Sister Parshall

So today I went down to Provo to say goodbye to Becca as she entered the MTC. I am so sad right now, but it's okay because really, I'm just very pregnant so my emotions are all over the place. She and my parents drove up to Provo on Monday and Josh and I drove down to meet them for a nice dinner and some last-minute missionary shopping. They stayed in a hotel in Provo while Josh and I went back up to Murray because we both had work the next day. Then yesterday, immediately after work, Josh and I raced home to change into church clothes and my family met us at our apartment so we could all go do a session at the Salt Lake temple. Becca has been traveling to quite a few temples since she took out her own endowments in December. She went to California one weekend and Utah a couple of weekends because she wanted to visit as many temples as she could. She saved the Salt Lake temple for last because my dad really wanted to be there for that one. And it was a wonderful experience, of course, because that temple is particularly amazing in my book. After the session, everyone came back to our apartment for some homemade beef and vegetable soup, rolls, salad, and carrot cake. We had a fun night talking before my family headed back to their hotel in Provo.

Then this morning I got up to take Josh to work but I didn't go in to work myself because I had taken the day off to spend as much time with Becca as possible. Instead, I drove down to Provo and helped my family pack up the truck and check out of their hotel. Then we all went shopping again to kill some time and we spent quite a bit of time in the Deseret Book, looking at all kinds of fun stuff. Around 11:30 we all made our way to Chuckorama, which is not my idea of good food, but it's a looooong-standing family tradition--especially when we're sending off a missionary--so we ate there and shut up about it. I had a pretty decent meal there and it was funny to taste some frozen yogurt and feel Scarlet start to dance inside me. (She gets very active with certain foods but I never know which foods are going to set her off so it's a surprise every time she does it. Cracks me up every time.)

Poor Becca was feeling pretty anxious by that time so she could hardly eat. There were several other missionaries-to-be at the restaurant, which I thought was cute, but I didn't really pay much attention to what was happening until the four of us left the restaurant and parked at the Provo temple. That was where we said our goodbyes alongside dozens of other families and missionaries. Becca received a discreet father's blessing in the truck and we all hugged for way too long before getting back into the truck and driving to the designated drop-off location inside the MTC's gates.

There was a nice young elder there who served as HOST according to his nametag, which meant he was there to help Becca with her luggage and escort her inside the building. We all hugged some more and were very quick and proper about it because none of us much care for public displays of emotion. I kept smiling at Becca the whole time she looked back at us but the second she walked away, the three of us climbed back into the truck and just lost it. It is so hard to send someone you care about away for so long. I just love my sister and we've developed a pretty special bond over the past couple of years and especially over the past few months. I've been chastising Scarlet for not coming sooner so Becca could meet her just once, but that's out of my hands, I suppose. It was an emotionally draining day but I'm so grateful I could spend the majority of it with Becca. Now she's spending her first night in the MTC as Sister Parshall of the Charlotte, NC mission. She'll be just amazing.