Angel Day, 2014

Two years. It feels to me like we're only about 9 months out from Elle's accident. The days leading up to Elle's Angel Day were no fun, so I was all for avoiding another meltdown if possible. 

Two years ago on a Saturday we were watching Cy and MK play basketball games. This year we spent the day at Mia's cheer competition and another of Cy's basketball games.

LP's tricky moving pyramid

Dance party before awards ceremony

1st place Varsity Cheer Advanced Division

Grand Champion Overall High Point Cheer across all divisions

I remembered I had my camera after Cy's basketball game was all over. Pfffff

In Elle's honor, Griff and Sienna wore pink ribbons around their backpack straps to school on Friday.

And made cards and visited her grave on Sunday afternoon.

Check out these two sweethearts! Elle's best friend is 6 (Elle's "would-be" age) and her baby 

sister is 4 (the age Elle died). What a difference 2 years makes in a little girl's life.

Elle's Vietti cousins wore pink

And the Hughes cousins gave her grave a heart attack

And snuck in another heart attack on our front door

Rob and I and four of the kids visited Elle's grave together and found 

Granny and Doug already there. Aren't they cute?

Rob thought we should all put on my pink lip gloss and kiss the 

balloons before we sent them up to Elle.

I love this pic of Rob :)

Cy practices his pucker

Rob admires his lip print.

Getty says I kiss weird.

I talked to MK that day. She told me she's been going to the temple every week, and that sometimes waiting for a week to go back seems too long. The temple grounds were closed on February 8th, so she visited the cemetery, read the "Elle" posts about the accident, and wrote in her journal.

She also told me that as she wrote, she felt so grateful for the timing of it all. College friends ask her how her family handles these "Angel Days" and Elle's birthday. She tells them she doesn't really know, because she's never been home for one. But she was home for the accident, and she was home for those first six months of grief.

Sometimes I wonder if Elle's life were prolonged. Maybe she could have been taken earlier, because she had no need to be tried and tested. Maybe Heavenly Father kept her here longer for our sakes. By February, 2012, our family reached the point when we had only six more months together before MK flew across the ocean to begin her new independent life. Maybe at that point, Heavenly Father took Elle Home, so we could experience Elle's death together and have some time to grieve as a family.

More and more I'm convinced that timing is one of the keys to seeing the Lord's hand in our lives.

Two years down. Hopefully, those were the worst two years of our lives. 

Over and done. 

Don't tell me anything different! ;)