We are so excited about Emily's graduation! Dad went to Utah a day early and helped Emily with getting her apartment packed up and cleaned. They had fun going to Ruby River Steakhouse with Nathaniel, Audrey, and Charlie.
Then we went to do some shopping to help Emily
pick out some professional clothes for herself. We went to Kohl's and she
found some great things, but a lot of the things weren't available in the store
so we had to order them online. Nathaniel, Audrey, and Charlie had to go back
to the house for a bit but they joined us at Kohl's so we got to spend a little
more time with Charlie.
By then it was after 8 PM and past his bedtime
so they left and we went to Ross. Michael was almost there so we finished up
with Emily trying on clothes in the dressing room. She found about four
different tops. Dad found a suitcase for himself. Then we met Michael at
Leatherby's family creamery. We all ordered some ice cream and it was about
four times the amount that we expected. Michael hadn't had dinner yet so I
thought that would be a good idea since they also serve food but we were all
stuffed.
Emily was going to come over but she wanted to
get Swig first. She texted us that she was there and she needed some help with
the soda so I went out to help her and she was having a hard time as she was listening to
the commencement speeches. It was hitting
her about graduating and she had listened to her friend Molly give the opening
prayer and her other friend give a speech. We all went to lunch at Brick Oven. That was right where we
needed to be anyway to go to her showcase and it worked
out great. We had a nice lunch at Brick Oven. Most of us did the buffet but
Emily, Audrey, and Nathaniel all got small pizzas. We had parked in the student
lot across the street. After lunch, we walked up to the Brimhall building. We
got to talk to Emily's boss Melissa and a couple of her professors and some of
her friends.
They had a slideshow going on the TV so we got
to see a couple of her pictures. We had fun meeting people and having everyone praise her and sat how
wonderful she is. Her friend Emmeline said that they're all obsessed with Emily
and what a great person she is and how her work is such great quality.
Everyone raved about her and hugged her and said
how awesome she is. She went to get her Comms sweatshirt and then we went back
in for one quick picture and then we headed back to the car.
Going down was way easier than going up the ramp
like we did. We saw all kinds of people milling around and getting their
picture taken, being all excited about graduation.
We headed over to Orem Toyota to drop off
Emily's car to get the oil change and tire rotation. Then we picked up the cake
at Provo Bakery. It was amazing! They did an amazing job and I took about 20 pictures of it. They had a ton of
other treats but we thankfully were able to resist. We headed over to Emily's
apartment and put the cake in her fridge. Then we worked on helping her move
out. We got the majority of the stuff out of her room and into the Lincoln.
Michael did a great job packing everything like he always does. I helped a
little bit with moving the stuff out. Michael had some emails to do and Dad
played on his phone and Emily and I cleaned her room. She did the walls and I
did the baseboards and the vacuuming and she cleaned out the closet and I
cleaned her bed post and everything. By then Michael and Dad were pretty
tired so we dropped them off at the hotel and then I drove Emily to pick up her
car. I
was so annoyed about the filthy windshield on the Lincoln. It was sprinkling and he ran the wipers
and it looks terrible. I asked Emily while we were driving to pick up her car
if she would look up if there's a Ford or Lincoln place and there definitely
was. In fact it's right by where I used to live at the Branbury. Anyway, I
stopped by there and bought new wipers. They even took to through the car wash for us. Neither Dad nor Michael noticed. Emily and I were chuckling about it because
they didn't notice the whole night that the wipers were new, the windshield was
much cleaner, and the car was clean. We came back to the hotel and picked up Michael and Dad and I freshened
up and then we went over to P.F. Chang's for dinner at 6 PM. Everything was
delicious! We all ate way too much. We had a very nice dinner together. They have a new thing called a Mongolian trio
where you get beef, chicken, and shrimp in Mongolian sauce but I was happy with
my Mongolian beef. We all got to hold Charlie for quite a while. He was happy
and making sweet baby noises and we passed him around the table.
Before they left, the guy brought out a little
firework candle thing for her and a treat. They let her choose what treat she
wanted and gave that for free so that was very nice.
After dinner, we drove over to the hotel to get
Emily's car. Dad went with her and they went back to her apartment to pick up
the cake and drop off her leftovers from P.F. Chang's. Then we all met up at
Nathaniel and Audrey's house. We didn't get to see Charlie again because Audrey had fed him and put him right to bed because by then it was almost 8 PM. I took a bunch of pictures and video and we
had fun admiring the cake and then we finally ate it.
Emily wanted to play Soundtrack Trivia so we did
that. We played some with some cards where you can get to the finish line
faster and that helped it go faster. Nathaniel won, of course.
It was so fun to watch Emily walk in. It doesn't
matter how old they are, when they look up and they see their family in the audience,
their face lights up and that's exactly what she did. You could tell she kind
of knew where our seats were but had a hard time finding us and then when she did,
she her face lit up and she waved at us. It was so sweet.
The talks were very nice. We were so proud to watch Emily walk across the stage. But we cheered and we said her name and we
cheered loudly but not obnoxiously.
It took us a few minutes to find her after the
ceremony. We were up on the second level. We found her downstairs and then we
took some pictures by the backdrop and then went outside.
She was looking for her boss, Melissa, and found
her out there. She got a picture with Melissa and the other professor that's
always in the newsroom. She got some group pictures with all the Universe
employees. She looked around to get pictures with some of her friends. Melissa
gave her an envelope with some cute things in it like a Dr. Seuss book with a
poem taped to the inside.
Once again, she raved to us about Emily. I took
the opportunity to thank her and tell her how much we appreciate her being such
a great mentor and great boss for Emily. She quickly told me how grateful she
was for Emily and what an amazing worker and person she is. I wish I could
remember all the great things she said but suffice it to say that she sang her
praises highly.
When they were giving out funny “burn” awards
last week, this was Emily’s: “I’m More Talented Than You: To Emily May, for
setting the bar so high, the rest of us have stopped trying. Thanks for the
inspiration—and the crushing sense of inadequacy.”
Once she got all her pictures with her friends
we tried to find a few more places to get pictures of us as a family and
pictures of her with a pretty background. We walked over to the Wilk to the
roundabout that has some pretty flowers and got some good pictures there. We
saw somebody else getting their pictures done and that's where we got the idea.
Michael wanted to go into the Wilk so he could buy some
cinnamon gummy bears for Jonny. I also wanted to get a little mini Lego set for
Andrew. I got a picture of Emily in front of the magazine box with the magazine where she had an article published.
April 23, Wednesday
Then we came back to the hotel and said good night to Emily. The boys had a lot going on so I kept having to check on them, making sure they were in the right place at the right time. Daniel texted me tonight to let me know that Jonny got home safely and they were getting ready for bed so that was nice.
April 24, Thursday
I suggested we have a family prayer so
we did and then we left. Emily took her car back to her apartment and we went
back to the hotel.
April 25, Friday
Here she is waiting to go on stage.
As we were cleaning, one of the new roommates who just moved in named Summer
was there with her parents. As soon as her mom walked in, she looked at me and
said, "I know you!" She said we were in the math program together and we took math
classes together and we were in the same student teaching class. I couldn't
believe it! How did she even remember me? I wish I could say I remembered her
but I didn't, unfortunately. However, we had fun commiserating over how
difficult the math classes were. Her name is Jenna Lee Parker. She used to be
Jenna Lee and now it's Parker. She said she got married later in life at age
29. She didn't go into teaching and got an MBA instead. We were amazed at the
coincidence. We told her Emily was actually moving out because she graduated
but it was still funny that they were moving in and out of the same apartment.
It's a small world. Later, Dad commented about that. He said, “You always see
somebody from your past every time you come here.” He remembered the time that
I saw Karen at the Iowa State Fair, seeing the Mitchells at the BYU bookstore,
and now this lady today. I told him those were absolute miracles and the Lord
sent them to me. There are no coincidences. We talked about that while we were
at Nathaniel and Audrey's playing a game later.
Anyway, we finished the
cleaning and at 2:30 PM the lady came to do her cleaning check. Her roommates
were warning her that the lady was really difficult to please but this lady was
fine. I told Emily I was going to sit on the couch and stay out of the way and
not seem like I was hovering. Emily had to explain that they had made a mistake
on the refrigerators and that the roommate who doesn't use her refrigerator was
assigned to clean hers and Emily was assigned to clean the other one and they
figured it out. The lady said that was smart and she handled it well. Then she
checked around the kitchen. She checked Emily's bedroom and had her wipe one
more thing and then passed her. She said she did a good job and looked at me
and said, “You've taught her well,” so that made me proud. We were about to leave and I told her you might want to say
goodbye to your roommates because this might be the last time you see them so
she took a few minutes doing that and then we went over to Nathaniel and
Audrey's and got there a little before 3 PM. Audrey was feeding Charlie and
brought him out and he was being a little bit fussy and she said she was going
to put him down for his nap but Emily said, “Can I please hold him for a little
bit?” This was her last chance. So, Audrey let her hold him and I didn't even
ask to hold him at all. She held him for a good 20 to 30 minutes. She had a hard time saying goodbye to that sweet angel. I knew it
was going to be a difficult goodbye and it definitely was. Charlie was so sweet and kept touching her face. You can tell he adores her.
I was getting close to the time that she needed
to leave and I had to warn her because I knew she would want some time to say
goodbye to Audrey and Nathaniel. She handed me the baby so she could say goodbye to
Audrey and Nathaniel. Nathaniel was acting kind of chill like he normally does
and comforting her. But the second time he hugged her, I
think it finally hit him that he's not going to get to see her on a regular
basis anymore. They spend a lot of time together every Sunday at Eldredges and
she watches movies with them a lot. I’m so proud to have children that love
each other so much. It was so touching to me that I started crying, too, a
little bit. She gave a couple more hugs and said goodbye again to Charlie and
then we had to leave. I drove her over to Rebecca's apartment and dropped her
off so they could go to the train and take that to Salt Lake City. She was so
excited to go see her Pirates movie with the orchestra. I asked her later how
it was and she said it was incredible.
I drove back over to the hotel. Dad was
up and wondering what was going on and so was Michael so I told them I was
going to pack all my stuff up and then we could go over to Nathaniel and
Audrey's. Michael wasn't quite ready when I was so Dad and I headed over there
in Emily's car and then Michael joined us later. Charlie was sleeping so Dad and I
started playing Spades. Then Nathaniel and Audrey were available to play so we
played a hand with them. Then Michael came over and now we had five people so
we couldn't keep playing Spades. Nathaniel got out a couple of games and one of
them was Five Crowns and I've been wanting to learn how to play that so he
taught us how. It was pretty fun! It's kind of like if you combine Gin rummy
with Phase 10. We played quite a few rounds. Dad was the clear winner. There
were only a couple hands where he lost any points at all. We played until about
6:30 PM. I think we were on the 10th level. Unfortunately, Charlie hadn't woken
up so we didn't get to say goodbye to him but they let us sneak in there and
watch him sleep for a minute and we said our goodbyes to Nathaniel and Audrey
and left for the airport. Michael stayed because he and Nathaniel were going to
go see the Warfare movie tonight.
I think it was about 7:45 PM by the time we
got to the airport. My flight left at 10:54 PM which was so late but
the only other choice was 5:45 PM and I would've lost the entire afternoon.
Because of the time change, I was scheduled to land at 11:33 PM so it worked
out OK.
April 26, Saturday
I'm grateful that everybody made it
home safely today. Michael, Emily, and Dad all left this morning around 7:30 AM Utah time.
Dad got here first. Emily was riding with Dad for the first half and Michael
for the second half of the trip. I can't remember what time he got here but I
think it was around 6:30 PM. Emily and Michael arrived about 10 to 15 minutes
later. I had a roast in the crockpot so we had a prayer and ate almost
as soon as everybody got here because they were all hungry. Then we brought in
everything from the cars. Daniel was at prom, and that's why I had planned to come home last night.
I am so grateful we were able to celebrate Emily and all of her accomplishments! Congratulations, Emily!
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