april was off to a busy start with general conference, finishing school, cory's accuquest interview in chicago, easter and our anniversary. and then came graduation!
general conference was so good this year and i loved how so many talks felt like they were just for me! visit lds.org with any questions :) of course we spent a session at aunt nicki's house for waffles. the next week, cory had to fly out to chicago for his final interview with accuquest. we were fairly confident they wanted him and he wanted this job, but this was the final test. he was told he had the job and would be receiving a formal offer by email a few days later. well, a week went by and the executive had emailed twice saying HR would be sending further information but cory still hadn't gotten the FORMAL offer. he finally called HR and the HR rep had sent his offer to the wrong email address. some other cory hill has been getting a lot of cory's emails...
friday night cory took me out to art city trolley for our anniversary. it was a fun place to eat and he bought frozen so we could watch it on the big hill on campus under the stars (awww). the next morning, we hit up great harvest bread for our bunny shaped bread and drove to granny and dorothy's house in cedar city! we had an italian lunch with them, the murphys and nicki's family. afterwards, cory, granny, dorothy and i headed to st. george where i so wanted to go to the st. george art festival! we got a beautiful plate painted/stamped with irises by a japanese artist. i've always said i'd love to live in st. george but i have to say, it was really hot for april! the next day the easter bunny came...even for cory and i! we had a nice church service and lunch/dinner with all the family. it was sad knowing it would be our last one.
monday was my last final and also our second wedding anniversary! cory got me some beautiful flowers and my favorite noodles & co. as we prepared our house for all our guest to begin coming that week!
my parents arrived on tuesday and we ate at the red iguana with aunt mindy (family classic). we went shopping at city creek where i got some awesome shoes for graduation. the next day we went to waffle love because ever since mom saw the pictures, she needed a waffle. we went to logan to put flowers on my grandpa's grave. we visited my great-uncle and his wife. after, we ate at maddox, a place my grandparents loved and another restaurant mom wanted to visit.
thursday i had to work, while cory went for a hike with his grandparents. we went to pupa's with them for lunch and then had to go home to get ready for commencement! it was crazy getting there, as we had lots of sweet family attending and lots of traffic :) president uchtdorf spoke, as well as my uncle tracy's mission president elder cardon. it was so fun to eat at the smoking apple, a bbq joint in lindon, with cory's granny, dorothy, his hill grandparents, his parents, siblings and my parents! so grateful they could all be there!
on friday, our graduation ceremony was at 11 am. i was surprised by how quickly they moved things along. cory and i had had priority seating and had previously arranged for me to graduate with him and the japanese majors. they loaded us into a hallway and the two of us walked up a ramp (woohoo) and shook some hands and got our diplomas! it was so surreal! everyone came home to our house where we had kneaders sandwiches, chips, pasta salad, fruit, lemonade and....3 gallons of graham canyon ice cream! what a whirlwind two days! lots of eating too, as we ate at texas roadhouse with cory's parents and family later the day and cracker barrel the next morning with my parents. mom, dad and i went to the sacred gifts exhibit at the MOA, then i got a pedicure with jodie, candice and shelly. we all went to the provo temple where cory and chad did the baptism and confirmation for their grandpa darrow. finally, we finished off the weekend eating at la jolla groves with my parents where cory indulged in hazelnut italian soda-his new favorite drink. WOW. i don't even remember what happened after all that action-just work for a few days (for me) and two weeks (for cory) and packing up the house. i'm so grateful for our time in provo. we certainly had a blast, loving our cute little house (most of the time) and our dog and our family and friends and BYU for the most part. i can't think of the last few years without much fondness and a little desire to go back. mostly, i'm so glad cory and i both decided to go to BYU, where we were successful in our educations and had the opportunity to meet each other. i'm sure we'll drag our kids around one day to all our old haunts while they roll their eyes. i have no idea when we will return back to provo!
