What a trip!! Ash & I left Idaho Falls at 5am on June 23,2010 and got to Reno at about 6ish that evening! First of all, it is the first time Ash & I have gone that far away from home by ourselves.
I guess I never realized how much I depended on Ben on these trips we take! ;) Doing all of the driving, gassing up the car, washing the windshield and carrying all the luggage into the hotel. Not that I haven't done it before but this time it was different, maybe it was just being so far away from home, or the Casino life making me a little nervous!
The first night we checked into the hotel we thought we would go to bed early because Ash had to be at the Convention Center at 7am, and we were tired and hot from that endless drive..so we got into bed and realized our windows were shaking because the music was SO loud!! I got up and pulled the curtains open and looked down at the pool area. The hotel turns the pool area into a night club!!! "Reno style"!! no one had hardly a stitch of clothes on and there were pole dancers in the center of the court yard & music so loud I could hardly hear myself think!! So.. knowing me, I call down to the front desk in a rage! Shouldn't they be more careful? This hotel IS filled to capacity with mostly 14 year old girls playing in the Jr. Olympics! The lady very "nicely" (not really) said "welcome to RENO" I guess I put the phone down after I picked my jaw up off the floor! After that, we only had our curtains open during the day!! But lucky for us at 2:30am they had to turn the music off! :)
The team played amazing! We went in placed at 45 and we ended in the 19th place Nationally! We did not place with a medal, we lost the bronze medal Championship game to Texas! But it really didn't matter, the girls gave all they had and that is all we could ask for! :) Our team was by far the smallest as far as size goes. We played girls that were over 6 feet and only 14!
When you go to the J.O.'s you give your opponents a gift that represents your State. The Idaho Potato Commission gave us "Spuddy Buddy" dolls and a bag of instant potatoes! Our gifts were by far the best ones there!! The team played 3 games a day and in the afternoon had a team activity and a meal together. Ash made tons of new friends from all over the Country and memories to last a lifetime! The last day some of the girls played the coaches in a beach volleyball game! That was fun to watch! Almost as exciting as the J.O.'s!
A special Thanks to all of her sponsors: Grandma and Grandpa Durfey, who not only gave Ash spending money but came to every game she played all year. They came all the way to Reno to support her.
Grandma Holley & Hal who worked tirelessly to get her sponsors and support her all the time in Volleyball.
Great Grandma Rees. Uncle Bryce and Aunt Aubrey for letting us crash their house every other weekend from Jan-April!! and making time to come watch the girls play!
North Ogden City Firefighters, who don't even know her, but were generous enough to help her out! Thank You guys truly! (Ash says she will bake something for you and bring it down) :)
PaPa Schow who is always giving Ash whatever she needs/wants to help her excel in the sport.
Mathews Plumbing who was so generous with her, Thanks Jody & Gavin!
Kevin Searle and GPOD.
Ash feels blessed to have so many good people who support her!
we also got shirts that said IDAHOAN! we loved those!
Ok so ... PART 2 of our journey!! On Sunday morning on our way to the Convention Center a light goes on in in the car by the engine light..I thought it may have been because it was SO hot or something like that..seeing how the car isn't even a year old nothing could go wrong, right? HAHA not so lucky for me! I called Ben who was busily getting the younger ones ready for Church and asked him to look it up online for me and see what it could be. He called back and told me to go back to the hotel after the games and stay there, that he would be packing up the Excursion and trailer and coming to get me!!!! The light that came on was something that makes the accelerator petal stop working completely! Plus there is like a 3 hour span of nothing but sage brush, dust and NO SERVICE! He didn't want Ash and I stranded on some dusty highway alone, so he packed up Chan, Anz and Blayre (Jensen was at his cousins for the week) and came down to RENO! Other than it being really expensive to come and extend the vacation and extra day so the kids were not riding in the car for 2 days..it was so much fun. He didn't get to watch Ash play, but we played hard once he got there. We took the kids on the Sky Ride. Anz loved by they way! The hotel has a movie theatre in it with couches, so we had tons of fun. Happy to be home though!! 
