Miles Don't Mean Anything

I am so completely and totally overwhelmed right now, that I don't know if my blunderings here will make any sense at all.

<< Rewind to 3 months ago when this chain of unfortunate events occurred.

Flight home from Peru. 

Only one week home with my family.

BOOM! 

Off to Utah to start a new chapter, alone and scared to death. 

I don't think I have ever been more nervous for anything in my entire life. 

Terrified.

Those first few days here in Utah were... in a word... awful. Everything that possibly could go wrong, did go wrong. I felt so alone, so broken, so homesick, Peru-sick, Rexburg-sick. I missed being around people that I loved, and people that I knew loved me. I held in my feelings all throughout work and then once 5:30 hit and I was alone in my car, the tears could not be stopped. Life was hard during that time. A different kind of hard that I had never, ever experienced before. For a million different reasons. Seriously you guys. If it possibly could go wrong ... it would go wrong.

>>Fast Forward to today. I am as happy as can be. I love it here. I'm sad to see my time here wind down.

How on earth did I go from days of silent tears to days of joyous cheers? Oh SO many things. There have been SO many factors. But it all came down to the fact that my Heavenly Father was mindful of me. He has been, and continues to be looking out for me day after day. Usually through other people.

Today's post is about one specific factor that completely and totally blows my mind. It's about four of the greatest women I know and about how their kind acts of love have done more for me than these women will ever know.

1. The first being Miss Abigail Tucker. I could go on and on about my love for this Chica. She experienced Peru with me for three months. She saw the good, the bad, and the ugly natural, caked-in-dirt look ;)  Because of that she perhaps knows me better than many. After Peru she went back to Rexburg, and I came to Utah.

Well, one day, after a long day at work, I decided to run home in the July heat. It's about a 25-30 minute jog from work to my house, and that sun was killer. When I arrived home, as usual, I stopped by the mailbox to see if I had anything in there (I get a new wedding announcement at least twice a week ;). What I wasn't expecting to find was a tidy little package with MY NAME (Elia) Written in bold on the front. A package for me?!?! From none other than miss Abigail Tucker! One does not experience such things without letting out squeals of delight. Best thing ever.

Only to open it and find THESE! 

Oh man, the laughing, the tears, the smiles, the audible gasps and outbursts that came in the three minutes that I opened this and carefully discovered each item were innumerable. My camera, which I have been pining for was here, in my possession! The Peru memories, bit of chocolate, body spray and sweet card brought such joy to my soul! Words cannot express the love that I felt. It was JUST what the doctor had ordered and gave me the strength and courage to finish out that week strong. Abi knew I could do it, and that gave me the confidence to help me know that I could do it.

My next jumbo jet of joy came not long after... in the form of another package!!

(I cannot find my camera card.. otherwise there would be a picture here of theee cutest package. They put the gift in a bag of sugar!)

This sugar-lovin' package was found, not in my mailbox, but was delivered to my bedroom! A package straight from the beautiful depths of Idaho from none other than two ladies that I think of with nothing but fond memories and English accents. Miss Claire Ruth Salmon Christensen (a very well know character in this here blog) and her divinely fantastic sister-in-law (this girl has so many crazy cool talents, I'm in awe!) Hannah Christensen. Again with the joy, tears, laughing, smiles, and outbursts as I read THEE cutest poem written directly for yours truly and unwrapped... 

Drum Roll Please

MUMU #5!!! (Again, pictures coming as soon as I can find that darn card! You HAVE To see this one. It even has pockets!!!)

If that is not the sweetest thing in the world, I surely do not know what is! It made me miss them SOOOO badly, and I was flooded with memories of late nights, Sunday dinners, movie nights, clean checks, trips to the gym and soo much more. Words cannot express how loved I felt when receiving this gem. I felt like I had thee best friends in thee entire world and that nothing could go wrong because even though we're miles apart, they were still there more me. Oh how I love them!

The last tendermercy-actofkindness-nearlybringNoelletotearsoutofsheerloveandjoy-experience came just this morning as I was doing my weekly blogstalking. Imagine my surprise as I'm scrolling through my list of new blog posts when I see the following pop up on my feed!

"Hey that's me!!"

A picture of myself as the main picture in another bloggers most recent blogpost.... what the!?!?

So I calmly pulled away from my computer and contemplated all the different reasons why my picture would be posted on another blogger's blog.

Uh yeah right....

I clicked on that thing as fast as I could and voila! To my utter surprise and delight I found that my dear, dear, dear sweet Gus had written a whole blog post, just for me!!! Now, one must know that I had the opportunity of living with Shae (Gus) for 3 semesters up at school, including being her room-roommate while she was engaged. The things that I learned from that saint-like woman are innumerable and unforgettable. She is held on such a pedestal in my eyes, so the fact that she would write a tribute to our friendship tickled me pink! What I love most is that anybody else reading that post would be completely lost and confused. Yet each line, every word even, was dripping with sweet, sweet nostalgia and memories.

Man, am I one blessed girl or what? These are just a few of the amazing acts of love that I have experienced these past few months. These ones have especially touched me because I am miles and miles and miles away from all four of these girls. I haven't seen 3 of them in over 7 months! Yet, they're still thinking about me. They still love me. And they go out of their way to show it and let me know. That my friends, is one of the greatest feelings in the world. And for that, and for each one of them, I will forever be grateful.

Love, Noelle

P.S. It just so happens that all four of these girls are ones that I can count on to read my blog. They're the reasons that this sucker is still up and running :) Thank you Abigail, Claire, Hannah and Shae. Thank you thank you thank you!!!