Elizabeth's Graduation

Wow, 4 years went by fast! It's so nice to finally be done! We had a great time during the week of graduation. My mom and step-dad David came up for about a week, and Trent's parents were here for a couple days too! How nice to have family here!

Here are some of the fun things we did:

• We picked Mom and David up at the airport and had dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory at Tolley Square. Then we drove around Salt Lake until we found the old apartment where David lived when he worked for the Deseret News.
  
• Mom and David took us to Sam's club to buy a bunch of groceries and graduation party food (now we're stocked up on all of the essentials...toothbrushes, toothpaste, otterpops, chocolate milk--though I've already eaten almost all of the french toast sticks nearly single-handedly)
• Ate French toast for breakfast at KNEADERS--twice! We went one day with my BFF Jackie, and another time with David's parents, brother, sister, and niece. YUM!
• Went to commencement, where David A. Bednar spoke.
• Went to convocation for the David O. McKay School of Education, where Elder L. Tom Perry said to me "Elizabeth, Congratulations" as he shook my hand when I crossed the stage (he also spoke at the end).
• Had a great little graduation party/lunch. That was fun--Mom and David, and Rod and Cindy and Kadee were there, and Jackie came and brought our friend Lawrence who hadn't seen in over 2 years (since before his mission). It was nice to hang out together and have some yummy food!
• We got lots of good pictures of graduation on those 2 days...with family and some with a few of the good friends I made here at BYU.
  
• We shopped around for a sewing machine (Thanks Rod and Cindy!) We went to 7 different stores and weren't very successful...but I found one on-line that I'm planning on ordering. I'm so excited! I've been wanting a nice sewing machine for a while, but couldn't justify getting one while I was in school, since there's no way I would have made time to use it--but now I'm done! Yay!
  
• Mom and I worked on the baby quilt we're going to use for the crib! It's really cute-- Mom brought up the bumper pads she made when she was having me (gender neutral, because she didn't know what she was having) and we made a cute quilt to match with these bunnies appliquéd on...I'll have to post a picture eventually, but we didn't get completely finished, so Mom took it home with her to finish.
• We also hung out at David's brother's house in Payson a couple of times--He made the most delicious roast and mashed potatoes and gravy ever! I'm craving it now, just thinking about it...mmmmmm.....
• I was thinking that was just about all of the interesting points, then I remembered this one: Trent bought an air mattress and pump a while back so that we'd have one if we had guests overnight. This is what Mom and David slept on while they were here...the funny part is, we didn't realize until Trent tried to blow the mattress up the first time that the pump he bought doesn't plug into a wall outlet--only a cigarette lighter in a car. So each night Trent carried the queen sized mattress out to the car to refill the air a little before bedtime.
  
• Okay, that story made me think of one more...On the way to picking mom and David up from the airport at the beginning of the week, I was talking on the phone and started feeling carsick. I rolled the window down thinking the air would make me feel better. It wasn't helping, so I started to roll it back up, when I realized I'd better hurry up and roll it back down quickly! That's right.... I ended up sticking my head out the window and throwing up as we sped along the freeway at 80 miles an hour... We pulled off in Sandy and got all cleaned up. Aside from it being really gross, it was also kind of funny. Something I've never done before and hope to never do again!

Anyway, here are some pictures from graduation:

I'm so glad you guys could come! It was so much fun, and I was sad when you had to leave!

I think this picture is fun because you can totally see some family resemblance there--Trent looks just like his Dad and Kadee looks just like Cindy in this picture!

Clearly four years was too much for us... Actually this is just us trying to recreate a funny picture we took our freshman year in Heritage Halls... Good times... but I think the first one was better, because in that one I crossed only one of my eyes, and I couldn't quite pull it off this time... Oh well!

Yay! I love BYU! What a great experience!