Holly Tholl

Holly Tholl

Holly was born in American Fork, Utah. She only moved once while she was growing up, the tremendous distance of 100 feet to across the street when she was 3. She was the youngest child of 6 kids. She grew up in a very peaceful and loving home. Her parents were calm and very patient with each other and the children. They are all very close today and all still live in Utah.

While Holly was young, she took violin lessons for a couple of years and piano lessons off and on until she was about 11. She also started ballet lessons at the age of 7. As her teenage years came on, she realized she loved ballet, but to be involved there was really only time for ballet so violin and piano took a back seat.

Holly danced ballet every day. Her teacher told her, “If you miss dancing one day, you see a difference. If you miss dancing 2 days, I see a difference. If you miss dancing 3 days, the audience sees a difference.” So ballet became the focus through the rest of her growing up years. She went on to dance professionally for one year. She was fortunate though, even though she danced many of the hours after school, she had great friends that made sure she was invited and came to any social event the was held after ballet was done. They would meet up with her after football games and made sure she always knew where they were.

While growing up in American Fork there was another member of her ward that would become the focus of her life, Cory Tholl. Cory was just a year younger than Holly but he looked so much younger that she never paid attention to him or even realized he was in the ward. That combined with the fact that Holly rarely made it to mutual due to ballet. One Sunday however, Holly walked into church to look up at the priests blessing the sacrament and saw Cory. She thought, “Who is that?” She noticed he was very cute.

After that it seemed her group of friends would sometimes hang out with his group of friends and they started to get to know each other. They hung out as friends until Holly graduated and went off to live at BYU. Still Holly preferred his company to anyone she was meeting at BYU, so they still saw each other. She would come home or he would come up to campus. Cory, however, was dead set on not having a girlfriend before his mission. She still went along with him though because she really liked him. Finally he must have realized she probably wasn't going to still be around after his mission if he was just a friend. So he relented and they started to date up until he left on his mission to London, England.

Before attending BYU, Holly decided that dancing professionally was not conducive to her long term goals of being a wife and mother, so she stopped dancing. Her dad was a recently retired orthodontist, and she had spent some time working in his office and really liked the environment of a dental office. She decided that she wanted to be a dental hygienist. She would need to complete two years of prerequisites (which she did at BYU) and do exceptional to get into the program at UVU because it was extremely competitive. So that's what she did.

While attending BYU however, she had the amazing experience of doing a summer semester study abroad at the BYU Jerusalem Center in Israel. She said it was such an incredible experience and one she could never duplicate at another time in her life. She lived in the Jerusalem Center on the Mount of Olives. She studied the Old and New Testament and Near Eastern history all day and went on field trips to the different sites. With the studying fresh in her head, the Holy Land opened up and became so real to her. They also studied the 3 different religions in the area, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. They even had instructors from all three faiths teaching them. Holly cherishes this experience as one of the most valuable of her life.

After completing 2 years at BYU, Holly started her first of two years in the dental hygiene program at UVU. When she had one more year to go, she looked back at her BYU transcripts and realized she was only one year away from having a BYU bachelor’s degree in Community Health as well. So she pulled up her boot straps and while staying in the dental hygiene program, re-enrolled at BYU, taking a full course load from both schools (26 credits per semester). During this year, Cory came home from his mission and they were married 4 months later. Cory enrolled at BYU and they overlapped only one semester. Holly’s last was Cory’s first. Cory went on to get an undergraduate degree in Mechanical Engineering and two master’s degrees, an MBA and Masters in Mechanical Engineering. Through their years in school, they were able to have summer internships and live in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Hillsboro, Oregon.

After Holly graduated, she worked full time for two years as a dental hygienist, went to part time after their first child Isaac was born, and then when their second child London came along they decided it was time for her to stay home. So she quit and has had the great privilege of being a stay-at-home mom ever since.

In 2006 Cory graduated and started working for a product development company in Provo. He worked there for 1 year and then did a year of free-lance on his own. He then took a new job with a company in Ogden. Living in Pleasant Grove created quite a commute for Cory each day, especially since he was teaching a class at BYU to boot. So in 2010, they came to our neighborhood in Kaysville and built their home on Equestrian Parkway to get closer to work. In 2012, Cory was made the president of the company and he recently moved his work location to Centerville.

Holly and Cory now have 5 beautiful children. They love spending time together and Holly especially loves boating and waterskiing. In fact, she loves it so much they planned having their children in the fall because that would give Holly the maximum opportunity to water ski (you probably guessed it, she water-skied while pregnant). They also love hiking and camping.

Her most recent obsession is doing family history work. She became addicted last fall when our ward started its big push to find family names. Now she can't get enough of it and has been very instrumental in helping many in this ward find and take names to the temple.

I asked Holly what's the best advice she would give someone with the things she's learned in life. She says the advice she always gives people is, “Don't take anyone's advice. Do what feels right for you.” She also says she would tell people, “Everybody has something to offer. Getting to know people stops judgment.”

Holly is one of the most approachable people I have ever met. She is happy and I truly believe she cannot be offended. If you haven't had the chance to get to know her, I recommend seeking her out.