A New Chapter...

Megan graduated on a Tuesday, and left home three days later. It doesn't get any easier when your second child leaves home. We got her things packed and loaded in and on top of the van. She didn't have quite as much stuff as her sister did, but it was still a tight fit. We had grandma Susan still visiting  with us so she got to come on our trip north. 

About two hours into our journey, something went terribly wrong, the air conditioning broke. No more cool air, just hot air from then on. It was a pretty difficult ride after that, being that it was the middle of June, and we were traveling across a desert. I won't ramble on and on about the misery we endured that day, as traumatic as it was at the time. Let's just say I was close to a panic attack on a few occasions. I had to re-hydrate myself with a couple of big bottles of Gatorade and keep a bag of ice on the back of my neck as much as possible. Everyone else were pretty good sports about it though. 

We had planned to stay the night in Bountiful Friday night and go to Logan the next morning, to spend the day unloading, unpacking, and getting Megan situated. With the A/C problem, we had no choice but to continue to Logan that night so we could have the van in the shop on Saturday. I don't think we had it in us to go home without cool air. 

We stopped in Bountiful to see my mom for a few minutes and have dinner, then we got back in that hot box. We ended up getting to Logan after 9:00 p.m. Ariel had a crew of her friends there to help us unload everything and it was done in no time. We were completely exhausted and worn out from traveling all day in the heat, so we didn't get to spend much time helping Megan unpack. We spent all of about 45 minutes with her. I felt horribly sad about that, she was very understanding and wanted us to head back since it was so late. 

Megan and Ariel are living together for the summer and sharing a room. It was very hard leaving Megan on her own. She is ready for this experience though, and I know she will be just fine. She has always been my independent child. It started after the first four weeks of kindergarten were over, that's when her teacher didn't have to take her from my arms kicking and screaming anymore and drag her into class. Good times. Megan has been a true friend to me, and I am going to miss her.

Megan's Graduation

We had a house full for Megan's graduation. Both grandma's and cousin Beka came for the big event. My brother, Stephen, also got to spend a few days with us, but had to fly out a few hours before the graduation.

My mom was a good sport and posed with an AR-15 assault rifle. Everyone wanted to take a photo of her...

I took a photo of everyone else...

Megan was a highly decorated graduate with her medal, cords and sashes.

The official diploma...many years of dedication and hard work.

We had a huge fondue party before graduation. My brother and sister-in-law loaned us their chocolate fountain, and we had plenty of stuff to dip. I had never done a fondue party, it was delicious.

 Megan was happy about it,

 and so were we... 

  My mom and Susan helped so much. They cut up all the food and had everything ready by the time I got home from school.

  After we stuffed ourselves, it was time for the photo shoot. I tortured everyone, and made them pose for an excessive amount of pictures, but you only graduate from high school once.

 Megan served as the student body secretary this year, so she sat on the stage with the student body officers. This was fun for us because we could see her on the jumbo tron the whole time.

 There were so many names to be called and it took a really long time. We entertained ourselves by taking photos of ourselves and sending them to Megan.

It was an incredibly hot day and we ended up waiting outside for awhile before Megan came out, then I tortured everyone again with more photos.

When we got back to the house, we had ice-cream sundaes. It was a wonderful day, we were so glad some of our family was here to celebrate. We're so proud of Meg and this huge accomplishment in her life.

 We ended the evening by writing messages to my Dad on Meg's graduation balloons. She took them outside and let them fly up to him. We felt him in our hearts, but missed having him with us.

Scout Camp

A few months before scout camp, Todd came home from a scout meeting and said he was in charge of the food. I mean EVERYTHING about the food...planning it, buying it, packing it and preparing it. What that translated to was, "Ang, could you please be in charge of the food." I felt a bit of anxiety about this because I am well under way in my summer semester of  Biology, which is taking up basically every minute of my life. We planned the menu, did the shopping and packed it all up the weekend before camp. I made a few of the meals in advance and put them in the freezer. I tried to make it as simple as possible, but we bought A LOT of food.

 Todd always takes plenty of pictures while they are gone, for which I am thankful for. 

 This is a picture he was quite pleased with. He calls it his "national geographic" shot. A tree that was still standing after much adversity. 

 This is one of the best scout camp pictures I have ever seen. I love this shot of the boys from the back.

There were no showers at camp. I don't think I would make a very good scout; I can't imagine a week out in the wilderness without a shower, but they didn't seem to mind. I couldn't believe Aaron's feet the day they came home, they were nasty! Dad and son had an enjoyable week together. I enjoyed the one on one time I had with Megan while they were gone. She slept in the bed with me, we went out to eat and ate treats. Next weekend we will take her to Utah, so the time with her was even more precious.

Seminary Graduation

June 3, Megan graduated from seminary. This was a very happy day for her parents, it came after having to make up A LOT of missed days. Megan worked really hard on make-up work and we're so thankful she graduated!