Sept 8th: Blake had wanted to plan one last cheesy date before he left. He went all out. He wanted to dress up and make it special. He stopped and got flowers and then picked Natalia up. They went to the temple to do baptism, stopped in to say hi to the grandparents, and then back to town for a fancy dinner. Blake had gotten a little gift for her. After dinner they went to Marble Slab for dessert and a walk around Henderson. It was beautiful weather and they had a blast. Back to her house where they changed and just hung out. Natalia made him a really cool notebook of all their dates and fun activities. It was a very late night. I took a screen shot of my very last late night waiting up for kids. By the time he got home and we chatted about the evening, it was 2:56 am. I did it, made it through waiting up for kids for years.
Sidenote: Many many people have told me I was crazy for waiting up for my kids when they are out. Even Dave thought it was a bit crazy at first. But over the last year, all my kids have said how much it meant to them, and how it really showed how much they meant to me. Dave said he thought it was the best thing. He saw how much they are open to talking about their day right then rather then then next morning. The kids have even said they totally plan on doing it with their kids. It was not a wasted effort and despite the exhaustion the next day and long evenings, I would do it again in a heartbeat.
While Blake was away on his date, Braydon and Ammon also had to work. So the girls and I, and Dave :), had a girls night. We had hot chocolate and some treat and watch Two Weeks with Love. A classic that if you can find, I highly recommend. It's a wild show that is hilarious. Leah had to leave right after the movie as she worked the next day. Cora stayed up with me for a bit. It was a fun time hanging out with my girls.
Sept 9-10th: Stake Conference. It was nice to have Blake join us for the adult session. I was thinking of the progression in the church. Dave waited years for his son to be old enough to attend Priesthood Session with him and then just a few short years later, here he is attending adult stake conference. We grow and progress and move line up on line, on step at a time towards eternity. Where hopefully we all end up together.
Cora and Ammon were there as well. The visiting seventy was really nice. He stood down in the audience greeting everyone that came in. Blake got a chance to talk with him. It was a great conference, as always. Saturday, Blake was hungry after so we made a quick stop at DQ. Pierson's saw us through the drive through window and came in to chat. It was so nice. Has been a long time since we spent time with them. After the Sunday session there was a group of kids that came to say goodbye to Blake. It was so nice to see this wonderful bunch of friends that wanted to see him on last time. Sunday evening the Stake President came out to our house to set Blake apart. Just before he was supposed to come his good friend text and said he wanted to take Blake for one last right in his car. This was something he had wanted to do for a while. As a missionary he would not be allowed to drive it and we debated for a few minutes, did it look worse to put the stake president off a half hour or to say no to these dear friends? In the end he decided to go for a quick drive and say good-bye.
It was a nice setting apart. We wanted to keep it very small with just our kids there. They all came out for dinner and hung out until it was time. Blake started Home MTC the next morning, bright and early.
Sept 11th: There was a funeral for a dear lady in our ward on the Monday. Her husband had passed away a month earlier and Blake had stay hours with us to help out. This time I didn't want to leave him alone, so Cora and I just went in quick. Which again turned into hours. We had no way of letting Blake know that we ended up helping in the kitchen and clean up. He would have liked to be there to help if he could have. The Saturday before the funeral we went to set up chairs. Cora was making bread. We told her we were going in and she could come or stay. She grabbed a water bottle and jumped in the car. When we got to the church she was surprised we were just going into town. She thought we meant set up for stake conference. An hour drive vs 8 minutes. We had a good laugh, but I thought what and awesome girl, she was totally in the middle of things and was just willing to jump in and help no matter what. She has a good heart.
Sept 13th: Blake had been getting emails asking him if he needed to request a flight or when he was arriving at the MTC. I finally decided to call and ask if we just request or wait until he has his passport back. They were confused and needed to call me back. After 4 different phone calls someone was like wait he is in Canada! That is what I had been saying the whole time. His passport was waiting at the Provo MTC for when he arrived. When it got all sorted they booked a flight right then and overnighted his passport up to us. But not to a box number. Rachel kindly let us use her address and let us know as soon as it arrived. The same day in the mail he got his name tags and his mission handbook. Which was not in English. Blake looked at it and checked his name tags quick to make sure they were in English. Haha it was kinda funny.
His Home MTC was not to bad. He did not love sitting on a computer for hours each day, but we tried to fill his down time. Unfortunately it ended up being the same week that I was required to be at work all week. We are implementing a new system and the clinic was closed all weed for training. We all needed to be there every day. Leah came and was with him one day, Dave was home one day. We would go for walks in the dark every evening right after his last class.
Sept 16th: Leah had been wanting to have a girl's night to Earl's. The day of Maycie's bridal shower ended up being a good day for all of us. Dave and Ammon were home with Blake, so Cora and I went and meet Leah. Love doing this with my girls. Love when they are all close enough to do it. I also love how they already plan to make sure Blake's wife comes with us all the time. The are excited to have another sister and include her in everything. Earl's was delicious as always, Maycie's shower was fun. The girls chatted with everyone for hours. Again they closed the place. It was so fun to see the 4 girls that had been so close together again and catching up.
Sept 18th: I was Blake's companion as we made one last trip to town to make sure he had everything. We came home and got everything packed. He had a few classes in the evening and had to email the stake president. He finished his last class and had a quick companion study. Right after we were trying to scan his blessing to make it small enough to fit in his scriptures and suddenly nothing was working. Blake had renamed the wifi so we would not forget him while he was away. Turns out when you do that, it kicks you off everything that was preciously signed in. Including his bank that he was trying to pay of his card before he left. It took us hours to sort some of it out. He said I better post about it since he had been planning that since he got his call. So this is what I put up. Dang kid.
Sept 19th: Flight day. The day had come. We were pleased to see in the end 7 other missionaries that were flying down with Blake. When he was checking in his luggage he asked the guy at the Delta counter if he saw a lot of missionaries. He said yes, every Tuesday they had a bunch flying out. We thought that was pretty cool.
Cora and Ammon jumped in with us on the way to the airport. Leah and Braydon were able to come for a short bit as they had an appointment in town as well. I felt very blessed to have every one of them there.
We talked for a bit before it was time for him to leave. We all said good-bye and off he went. Ammon and Cora headed up to his parents for a few days and Dave and I came home. It was a little weird how quite it was. That evening we got an 18 second call saying he had arrived safely.
That ended up being a really long post, but so much happened in just a few short day. We look forward to hearing from him and pray for him every day.
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