Emily's At College and Jude's Birthday

So this past weekend I flew with my BFF Gina to get Emily's dorm set up. I seriously owe Gina like 400 hours of babysitting or whatever she needs for the past two weekends. She flew all of Emily's luggage to West Virginia for Emily's competition and then she turned around and helped me fly all her luggage again to Alabama. 

I am happy to announce that Emily was second runner up at the Teen International competition!! We were absolutely thrilled she placed so well. Her friend Carly teen CA won the entire event and she was just a doll!! 

So now skip forward to the past weekend and it was a whirlwind. Gina and I flew out very early on Saturday morning and got to Birmingham. From there it was about an hour drive to Tuscaloosa where we had to hunt Emily down in sorority rush week to get the key to her dorm. I made a joke to Gina that I hoped Emily's dorm wasn't on an upper level since we had so many items.......it was on the 5th floor, of course. Anyway, we set the entire room up while she was rushing and we joked via text that we didn't care if she didn't like it. When she got back she was thrilled and extremely grateful! We then took her to dinner and when we dropped her off "Aunt Gina" got a little teary saying goodbye. 

I on the other hand kept myself pretty composed until I shed a few tears on the plane. Not because I am leaving Emily behind because I know she will thrive but because it's another new normal. I should be going home to a son that I would be getting ready for the first day of school but I am not. There are no children scampering around my house this year getting ready for the fall full of Halloween and parties. So that's why I am sad. Emily I am proud of and I know she will excel. She will also be flying back in for the Emily's Smile Box Day in September. I will most likely throw a birthday get together for her at our house after the Smile Box event. 

Speaking of we are scrambling a bit to raise another $2500 for Emily's Smile Boxes for the fillers for the boxes for the event. If or your company would like to make a tax deductible donation we do accept paypal at Emilyssmileboxes@yahoo.com. It's getting to that time of year where we have to place the order for all the boxes, labels, postcards, and fillers for the event. 

So I also have some exciting news coming up that I will share with everyone soon but I will say it's a positive thing. :) 

Mike and I heading to Pagosa Springs CO for Jude's birthday to have some quiet time alone and relax with nature. I am looking forward to some time with him.