That's Elder Farley, If You Please

Whew! Yesterday was Tanner's farewell*. I don't even know where to start. Oh wait, I decided. The beginning.

Saturday night Tanner sort of stopped talking. Or doing anything, for that matter. He filled up a plate of dinner and then just sat there. "Hey Tan, why'd you go offline," I asked him. He said he wasn't feeling too well. We all assumed he was nervous for the next day, but he said that wasn't it, since he wasn't nervous.

Then he ran off to the bathroom. I'll leave his hilarious comments out for now, but I'll tell you in person if you want to ask me later. Suffice it to say, he and the bathroom were pretty much best frenemies for the rest of the night. We called a neighborfriend and he and Bob gave Tan a blessing. His face was kinda green. And not from jealousy.

I was sure he'd wake up in the morning fresh and perky, but no such luck. Poor thing. I felt so bad. What a terrible day to be sick.

As he sat on the stand, our good friend and b-bric couselor Brett Blake, kept asking him if he was okay. I could see Tanner saying he was fine, which later he told me he was. But Brett told him that if he threw up during his talk, at least it would be memorable. Tanner told him if he threw up, it wasn't going to come out his mouth. Ba-doom ching! That would have been especially memorable--for Brett, since he was sitting right behind the podium! But he felt fine the rest of the day. Tanner went on to give a great talk. I wish I had it recorded. The kid can speak.

Then our nextdoorneighborfriends, the Belnaps sang a beautiful song. I loved it and I cried.

I think it's interesting/funny that they send the missionary out in the middle of the last song so that people will leave the chapel after the meeting. They just started doing that, so most people don't know what's going on. In Tanner's case, many thought he was making a run for the bathroom. Hahaha!

After that we had about 210 people at our house, judging by how many plates were used, and most of them at the same time. Bob made about half a ton of bbq pulled pork. It was ridiculously good with its sauce of barbecue mixed with raspberry vinaigrette. There were salads and desserts aplenty and funeral, er, farewell potatoes while they lasted. Many thanks to my foodiefriend Si, who was the perfect consultant and helped me enormously with the food. It was so nice to have so many of our friends and family whom we dearly love, all here on the same day. The only hard part was not getting to talk to everyone as much as I wanted to--just a bunch of too-short little snippets of conversation here and there. But I have to say, I could NOT have had the great day I had without my Beckysisterfriend! She left early from church, came to the house, got stuff started, bossed people around, kept the food flowing, ordered me out of the kitchen, shoved food at me when I forgot to eat, and pretty much ran the show so that I could enjoy the day, which I totally did! If only I'd had her remind me to take a potty break. Oh well. Next time.

I had made little address cards that people could take and put them on a table in the entryway with a book for people to put their email addresses in. That way I can forward his letters to people who want them. More on that in a minute.

At 6:30 everyone was gone and our stake president and our bishop came over. We each said something to/about Tanner and it was very sweet to hear the what the kids had to say. Then Pres Taylor talked for a while gave Tanner and the rest of us some great advice. Then he set Tanner apart as a full-time missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day-saints. That was powerful. And the blessing he gave Tanner was amazing and beautiful. There was a strong, beautiful spirit here. We all loved it.

At the end of the night, we were hanging out in the living room, just me and Bob and the kids, talking and laughing. One of my very favorite things in the whole world. In the midst of it all someone pointed out that I had a little typo on the address card. I couldn't believe it! I'm always so careful! When they read it aloud we all got a good long laugh out of it. See below.

Can you see it? I wrote substibstitute. One of our new favorite words.

*I do realize I blog about Tanner like I only have one child. It's not true. I have more, as you will soon see. It's been a big year for Tanner, so, lots to blog about. Haha, I say "blog" as if it doesn't sound anything like "brag." Yeah, I noticed. But I am still going to document his first and possibly even second day as a mish, since he's still here. But I'm going to do that in my next post 'cause this one's way too long.