Week 30

 In welding this week I finished all of my physical assignments. That means I can finally start on my project. I'm excited, I think it will turn out good. My mom and I went to Home Depot to buy the rebar for my project since my welding teacher doesn't have a source for rebar.  Also this week I went for my first drive with a driving teacher. It went really well but I need to work on slowing down sooner. I was getting a little closer than I should to the other cars. I had what will be for now my last physical therapy appointment. I went to the gym twice with my dad to do squats and other exercises. My knee isn't hurting when I do them, so that's really good. I did math assignments and also had a quiz this week that I got all the problems correct on. I took video of riding my bike on the river trail with a couple of friends and worked on editing it. I still want to add some music to it so I'll do that next week. 

Week 29

 This week I started my home study workbook part of my drivers ed course. I did the first 3 or 4 lessons. I had a driving practice session with my mom. I drove on Lakeshore Parkway, which is right outside of our neighborhood. The speed limit is 45 so that is faster than I have been driving around the neighborhood. It's going pretty well. This next week I will have my first session with the driving instructor. 

I stayed after school on Friday to work in the welding shop. I helped my friend Heber work on his drift trike. 

I did my other classes as well. 

My knee is doing a lot better. I only have to go to physical therapy once a week for now, and I'm supposed to do squats at the gym and go jogging/biking. 

Week 28

 I had a math quiz this week. It was kind of tricky so I had to review a couple of the questions after to understand them better. One was solving vertex form of an absolute value equation. 

I had physical therapy 2x this week. My knee does seem to be doing a little better. My wrist is pretty much back to normal, so that's good. 

In welding this week I did square tube welding. I had to do an edge weld. It was hard and I kept messing up. Luckily Mr. Money told me what I was doing wrong and I was able to do it correctly after. 

I did a driving practice session with my mom. I practiced backing up, parking, and pulling out of parking places along with just driving around. I drove around our neighborhood a couple of times. Backing up was kind of tricky because I was trying to just use the windows and mirrors, but my mom's Jeep has limited back windshield visibility because of the spare tire. It has a backup cam, but I was trying to learn the skills of backing up for driving any car, not just hers. 

Week 27

 In welding I made a 3.5 inch steel cube. The first thing I had to do was cut six squares. They had to be very precise to be able to form a cube. Then I tacked them together and made sure they were perfectly square. After checking for squareness I did the final welds. And for the final step I used the grinder to make it smooth. It is surprisingly heavy for its size, even though it is hollow. 

Week 26

 I had a quiz in Math. I got 100%. I am learning about composite functions and inverse functions. Also the difference between functions and relations. 

I had physical therapy twice this week. Both times with the dry needling. It wasn't as bad as the first time but it is still uncomfortable. The idea behind it is that it kind of tells your brain again that the area is injured and your body should work on healing. Sometimes with lingering injury your brain and body just adapt to the chronic pain. 

We had some basketball games. The game on Friday was really exciting. We were playing Park City and we went into overtime. Then Park City was winning by 1. At the VERY LAST SECOND my teammate Jayson hit a three pointer and we won the game. It was pretty great. We have lost almost every game this season so to have an exciting win like that was pretty great. 

I am reading Ready Player 2. I really liked the first one. I practiced using prepositional phrases in my writing this week. 

Last week I ordered some new Nike shoes that I really liked. I wasn't sure if I wanted to spend the money on them, but they were on sale and my dad convinced me that I would probably be sadder to miss out on them as they are likely to be sold out than to just have the money sitting in my account. I really like them. 

My new shoes

Week 25

 This week I went to a new physical therapist to try something called dry needling. They stick needles in your body and send electricity through them. It is like electrical acupuncture kind of. Hopefully it will help my knee recover better and faster. It wasn't too uncomfortable except for the lowest needle. I am going back next week. 

I worked on figuring out my welding project. We decided on some of the specifications and looked into the materials I need. I also had to fill out a job application for welding class. 

I had a cold and a sore throat this week so I had to miss one of my days of school and some basketball. At least it wasn't covid though.

My mom was messing around with her new phone taking pictures of my cat

Look, there I am in the background

Doesn't this look fun? 

Week 24

 For my writing I am incorporating another sentence type in my paragraphs. In Math this week my lessons were on the quadratic formula. We found some supplemental videos to watch because it is kind of complex and my mom wanted me to have a good understanding of what is behind it. 

I had to come up with a project plan for welding. The project I am going to make is a bottle tree for the backyard because my mom really wants one.

In geography we learned about Ethiopia, Djibouti, and Eritrea. 

My cat likes me the best

Week 23

 Still on quarantine from attending classes at the high school due to COVID exposure on the basketball team. I did a couple of welding assignments that were online, but obviously didn't do anything in class. I am doing my physical therapy for my knee. I guess I have patellar tendinitis. It is annoying. I attended the Zoom meeting for the eSports club. I hope it works out with my schedule so I can participate. I really like playing SmashBros. I watched the inauguration of President Biden. In Geography we learned about Egypt, Sudan, and South Sudan. It wasn't that long ago that Sudan and South Sudan became separate countries. I tried a couple different things to record a video of popcorn with my GoPro. Unfortunately I can't do a lot of active stuff with my knee right now so I am having to think of other things. 

Weeks 19-21

 We had basketball practice the second week of break. We had a game versus Wasatch. We lost. I have been doing my physical therapy exercises and my knee is doing better but it's not totally better. 

In American Government I learned about how voters decide and what influences them. In different studies it was noted that the political views of someone's parents have a a big part in what someone's opinions will be. Also sometimes people vote only based on what they think of the person running and not so much which party they are. 

I cut out ten more ornaments because one person who ordered five wanted ten more because she really liked them. I need to get ribbons on them and then we can mail them out. 

Week 18

In Welding I was working on converting a logo to an ornament to sell but it didn't end up working. So I decided to make these Jeep grill ornaments instead. My mom shared them on a JeepCrew Utah group she is in and I sold 21 of them already! So that has been one of my main projects this week. I went in a couple times to the shop after school to work on them.  I made almost $200.

I went to a physical therapist this week to get started with some exercises and stretches to hopefully help with my leg/ankle/knee pain. I have a bunch of exercises to do on my own, too.