Brough Family Update 2017
The main reason we even started composing these updates years ago is because we aren’t journal writers and so they were our only documentation of our life to pass down to our posterity. Then we thought it would be a good way to let those of you who we send Christmas cards to see what we had been up to each year so we started making copies of them to send with our cards. But the more we heard about people who hated getting this kind of thing in the Christmas cards they received the more we thought about doing it this way. So if you are one of the few people that are reading this we want to thank you for the time and trouble it took you to do so! We will try to make it as concise as possible!
Three/fifths of our kids are currently living in Provo…
Caleb continues to enjoy working at Wells Fargo Bank. He transferred from the branch in the BYU Bookstore to the North Provo Branch right next to campus. He is taking online classes through Rio Solado Community College. Mollie graduated from BYU in April majoring in Communication Disorders and is now working on her masters. She is such a devoted student and we are so proud of her. Caleb and Mollie team teach the 8 and 9 year olds in Primary (our church’s childrens’ auxiliary).
Dalton got accepted to BYU for Spring Term and moved to Provo in April. He got accepted to the Marriott School of Management and began his program in Human Resources in the fall. He is working for a start up company called Jolt as a recruiter and in the new year will also be working with a couple of his friends as the producer of a podcast called Ticked. Although he has always loved being an Arizona boy he really loves living in Utah. He is in the Sunday school presidency in his ward and really enjoys that because he loves to teach.
Zach is finishing up the last year of his MBA at BYU. The first year of his program was mostly about securing an internship which took them to Seattle for the summer to intern for Amazon. They loved it there and it led to Zach getting a job offer from Amazon after completion of his MBA this coming April. Tara continues to be a creative vlogger on her youTube channel Broughington and through that caught the attention of a really successful vlogger who hired her to do some editing for him. She is also very involved with the MBA Spouse Association at BYU. Of course that is in between being a busy mom to Porter (5), Piper (3) and baby Beau David (11 months) who was born on January 13th and is the sweetest and most smiley baby! Porter is in Kindergarten, just learned how to ride his bike without training wheels and likes Pokeman. Piper is our little singing artist! Zach serves with the 16 and 17 year old young men in their ward and Tara is in charge of the ward newsletter.
…One fifth of our kids live in Pullman, WA…
Landon graduated from ASU in May with a degree in Applied Biological Sciences. After being accepted to vet schools at Washington State and Oregon State, he chose Washington State and in August they moved to Pullman, WA and has now completed his first semester of vet school! Ashlin started taking online classes through ASU majoring in Graphic Information Technologies. She is a talented artist and has an Etsy shop called Popsicle Paint. Dora (2) is a busy little girl that loves sharks, her kitties Ruben and Maple and her baby brother, Theodore Raphael (aka Theo, Teddy and Bubba) who was born on May 9th! He is the chunkiest and sweetest little guy and loves watching Dora and all her antics. They are enjoying their new neighbors and their sweet ward (geographically determined congregation) and are learning all about researching family history as they have been called to help others research theirs.
…and one fifth of our kids still live in Gilbert!…
Jordan and Casey sold their first home and have recently moved into a beautiful new home they built that includes a hair salon with its own entrance for Casey to work from home. We are just grateful that they didn’t move to Provo or Washington but are still in our neck of the woods! Jordan loves his job at Go Daddy and once again coached the girls swim team at Gilbert Classical Academy this fall. In addition to cutting hair Casey has a business called AZ Bridal Hair and really enjoys doing hair for wedding parties and she also sells a line of makeup called Maskcara. Lindy (3) loves playing with her mommy’s makeup, riding her scooter, Paw Patrol and took a dance class and did great in her recent dance recital (a new thing for Nana and Papa!). Jade (1 – and the one on our card that was not so thrilled about sitting on Santa’s lap) also loves riding her scooter and Peppa Pig. We are so grateful we at least have these two darling granddaughters nearby! They love their new ward and Jordan serves with the 12 and 13 year old boys in their ward and Casey is in the Primary presidency.
Don and Nancy became official empty nesters in April when Dalton went to Provo. It can be kind of lonely at times but we are not going to lie – we don’t hate it! And we have been in the process of finally having proper guest room accommodations at our house. We aren’t finished yet but we were ready enough by Thanksgiving to have Zach’s family and Dalton stay with us at Thanksgiving and Landon’s family and Dalton stay with us at Christmas. All the kids will be in town for Christmas.
Don is grateful for his job at Wells Fargo and even though he didn’t have any business trips to San Francisco for the first time in many years he did travel on business a few times this year and of course Nancy made sure she went along. In March he had to go to Charlotte for a few days and then afterwards we went to Hilton Head Island and met up with Nancy’s only cousin on her dad’s side and her family. Even though Nancy lived in SC during her childhood she had never been to Hilton Head. It was wonderful! While down there we did a little day trip to the Isle of Palms to check out a beach house that Nancy is hoping she can talk Don into letting us rent for the whole family one of these summers! He also had work in Minneapolis in July which was fun because Nancy had never been there before either. Then in October he had some meetings at Lake Las Vegas (actually in Henderson and the resort had no slot machines or gaming going on which was nice – we are not big Vegas fans) and then we drove up to Utah from there to attend Don’s sisters 5K run for her charity in West Jordan and to see our Provo kids, then flew home from SLC.
We also went to Utah several other times – in January to visit Don’s dad in St. George for his birthday and then up to Provo to visit kids and Nancy’s dad in the VA hospital in Payson – in April for Mollie’s graduation – in September to spend some time with Don’s sister and see our Provo kids AGAIN! In May Nancy’s brother, Eric, married a darling woman, Alex, in the Washington DC Temple so Jordan and Casey went with us to that and then we stayed for several days to see the sights in DC (Jordan missed out on a family trip we took with all the other boys when he was on his mission). It was a beautiful wedding and Nancy is so happy to have a new sister in law that she loves! In June Landon and Ashlin invited us to join them in Solana Beach, CA with Ashlin’s extended family’s annual trip there. We love to go to southern CA and it was fun to experience a beach trip Blake style (Ashlin’s mom’s maiden name). So we spent a few days there and then Don and I also spent a night at our family’s favorite boutique hotel in Hermosa Beach, Hotel Hermosa. In July Don, Landon, Jordan and Dalton helped Landon get their car and U-Haul to Pullman, WA and then Ashlin, the kids and I flew up to meet them and we helped them get settled in and toured the campus and the buildings that Landon will be studying in for the next 4 years. We loved the Palouse (a unique terrain of rolling hills which were covered with wheat fields while we were there). Pullman is a cute college town and we feel really good about them being there. While we were there Zach and Tara came down from Seattle (a 4.5 hour drive) for the weekend to join us. We went to Seattle in August with some dear friends and loved seeing the city, Mt. Ranier, Victoria on Vancouver Island in Canada and got to spend some time with Zach and Tara and kids and tour the Amazon building that Zach worked in. We are excited that we will get to spend more time there in the future since they will be living there. On Labor Day weekend Dalton, Caleb and Mollie met us in Denver, where we met up with Nancy’s niece, Katie, to go to two Diamondback vs Rockies games at Coors Field.
We were blessed in September to get to meet up with Nancy’s cousin and his wife from Florida when they were in town for their son’s football game.
We didn’t renew our Diamondback season tickets this year and so of course as luck would have it they had a good season which Don enjoyed watching from the comfort of our family room. We have enjoyed going to a couple of musicals at Gammage on the ASU campus since we decided to get season tickets for the plays and musicals coming there this season, mainly so we can see Hamilton this coming February which we are looking forward to. Don keeps busy as the stake executive secretary.
Nancy started working at the temple again after taking an 18 month break. This time she is an ordinance worker on the Tuesday early morning shift and loves it. She also has a small calling with the Young Women (girls 12 to 17) in our ward encouraging them with some requirements to pass off in a program called Personal Progress and is working on passing off some of the requirements herself. She is trying to learn how to play a couple of hymns right now. She also spent a lot of time making 72 holiday pillowcases for the grandkids which is going to be their Christmas present this year (of course it won’t be the most exciting gift for little kids but hopefully in time they will enjoy them).
It’s hard to watch our parents age. Don’s parents are doing fairly well, although his Dad did recently have a mild heart attack. He is doing well though now and getting used to his new normal. As mentioned before Nancy’s dad is in the VA hospital in Payson, which is hard for Nancy, to not be able to see him as often as she would if he was nearby. Thankfully our Provo kids can stop in from time to time.
As we write this at the end of another year we want to express our love and gratitude to you for your love and friendship through the years. We love this time of year as we celebrate the birth of our Savior. Our church is doing their “Light the World” campaign again this year which helps to remind us each day of ways we can help others to feel loved and nurtured. We hope you all are enjoying the season and wish you all the best in 2018!
(So much for making this concise – sorry!)
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Email: brough7@q.com
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