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What. A. Week. I don’t even know where to begin. It was exciting at times, so boring at others, and then a frantic push to the finish line.

Monday Rusty left for Mountain View and Josh and I woke up and went to the gym. His classes didn’t start until noon. He was eager to meet his companions and his district. Everything went really well! He’s in a trio with Elder Toganivalu from Figi and Elder Myllylä from Finland. The only thing he was sad about was that practically everyone in is district is headed to the same mission in Taiwan, except him. Classes go till 9pm and then bedtime at 10:30.

Each day they added more and more classes. It seemed like he’d have 30 min of free time here or there, but it was a pretty busy week! Josh and I had Jersey Mike’s on the trampoline one afternoon to get some sunshine on his blue light-soaked face. Wyatt came over one afternoon and hung out for a bit and had dinner with us–while he was here, we spotted a fox trotting along the fence line! We hit the gym another morning. Finally, Sunday came, and it felt like a nice break from the routine. Church was good–it was fun to go to Sunday School with Josh! Lots of goodbyes and well wishes from ward friends. Then Josh and I drove over to Flatirons Vista to get some Mountain pics with his missionary flag. It was the wrong time of day. The lighting was too harsh. But, he’s adorable nonetheless.

We played Pickleball in the afternoon and the boys BARELY hung on to their winning streak. Rusty kept saying things like, “this is the last time we’ll play pickleball with Josh.” And to keep from getting super sad, I had to remind him that it was not, in fact, the last time we would play pickleball with Josh. Just the last time for a little while.

As we were coming home from Pickleball Josh said that his body hurt a little and that he had a headache. Uh oh. He assumed it was the fast sunday dehydration headache.

Then it was the last Rowberry dinner! Jane and Luke were so sweet, giving him the biggest hugs and telling him how much he’ll be missed. By the time we were home from Rowberry’s, Josh was feeling worse.

Monday was p-day and Josh woke up with a sore throat. NO NO NO! We hit up Walmart and Kohls, trying to find some athletic clothes, and struck out big time. So, a quick Amazon order it was! We loaded him up with snacks to take to the MTC. Then he needed a nap–he was feeling terrible. Blake didn’t feel great either. Halle came over to hang out for a bit and she just found two boy lumps on the couch. I was starting to get a bit worried–what if he was still feeling awful on Wednesday morning? Should I send him on a plane? I tried not to worry and hope for the best.

All too soon it was Tuesday. Packing day! Josh woke up feeling a bit better, but he was nowhere near 100% We did some room cleaning, went through the packing list a million times, and thought we had it all. At 6:03, all of a sudden, it struck me that we had not picked up his suits from the dry cleaner! And they closed at 6. Rusty said, “Let’s hope for a little missionary miracle!” So I called them and luckily someone answered. They agreed to stay open for 10 more minutes while I sped over to grab the suits. Josh handed me $20 to tip the employee on my way out the door and said, “this feels like a good way to spend some of my missionary gift money. We’ll keep the karma rolling forward.”

With suits in hand, we were officially done packing. Now it was time for our family Chinese feast. We ordered a ton of takeout in honor of Josh’s soon-to-be Mandarin journey. With both boys under the weather, we didn’t have our garbage disposal eaters and ended up with a ton of extra food. We loved being together just chatting and hanging out. We had Josh’s favorite, Pazookies, for dessert.

We all ended up on the loft couch while I tried to make room for all the snacks without going over weight. I can’t remember how this came up but Josh said something like, “Am I old enough to say something about your parenting?” We said, of course, and he said, “You guys are terrible at enforcing consequences. I’m surprised I turned out as well as I did!” He said it in a lighthearted way, but Halle was scandalized. She said that was a “diabolical” thing to say the night before he left. I knew he meant no harm, and Rusty just said, “You’ll get yours someday.” We all couldn’t stop laughing.

Rusty and I went to sleep to the sound of the three kids out in the loft laughing and talking with each other. Best sound ever.