Elliott and Lara

Lara, it turned out, is one of those people that you meet and instantly adore.

My nephew Elliott called last year at the start of spring break, saying he was thinking of jumping in the car, driving the 800 miles from BYU, and playing tourist with a friend of his: San Francisco, the redwoods… Would we have space for them if they came?

Would we! Watch me jumping up and down! Yes!! It was while I was getting the house ready that one of my kids, who also goes to BYU, mentioned casually, You do know that his friend is likely going to be Lara? That he’s got a girlfriend?

Oh. Okay. He didn’t mention that little fact. Two rooms… (Hey. We’re all good little Mormons.)

And so we had a far too short but absolutely delightful visit. I asked Elliott at one point how they’d met, and he said they were old college friends; he mentioned some to-do where he was supposed to bring a date, and he didn’t have a date, and he just thought, eh, I’ll invite Lara, why not. He had never thought of her as a potential date before–but when he agreed to the thought, “I was just..so…HAPPY.” He kind of shook his head a little at the memory of it, with this big and slightly bewildered smile on his face.

Have you ever had the experience where you see a couple and you instantly know they were meant for each other? But I was careful not to say anything too presumptuous sounding, because it wasn’t my decision to make.

Months later, I got another call I loved: they were engaged, and he wanted me to know that their visit here was what got them each thinking of their old friend as, actually, the person they couldn’t imagine not spending the rest of their lives with.

Lara is from Fairbanks. The date was set for last week. Um… They looked at it, and realized that for almost everyone that would want to be in attendance, it would be a destination wedding because of the remoteness of where she grew up, and–who in their right mind heads to Alaska in January?

And so they went for the opposite idea. They kept it very small (although, with a large reception to follow in Salt Lake City). For the actual wedding at the Mormon Temple, I know on his side, there were his parents, his three living grandparents, and his brother playing photographer.

In Hawaii.

My sister Carolyn, his mother, forwarded me some of her older son’s pictures and gave me permission to put them here. The first is one that Joel snapped not knowing why he was getting the expressions on their faces he was, but he caught it just immediately before the surprise big wave on the calm day swamped him and then them. The second is after the wave.

And a good time was had by all. Happy forever, Elliott and Lara, I love you dearly. And I am SO glad you came!