that what killed Michael Jackson?!--and the guy told me...well that was misused, but actually you'll see, it is a "thing of beauty" because you go out and the next thing you know, you're all done...and that's pretty much how it was!--aside from maybe being thirsty and having my throat hurt a bit from being intubated, when it was over. I missed most of the rest of Education Week, but had a nice, comforting, loving place to recover at my parents' house there in Provo getting kind and sympathetic care that may not have happened much at my house--Haha!--while the others went to the rest of their Ed. Week classes. I ended up with 3 pins sticking out of my toes and foot (kind of like Frankenstein! Or maybe the Wolverine!) along with a "tightrope" cord drilled through the big toe and a donor ligament to hopefully hold things in place. Lucky I had insurance now when previously we'd had a bit of time without any when the Obamacare stuff first came into play and our California Dental Association decided not to do medical insurance anymore (so I had increased my hours to half time doing speech therapy in the schools to be eligible for medical insurance, and luckily we'd met our deductible by that time) otherwise things would have cost somewhere between $25,000 and $40,000 for all the surgery, hospital and doctors' bills! Yikes! How do people afford that?! Anyway, they let me rent a knee "scooter" also with our insurance, which was so much better than crutches I also had, and I could actually get around a few places with that scooter after a few days...even going to a class or two the last day of Ed Week. Traveling home was not too comfortable--Jim had to leave by plane to go to the California Dental Association convention in the Bay Area, and so Kira, Daniel and I had to get us home in the car (and Daniel didn't have his license yet) with me trying to keep the foot stuck straight out on the passenger seat and using my left foot to drive! I stopped taking the regular pain medication after just a few days and relied on only the Tylenol-type stuff, so that I would be clear-headed enough to drive home--but we had to leave the rented scooter there and just take crutches until I could find someone in our local area to let me borrow a similar one at home--since it had become almost a necessity!

     Special education teachers and speech therapists at the school district had to report back to work on August 25th (with me on my knee scooter) and then on August 26th at 6:15 a.m. we had to leave to go down to our new Stake President's Law Offices in Eureka for Kira to get set apart as a missionary and then we took her (and her friend Jade that had come along) to the Arcata/Eureka airport to send her off to fly to Mexico City for the start of her year and a half mission! She was excited!

      Back in Utah, Mark moved into the German Foreign Language housing where he was accepted after demonstrating his German skills, so that way he could keep up his language abilities after his mission (they are only allowed to speak German while on the premises). Later they asked him to stay on as a facilitator which comes with a scholarship for free housing! Also they fix dinners and eat together there, so that is a savings, too. He also started working at the BYU Auto Shop which he figured would help sharpen up his car repair skills as well!

      In September after our school had started, I got my cast off the right foot and the stitches out by a local foot doctor, but they still left the pins in and now I had a boot on, which could be removed for sit down showers (in our "new" downstairs large tile shower that had taken the guy so many months to complete after our remodeling) etc., but I still was not allowed to bear any weight on my foot. I didn't get the first two of the pins out until the very end of that month, and the final one out in mid-October after 8 weeks! I was super glad to finally be able to stand and walk again (and wow, did I have some pretty strong arm muscles by then from using the crutches and scooter)...My knee had started getting sore from using the scooter all the time, and it had been rough getting over gravel, etc. while going to games and things, plus when I would use the crutches sometimes, that could be precarious too, and I took at least one fall trying to carry stuff (memorably at the Eureka Post Office steps, which was no fun, though it bruised up my ego more than my body, luckily). Once I could walk again, I started back in with cleaning at our Pebble Beach Drive vacation rental, but I ended up deciding that it was kind of nice hiring someone to do it, like I'd been doing while I was recovering from foot surgery, so I decided to keep on hiring someone for that, most of the times anyway, because it really seemed worth it!

       Daniel, now in his senior year, played on the soccer team once again, and now got to be a co-captain and ended up earning a league "White Star" (like a all-star award) at the end of the season. The team even asked him to say a prayer for them/with them sometimes at the beginning of some games. It was nice to know that they were believing that he could say an effective prayer to help them win! He took the ACT (and SAT) (on one of the times he took it in Grants Pass, Oregon, Jim and I went up to go to the Medford Temple while he took the test) and he prepped all his college applications. We encouraged him to apply to MANY places since we didn't know how hard it might be to get accepted to BYU these days. (He actually ended up later getting accepted to nearly everywhere he applied, so he got to pick from the school logo hats of 8 colleges, including UC Berkeley, Santa Cruz, Santa Barbara, San Diego, Irvine, Davis--an alternate there, University of the Pacific and later Utah Valley University, besides Brigham Young University--which, though the choice was a bit tough, he still preferred over the others since all his siblings and parents and maternal grandparents had gone there, and Mark and David were there now). Daniel also tried out once again for the ACDA and future All-State Choirs and made it with a very high score of 93 out of 100 on his auditions for judges. He also enjoyed surfing with his friend and soccer and pole vault buddy, Chris (younger brother of Jon, who he had also surfed and vaulted with).

     For one of our family home evenings in October, we talked about our Patriarchal Blessings, and on hearing some of the things mentioned in mine, Daniel said yeah, "Mom does that" so I was happy to hear he notices some of the good things! :) He ended up getting his own blessing in mid-November. At our church's General Conference it was an inspiring experience seeing 3 new apostles join the ranks, as 3 very beloved ones had sadly passed away (Elders Perry--who had visited our area and shook our family's hands, Packer and Scott--the latter who always spoke so well and peacefully in his messages--he kinda reminded me of my own Dad!). 

       Also in October, Garrett got an interview at UC San Francisco for November, to see if he might go to dental school there and Kira ended her Mexico City Spanish language mission training experience and flew to Tempe, Arizona for the rest of her mission. We did some research and arranged for a nice, white bike to be there when she arrived, since they sometimes even have the sister missionaries work on bikes, apparently.  Daniel's marching band went to a big competition in Grants Pass with their "Harry Potter" themed field show. Band members, parents and chaperones were able to get commemorative sweatshirts for the season that said on them which "house" from Harry Potter's Hogwarts School people identified with (in addition to what instrument they played)--mine had Ravenclaw on it. I think Daniel's was Gryffindor, (or maybe it was Hufflepuff?)...and it said "Prefect" on it for being a section leader for trombones. Daniel also got several acting roles as "princes" with the "Princess Perfection" group that does parties and events (the same one that Kira got to be Snow White for and I got to be Maleficent for), and he got to be a wonderful Prince Charming, as well as sometimes Kristoff from "Frozen." He quite liked the Kristoff wig (with kind of bleached blond scraggly hair) as it made him look sort of like a surfer dude if he wore it with beach clothes--and I think he even tried it out at school one day! He got paid pretty good money for the acting jobs, too, so I guess you can say he's a professional Prince! Daniel also taught some of the line dances he had learned at EFY during the summer to our youth at church. It was fun to watch that! I did more piano teaching with some new students (and found my long-missing piano lamp in a closet at church by the piano--I guess I must have left it there a year or so ago!) and Jim finally stopped his dodging around and went in for a recommended colonoscopy and got a good bill of health happily! For Halloween, I was Maleficent, of course, since I had the costume, and we had over 950 Trick or Treaters come to the house (we tallied them up!) and we went through 17 bags of candy!

      As November rolled around, I was finally able to get some regular shoes on again (though at first they were Jim's shoes!--his black dress clogs--'cause I still couldn't fit into my own Sunday shoes with lingering swelling from the foot surgery!) I started having physical therapy with 2 different ones in town, because I couldn't decide which I liked better, so got the benefit of both. I also had some massage and low-level laser treatments to hopefully get more motion back in the toes. I continued serving in our church young women's program pretty much through the end of the year and then was called as the Ward Organist again for the coming year of 2016.  Soon after that, I got an additional calling to teach in Primary--for 2 weeks before being called into the Primary Presidency. But at least during that 2 week time, one of the little boys said I was the best primary teacher he'd ever had! Woo-hoo--glad it could have an impact, even if only for 2 weeks! :) One of the last few activities I helped plan for the Young Women was an "Oz" themed Young Women in Excellence program where they had to follow the yellow brick road to complete their progress. I also had fun working on a youth talent night, where the female leaders did a funny Mormon rap and Daniel did a funny skit about asking girls out and used BYU shirts versus University of Utah shirts when portraying what to do and what not to do! He also did a group skit with many of the young men. He had some preliminary meetings with a county Supervisor and others to discuss his upcoming Eagle Scout project and how they wanted him to refurbish some large redwood signs at the highway entrances to our county.

      I chaperoned and attended an amazing regional Honor Choir concert to hear Daniel and the others sing in Palo Alto at a beautiful and acoustically wonderful Methodist Church. Jim's dear Aunt and Uncle Schoenfelder and their daughter Corinna from nearby came to hear Daniel sing at the Honor Choir concert like they nearly always do when he sings in the Bay Area! (They also came at another time and visited us up in Crescent City.) On the way down to the Bay Area, our group of about 12 singers from our high school stopped at In 'n Out Burgers and serenaded the employees there much to the workers' delight! They were pulling out their phones to record or take photos, etc. Later in Palo Alto, they serenaded each other at a 2-story ice cream shop, with some on the balcony and Daniel (and maybe others) below singing to them--Lovely! The singers from our area and a couple chaperones including me, stayed at a house in "Mountain View" of a friend--named September--of one of the chaperones, that had a whole huge, home-built indoor playground in their basement, complete with slides, tunnels, a sliding or climbing pole, a climbing wall, a zip line, and a movie screen! Kids' wonderland there! Even the music director had great fun running around there and having nerf gun fights with the students! September also baked us great homemade bread! Those that couldn't fit at that house stayed at a very nice and fancy vrbo rental house that we found not too far away. Some nights some of the chaperones cooked great food for everyone at the house. One of the nights we took the group to go see the much-anticipated final Hunger Games movie together--(unfortunately, I felt kind of sick--maybe after the Greek food we ate at lunch?--and had to spend most of the time in the restroom :( so I'll have to go to that movie again sometime to get to see it, I guess). The aforementioned chaperone is also a massage therapist, so it worked out wonderfully for me to continue getting some great and much needed and appreciated foot care for my recovering right foot! I also started brainstorming with her and researching the idea of organizing a choir trip for our students, since the school policies were being enforced differently now so that the teacher had said there wouldn't be a way to get them on much or any trip this year. I had the idea that if we formed our own "separate" group--of the same high school choir kids and director--we could travel right after school got out for the summer and not have to go as an "official" school trip and maybe accomplish the purpose. We figured a cruise would be great because the band had done one before and it has a planned itinerary and activities and all the food's included!--and they could perform on board.  So I found a company willing to work with our parameters (lots of separate payments after fundraisers we would do) and we got the ball rolling to do that the following June 2016--and then we had to dream up some fundraisers for our "Del Norte Teen Choir"--that's also the name of our county as well as our high school, so it worked for our "separate" group!) Busy times to come with that! There's a whole lot to organizing a trip of that scale, I found out--But it would be worth it for them to have a memorable and fun trip!

      Our family spent Thanksgiving in Utah as usual, and this time we found a nice vacation rental in Sandy, Utah (by the mouth of a canyon leading to some of the Utah ski resorts) where we could all stay and celebrate the holiday together. Daniel and I drove out earlier than Jim with some church member friends' (the Mena's) car that needed to get it to Utah or Idaho, and so that Daniel could see a couple doctors for some medical procedures (including an endoscopy at the hospital to check on his swallowing and reflux, and getting an implanted monitor where he had to keep track of the food he ate and how it felt for him for several days, plus some other dermatology surgery, all before Thanksgiving, and also so my foot surgeon could do a recheck with me. Our son Jason and Kendra wanted to bring their family to Utah for Thanksgiving this year (since most of the others brothers were already there), but they didn't really have a big enough car to do it for a long road trip--and Kendra was worried Jason would be too tired to drive after his long medical internship hours--so Jim drove our minivan up to Tacoma and picked them up (Kendra was now off of bed rest and okay to travel) since Daniel and I were already gone. We all met up in Utah and had a wonderful time with about 36 of us relatives from the Carver side that were there. We took a huge "selfie" with my sister Darsi holding a selfie stick, and it surprisingly worked out to see all the group alright! Then Daniel and I packed in with Jim and Jason and family and drove them back to Tacoma--getting them used to long distance road-tripping now!--Kinda of the Standring way, I guess! :)

     In December, Garrett started a new job working for a company called Mighty Lite, Jim underwent a sleep study to see if he has sleep apnea--inconclusive, I think. Daniel finally did his senior pictures so they could get into the yearbook. Daniel tried out for the main part "Lord of the Manor" for the annual Madrigal Dinner put on by the choirs and did a superb job being a high and mighty nobleman entertaining the peasant guests! It was kind of hard to believe that this was our final child performing his final Madrigal dinner after his 4 years, but also we'd been coming and watching them for like the last 19 or 20 years even, with all our kids in them and even a year or 2 previous with some of their friends that had told us about it. After the final show, they held the Madrigal "After-Party" at our Pebble Beach house like they'd been doing for many years now. At the church ward Christmas party that the youth put on with a Polar Express theme, we got a great photo of big teenaged Daniel sitting on Santa's lap! Also, Daniel turned 17 on December 20th and I did up an invitation for his party (that was also at our Pebble Beach house) that looked like a cover of "Seventeen" Magazine with Daniel on the front. He had lots of friends that packed into the place and made it super fun for him! They played some games and he had fun opening presents. A new Star Wars movie came out (The Force Awakens), and some of us went to see it right away! We went down to Fullerton and Jim's Mom's house for Christmas, and Mark arriving from Utah met us there, too. It was a bit smaller gathering this time as the other boys were with their in-laws this time around. We did get to Skype with Kira on her mission on Christmas Day and also my brother Kendell and his wife Veronica had their baby son, Gabriel, born on Christmas Day! A couple days after Christmas we headed over to Atascadero, California where a Pole Vault Camp put on by an Olympic bronze medalist, Jan Johnson, was being held. Daniel's vaulting buddy from school, Christopher met us there and we gave him a ride back to Crescent City after the 3 day camp was over. We stayed in a little bungalow vacation rental in San Luis Obispo and while Daniel and Mark (our ones that pole vaulted in high school) attended the camp that the director holds in his backyard property with an incredible array of vaulting and gymnastics and weightlifting and even skate-boarding equipment--like a huge backyard jungle gym of pole vaulting pits and everything all out among the trees and leaves, etc.--I explored around the historic mission of San Luis Obispo and had some relaxing time there. We also went over and observed some of the pole vaulting practice which was quite fascinating to observe, there in the forested outdoors. The vaulters all looked like they were having great fun and getting tips at each vaulting spot, from some of the many co-coaches there, to improve their technique.

      We got back to Crescent City, just in time to join in with some of the festivities at the Sweet 16 New Years Ball for 2016 (that I had helped come up with the idea for), so that kind of brought us full circle. For 2016, we were looking forward to having Garrett & Chelsea's daughter Quinn come stay with us for at least 10 days in early January while her parents go with the in-laws to Hawaii! Fun times!

       [Other things that were to come for 2016 were Jason and Kendra's 3rd child, Callan, born in February; Daniel's track season with a league high 13'3" vaulting height; and high school graduation (that I got to participate in as faculty) and him being the first recipient of the "Standring Legacy Scholarship" that the high school music department set up since we'd been there for 19 years of kids in the program!; then the big fun Del Norte Teen Choir Cruise; another Philmont Scout trip for Daniel, this time with Mark; an Albuquerque reunion for me then travels around New Mexico where I grew up with my 2 sons just finishing up at Philmont; Daniel completing his Eagle Scout rank (yay!) and heading off to college; my Mom having a fall (out of bed) and breaking 2 vertebrae in her neck! but luckily surviving without surgery just lots of rehab and physical therapy etc. to finally get out of her neck brace 4 months later; our oldest son Jimmer and wife April having baby Crew born (their 4th child) the end of September, but with a heart defect that only allowed him to survive about 2 weeks (a very hard and emotional time for them and us all), then their oldest son, Carver getting baptized; Kendell's daughter Kailey getting married; Thanksgiving at Midway Utah in a familiar rental house for the 5th time--all of those things resulting in us being in Utah for most of the weekends of the fall like 9 weekends or something (so no time to feel like there was an empty nest or write my new blog I was planning "The Real Housewives of El Monte" which is the name of our street, or anything else like that--people started saying we should just move there since all the family will be there apparently); then a dream anniversary trip to Cancun with 7 scuba dives (after me getting certified to dive this fall); Daniel turning 18 and getting his drivers license; and us having almost all the family in Anaheim at a rental house for Christmas; plus pole vault camp again; also finding out we have 2 more grandkids on the way for David & AmberLee and Garrett & Chelsea--both boys--and that Jason is taking a job as a doctor in Nephi, Utah after his residency finishes so will be moving his family there in July; AND Kira getting finished with her mission the end of February!]--This Merry-Go-Round of Life just doesn't stop much, to take a breather, does it? Well, have a great year, everyone! Love, The Standrings