Vegan Chili with Beaf

So a few days ago Charly and I decided to have chili for dinner. I was excited because I like chili. This time was different though. Charly and I had some canned chili and I wanted to add some vegetables to it so I looked up a recipe online and completely ignored the instructions, using the picture as a reference.

"Charly do you want some vegetables in your chili?" I asked as I chopped up the sweet peppers and spinach. She looked over at my preparations and gave me her look.

"No thanks," She said.

"Come on!" I insisted.

"Nope," She answered again.

"Just try some," I said, holding out a chip with some chili on it.

"Ok," She said." Charly ate the chip with my chili on it.

"It's pretty good actually," She said with a smile.

"I know!" I answered excitedly. "I didn't make this one up like the corn soup Charly. I found a real vegan chili recipe online."

The excitement left my voice as I looked down into my bowl.

"Oh no! There is beef in this chili!" I exclaimed. "I made vegan chili with beef in it!"

Charly just laughed.

90 Degrees

"Benjamin!" I called out from the bedroom. It was starting to get really warm in here. Ben was working on homework in the kitchen. "What do you have the thermostat on?" 

"Wha-at?" Benjamin asked in his I'm-picked-on-I-would-never-do-what-you-think-I-did voice. "I don't know." 

"Benjamin," I said again, this time with a laugh in my voice. "Is it on ninety?" 

"Of course not ..." Ben said, using the same voice. Not exactly reassuring. I jumped up and came into the living room to check. Ben has a habit of turning the thermostat on really high to warm the apartment up fast. Sometimes he turns it up without even looking to see what temperature it's at. 

It was at 75 degrees. I turned it down a little. 

"Was it on ninety?" Ben asked. 

"No," I said, ignoring his triumphant grin and "told you so" as I walked back to what I was doing before. 

The Christmas Present

"I bought some Christmas decorations from Wal-Mart," Charly said as I got home from work.

"Really?" I asked skeptically.

"Yup," she said, "Come look."

I followed Charly over into the living room. She was practically glowing with excitement.

"I bought these candles, and these window decorations, and these lights, oh, and look. I bought two kinds of wrapping. One color is for you and the other is for me. What one do you like the most?"

I looked down at the two colors. "I like the silver one," I said.

"Good, I like the white one more," she replied with a grin.

A week later and after Thanksgiving day, Charly and I were in the house. We had aquired a small Christmas tree from Charly's mom and decorated it. The tree looked really good. Charly had hand made a ton of small paper snowflakes, we had borrowed some hand made ornaments, and even made some on a date together. Charly walked over to the tree. She was holding a large box. To this day I'm still not sure what was in it.

"What is that?" I asked.

"It's a Christmas gift," She answered.

"Is it for me?" I asked again.

"No silly, it's for both of us." She replied smiling.

At that moment I was struck with the realization that our brilliant plan in having two colors of wrapping paper, one for each of us, was flawed. My face fell and I looked at Charly with an expression of grave concern on my face, "If it's for both of us how are we suppose to wrap it?"

She just laughed at me.

A Christmas Present to Us

My mom has a Christmas tradition with Christmas presents that I love--every year, instead of writing the person's name on every single one of their presents, she has a specific wrapping paper for each individual person. It's really fun, because in the weeks leading up to Christmas, you can try to figure out which wrapping paper is yours. This is a tradition I wanted to continue in my own family, so I bought two different rolls of wrapping paper at Wal Mart. 

While I was Black Friday shopping, one of the few purchases I made was a ten dollar griddle. I decided to wrap it, so our cute little tree would have plenty of presents underneath it. This week, Ben grabbed the griddle and went to open it. 

"No, no!" I shouted, in my typical panicky voice. Ben says we have a good chance statistically of dying at the same time, since he's older and a guy but never stressed, while I'm younger and a girl but always stressed out. 

"What?" Ben asked in sincere innocence, not letting go of the griddle. 

"The griddle," I said, walking over and taking it away from him. "I'm going to wrap it."

"Oh," Ben said, giving me a puzzled look. "Who's it going to be for?"

"Us, of course," I laughed. 

"Both of us?" Ben asked. 

"Yes ..." I said, looking for the trick in the question. 

"But ..." Ben grinned his teasing-Charly smile. "What wrapping paper are you going to use?" 

I just rolled my eyes, though I couldn't help grinning along with Ben. 

Locking the Door

Tuesday morning Charly got up to get ready for school and found the bathroom door locked from the inside. I have a funny habit of locking doors, almost an obsession with it actually. I guess I locked the door while leaving the bathroom.

We didn't have a key for the door.

"You must have locked the bathroom door," Charly said to me. I was still in bed and was planning on sleeping in just a little because I had been up late the night before working on an assignment.

"Try the little wire," I replied sleepily from the bed.

We have a wire we use to open our front door sometimes. We only have one key but the wire lets us lock the door and then open it no matter who gets home first or who has the key. I could hear Charly fiddling around with the door but she couldn't seem to get it open so I got out of bed and walked over.

"The wire won't open it," She said. I tried it anyway, like most stubborn husbands would. Sure enough, it didn't fit.

I was fully awake now and for some strange reason I was enjoying this ridiculous challenge. I grabbed a screw driver from a kitchen drawer and started taking the door knob off. I had replaced door knobs before so I knew what I was doing. I was able to remove the door knob and then unlock the door. Afterwards I put the knob back on, vowing to never lock the bathroom door like that again.

I think I might have gone back to bed but I don't remember... I felt silly for locking the door but I'm pretty sure Charly was impressed with my amazing door knob hacking skills.

When I Was Oblivious to Charly's Signals that She Wanted Me to Hold Her Hand.

I'm just an oblivious sort of guy. I know there were many times where Charly wanted me to hold her hand but I didn't. She probably gave me some sort of signal as well. I know all the signals now because she has told them to me. Before though, I had no clue.

I remember one night when we were at Charly's house and we were watching Robin Hood. During the movie I really wanted to kiss her. I don't think we were even dating at the time yet but I sure wanted to kiss her. I didn't though.

I remember another time when Charly and I were at the temple and I was showing her something on my iPod. She was holding the iPod so I used that as an excuse to put my hand under the hand she was using to hold the iPod. It was a small moment to everyone else but it was huge for me.

You see, I take any sort of physical statement very seriously. I feel that holding hands is something you should only do if you really like somebody. I know everyone will have different views on this but the fact is that most girls take physical attention as a sign of love and guys don't usually see it the same. There are exceptions to this but many times this is true. I think that men need to be careful. They might lead a girl on without even meaning to just because they don't see things the same way.

Anyway, I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm actually a very physical person once I feel like I'm committed to a relationship but before that I'm very careful. I don't know if this is the best way to be while dating but it's the way I chose to be.

I know this was very frustrating for Charly but I didn't know this at the time... well, mostly. Charly has always been very patient with me and I love that about her. I know it drives her crazy sometimes. I guess when it comes to love crazy can be a good thing.

Pear Picking Pair! (I'm the best at pear jokes)

Oooooh boy am I cutting this blog post close. It's 11:33 pm and I'm just starting. Luckily for you guys this one should be short and pear sweet.

Charly and I went to got pick some pears last Saturday because Charly wants to make fruit leather out of them... can you even make fruit leather out of pairs?

Anywho, it was pretty fun adventure. When we got there most of the pears near the ground were small and not very ripe so I volunteered to climb the tree and try to grab some of the better one higher up. Have you ever climbed a pear tree? DON'T. Anyway, after getting attacked by evil branches and giant spiders I managed to escape with a few pears.

I did manage to make a funny joke though. While I was up in the tree I grabbed a two pears and handed them to Charly.

"Here is a pair," I said in my silly voice.

Charly just rolled her eyes at me but she clearly thought it was funny. I can always tell.

The Things Charly Does to Keep Our Relationship Strong

I think the title explains this post pretty well. These aren't in any specific order. I just wrote each one as I thought of it.

1. Charly loves me.

I know because she tells me and  because she serves me and puts up with me.

2. She works hard.

She is always doing something whether it's school, cleaning the house, or working her part time job. She is a hard worker and she is always busy.

3. She spends as much time with me as she can.

Sometimes it's hard with school and work and all of the things we are doing but she always makes time for me. Even if all we do is watch a doctor who episode during lunch, we make sure to spend time together every day.

4. She listens to me.

Let's be honest... I talk a lot. Sometimes I talk about things that I know that Charly really isn't interested in, like math or programming, but she still listens.

5. She shares her feelings with me.

I'm very grateful that she tells me how she is feeling. I know I'm not the best yet when it comes to validating and empathizing but it makes me feel like I'm part of Charly's life when she shares her frustrations, joys, and other feelings with me.

6. She feeds me.

Yup. I'm a guy. I need food. I try to help with preparing the food, even if I just get out the dishes or clean them after but lets be honest, she is a much better cook.

7. She lets me hold her hand almost all of the time.

8. Sometimes she kisses me first.

Let me tell you. I'm pretty lucky. Sometimes I get kisses when I'm not expecting them and I love that about Charly.

9. She helps me make sure that we read our scriptures and say our prayers together every night.

10. She goes on dates with me every week.

I think this one is one of the most important ones. It's up there with spending time together. We always have fun on our dates even when they only consist of buying a couple books at Barnes and Noble.

I remember every day how lucky I am to have Charly as my wife. I'm so glad that I chose to ask her to marry me and that she chose to say yes.

How to Make a Marriage Work

My Grandma Pat died when I was very young. At her funeral, they read a few excerpts from her journal. My Grandma Sue, the woman my Grandpa ended up remarrying, was at the funeral and heard as they read the words, "Arno knew how to make a marriage work," straight from my grandmother's everyday journal.

That is my Grandpa Sue's favorite lessons for the  grandchildren--that my grandfather knows how to make a marriage work and why.

Benjamin, too, knows how to make a marriage work. This is a list of some of those ways.

1. Ben is patient with me. Even when I am grumpy or talkative or irritated or excited.

2. Ben does all the little things still--things like opening the door or putting his arm around me in church.

3. Ben does the dishes while I'm at work and offers to help with dinner.

4. Ben will do things for me even when it isn't necessarily the thing he wants to be doing. He goes grocery shopping and helps me with math homework late at night and drives me to dance.

5. Ben never treats me poorly. He never says anything to me or about me that would indicate a poor opinion of me. Ben lets me know that he thinks I am wonderful and that I can be wonderful.

6. Ben snuggles with me in the mornings when we wake up. I don't know if every healthy marriage needs this, but it sure helps ours.

7. Ben is thoughtful enough to think of my needs. He will carry heavy things, unload the car, and give up his jacket in the cold for me. I never even have to ask.

8. Ben makes me laugh. It is my personal opinion that not every person in the world needs to marry someone funny. What I think they do all need is to marry someone they can laugh with. Our marriage is so much the better for the daily laughter Benjamin brings into it.

9. Ben never lets me wonder if he loves me or misses me or thinks I am beautiful. He will text me, call me, message me on Facebook, leave me notes. It's the last thing he tells me before we fall asleep at night and often the first thing he says when he wakes up.

10. Ben loves the Lord. He makes sure we make it to church every week. He leads me in scripture study and remembers to pray more often than I do. He holds my hand every night as we kneel in couple prayer. Benjamin has a wonderful, strong testimony and that testimony makes our marriage so much the better.

I'm a Genius Math Teacher

I'm sure my family will relate well with this post... Especially Donovan. Too bad he is on his mission and won't get to read this post for a while, oh well.

Thursday I had my Computer Architecture class. During class the teacher taught us about binary math, different bases, and twos compliment.

The entire class was review for me. It was boring. So boring in fact that when I got home from class I started to rant to Charly.

Now you should know that Charly doesn't like math. She doesn't hate it, but she doesn't love it either.

I love math.

When I told Charly about binary math and the different base system she was a little curious; at least, she seemed curious to me. Our conversation went something like this:

"Do you remember place value?" I asked.

"Not really," She answered.

"It's like, you have the ones place, and the tens place, and the one hundreds place, and..."

"Oh yeah, I remember now," She added quickly.

"Well our number system is in a base TEN. If you notice when we get to the number ten we actually don't have a symbol for it. We write a ONE in the tens place and then put a ZERO in the ones place. That represents TEN," I said excitedly. I'm telling you, this is going to sound very familiar to most my family.

"Wow," Charly said, "That is so cool! You should show me what it would be like if our number system was base FOUR!"

Okay, lets be honest... That's not actually what Charly said. That just must be what it sounded like to me... because I started explaining how base four worked. What she actually said was:

"Imagine if we used base four."

Anyway, to make a long story short. Charly got a very thorough math lesson on bases and binary even if she might not have actually wanted it. She will be grateful later though if she needs help in the college math class she is taking this semester.

Our First Date: When I accidentally forgot about Ben being a creepy Facebook stalker and fell in love with him instead.

After the night that Benjamin and I met (http://lovegogglesbc.blogspot.com/2013/08/the-first-spark-between-benjamin-and-me.html), I might have fallen in love with him. I might have, except for the fact that he turned into a creeper.

I'm not kidding.

He looked through all my pictures on Facebook. ALL of them.
All the way back to the ones from seventh grade.
And I knew about it, because he commented on half of them.
He liked everything I posted on Facebook. Everything. 
And then he would he would comment on it.
And try to start conversations about his mission and his family in the comments.
Ben was all over my Facebook.
He even friended my mom.
I was just like, Who are you? I don't even know you. 

Ben says he was being subtle.

Then came the time that he asked for my number. Ben didn't ask for it on Facebook, despite the fact that we were apparently best friends on there. Nope, he told my cousin (our mutual best friend) Jeremy to get it for him.

Jeremy called me up. He said, and I quote, "Hey, Ben wants to know if he can have your number, but he can't tell you why yet." He can't tell you why yet? What, is this some sort of mystery story? Like I don't already know why he wants my number.

Turns out, his "secret" reason for wanting my number was so he could text me on my birthday.

The week after Christmas break, I was back at work, vacuuming classrooms after school, when Jeremy called me. Our conversation went something like this:

"What're you doing on Friday?" Jeremy asked.

"Mmm ... Maybe babysitting. I don't have anything planned yet. Why?" I said.

"Just wondering." Jeremy said.

I waited, but Jeremy didn't elaborate. "What do you mean, just wondering?"

"Nothing. I was just wondering."

I didn't buy it. People don't just call other people up and ask what they're doing on a certain day simply because their curious. Especially when those people are me and Jeremy.

Before I could question him further, however, Jeremy hung up the phone. I was pretty sure I knew why he'd called. My suspicions were confirmed when, five minutes later, Ben called me.

He asked me to go with him on a date Friday night. I said yes, because I was trying to date a hundred guys and, creeper though he was, he did seem nice. I hung up thinking, We could probably end up pretty good friends.

Ben was late picking me up. When he came to the door, I was struck again with just how cute he was. I didn't let it get to me, however. There are plenty of attractive men in this world, but that doesn't mean you have to fall in love with them all.

For the date, we made sock puppets together. We had yarn and buttons, along with a package of new socks. At first, it was a little bit awkward. I didn't know what to say and Ben was (what I now know to be uncharacteristically) quiet. The awkwardness helped remind me that I did not want anything at all to happen between Ben and I.

Then Brynndi got home from school. Brynndi is Jeremy's little sister. She absolutely adores Benjamin, and Ben adores her right back. Brynndi walked through the door, saw Ben, and ran towards him. Ben held arms out for her and picked her up, swinging her. Both of them were laughing.

I watched and my heart melted to my toes. I had never seen anything more adorable in my life.

Soon after that, Ben and I started laughing together. We found food coloring and started dying our sock puppets. We spilled it all over the counter and couldn't get it to come off. For some reason, that was absolutely hilarious to us. Ben and I were laughing so hard together.

The boys had put together a little puppet show of Green Eggs and Ham for the girls. They performed it for us after we'd finished our sock puppets. It was very cute and they had us laughing our heads off.

We played a game, still laughing together, until Jeremy's date had to go home. We all loaded into the car. Because they had just picked up Brynndi, her car seat was still in the back. I climbed in, sitting in the middle seat. Ben slid in next to me, close enough that our arms touched.

I don't even know how to describe what happened. It felt like ... like when we kiss.

I know, I know, our arms touched. How romantic. Except, that it really was. It was like magic.

It was only ten o'clock and I didn't have a curfew, so I went back to Jeremy's house with the boys. We watched Psych until midnight, when they finally took me home.

I went home feeling on top of the world.

This Picture is Worth a Thousand Words (My Favorite Picture of Charly and Me)

Good thing I have a picture because I don't want to write a thousand words and I know that none of our readers want to read a thousand words.

Choosing the picture for this blog was hard because there are a ton of great pictures of Charly and me together. I finally chose this one and I'm excited to see which one Charly chose.

This is my favorite picture of Charly and I together. It's from one of our first dates. Charly and I are really goofy, well, I'm goofy and I rub off on Charly. We are always laughing and always having fun. I think this picture represents that.

In this picture we were just at the mall trying on random hats and glasses. Charly loves taking pictures and it was a good excuse for me to put my arm around her so we took lots of pictures.

10 Reasons Why I Fell in Love With Charly

Here are the top 10 reasons why I fell in love with Charly.

1. She has a strong testimony of the gospel.

This is number one because it is the most important to me.

2. She loves me.

This one is also very important. I know Charly loves me because of the way she treats me. She is patient with me when I'm going through one of my hobby phases. She writes me love notes and nice things all the time. She makes me feel like I'm the best guy alive even when I know I still have a ton to learn. I love her for it.

3. She loves children.

This is something we both have in common. We love to be with children. From day one we were always around children. We would both play with them and be silly. I'm usually much sillier than Charly though. We are excited to have our own children some day and I know Charly will be a great mother to them because I've seen her with children.

4. She is adventurous and fun to be around.

It's always an adventure with Ben and Charly... That's our motto. Some of the dates we have been on were the most fun I have ever had. We've sneaked cloths pins on to strangers, volunteered at clothing stores as greeters, put on puppet shows, and went to tons of fun dances.

5. She is a writer and she loves reading.

Yeah, I cheated and put two in here. Reading and writing is something we have in common just like our love for children. We spent lots of hours talking about different books we had read and others that we might read. Charly writes stories and I think she is an amazing writer. I love reading her stories.

6. She always tries to think of others.

I can think of many examples where she has done this but the one that stands out most to me is when she worked so hard to make sure everyone could make it to our wedding. She had to sacrifice some things that she wanted in order to make it possible and I admire that in her.

7. She wants to home-school our kids.

This one is pretty straight forward. I was home-schooled and I loved it. It is something that is important to me and it is to Charly as well.

8. She laughs at me.

I'm really.... goofy. Some people think I'm funny and some people can't figure me out. I love that Charly always laughs at me, even when I'm being ridiculous... and trust me... my jokes are ridiculous.

9. She is patient with me.

I sort of already put this one down up close to the top. Trust me though, sometimes I take a ton of patience. You should just watch me put my shoes on.

10. She is beautiful.

Don't say it's shallow because it's not. Everyone wants to fall in love with someone they find attractive and everyone has their own version of attractive. In my world Charly is the most beautiful girl I have ever met. Sometimes I just stare at her and think how beautiful she is. She usually gets mad at me for staring at her. I think it's cute. My favorite thing about her looks is her eyes.

End

I love Charly so much. These 10 reasons, and many more that I didn't even list, remind me every day of how much I love her. I'm so lucky to have found her and also to still have her.

My 10 Favorite Things About Benjamin

1. He loves me. And I thank Heavenly Father for him everyday.

2. He tries so hard to be a good husband, especially with the little things. For example, while both of us like our house to be clean, I'm the type of person who likes everything to have a spot, a place where it "goes." Ben isn't really like that at all. When we first got married, I would joke with Benjamin because he would forever be leaving his shoes all over the place. So, I would pick them up and put them in their "spot" in the spare room. When I joked with him, I was only kidding; it didn't actually bother me at all. I've caught him several times now, though, taking off his shoes and putting them in their "spot." He such a sweet husband because he does little things like that everyday.

3. Ben loves to just be close to me. The first few times Ben came over to give me a hug for no reason, I asked him "What? What do you want?" My family just isn't as touchy (if you want proof of that, go try to give my brother Jon a hug). It makes me feel so loved that Ben comes over to cuddle with me for a minute or to give me a hug, or just scoots closer so that our arms are touching before we fall asleep.

4. He lets me cry. I know this one may sound weird. It's not that I'm sad all the time, I just cry a lot. I am a very emotional person. I cry when I'm happy, I cry when I'm frustrated, I cry when I'm upset, I cry when I'm angry, I cry when I feel the spirit, I cry when I feel particularly blessed and thankful.  But Ben, as the sweet and caring husband he is, will just hold me until I'm done and then make me laugh. I cannot even tell you how much this means to me.

5. He takes people as they are. This is something that I noticed (and admired) right away in him, and I've always admired him for it. He doesn't judge people or criticize them for their differences and their flaws. He sees those things as them being them. He knows they can change, and helps them do so, but in the meantime, he simply lets them be themselves.

6. He works on improving his many talents. Do you understand how talented my husband is? He does everything--art, guitar, singing, violin, piano, programming, reading, writing, dancing, the Pokemon card game, riding a unicycle. Seriously. He does everything and I love that about him.

7. His jokes. They're ridiculous, every time. But everyday, without fail, he makes me laugh. Every single day.

8. He believes in people, but more importantly, he believes in me. And when you have someone believing in you in every day, it doesn't take long for you to start believing in yourself.

9. He serves others. He is better than me at seeing other people's needs and meeting them. He's such an example to me in this. It's one of the reasons I fell for him. I knew I was looking for something special in my (at the time, future) husband.This attitude that Ben possesses was one of those things.

10. All of these are just pieces of what makes Ben such a wonderful person and such a great husband. And I love all of that. But do you know what my absolute favorite thing about Benjamin is? He's my husband.

Marriage and Leftovers. (The True Story)

I love this story. I think it shows how even when two people can come from very similar cultures, and have very similar beliefs, that we are still all very different.

A few weeks ago Charly was making dinner and I had just gotten back from work. I'm not exactly sure what she was making but I think that there was chicken with it. I love chicken. I'm trying to eat more proteins because I don't think I get enough during the day.

When I was growing up I was never much of a big eater and so my mom would pretty much let me eat as much as I wanted as long as there was enough for the other people in the family as well. That was what I was used to, so when Charly started putting the rest of the dinner in the fridge, after dishing some out for each of us, but before we had even started eating, I had no clue what she was doing.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Saving some dinner for later," she replied as if it was obvious.

I looked down at my plate and back up at her, "Why?"

"Because that's just what you do. You make dinner, dish some out, put some in the fridge and save it for later."

Now, at this point in the story you should know that Charly often does things simply because she has seen someone else do it that way. I don't know if she has a good reason for it because often she doesn't tell me. She just says, "Because that's just what you do." I think it's really cute when she does this even if I don't understand it.

Back to the story.

"What if I want more?" I asked.

"You don't need more. We need to save this for later. It's called 'leftovers'," she said
.
"What?" I responded laughing. "That's not leftovers. Leftovers is when you eat all you can and then you put what is 'left over' into the fridge. You are putting some of the food away before we have even eaten. That is called 'rations.'"

Charly looked over at me and we both started laughing.

Moral of this story is that when you find the person you want to marry, remember that they are different from you and that the differences you have are good things. Look for them. Laugh at them. and expect them. They make marriage so much more adventurous.

Rations

I have to admit, I don't know a ton about cooking, but what little I do know, I learned from my mom. And my mom was an expert at cooking so that we would be able to make another meal of it. Naturally, then, when I got home from my last grocery shopping trip, I cut up and froze the chicken I had bought. I put three pieces in each bag, two to eat right then and one to put in the fridge for later.

One night, Ben and I got out the chicken and cut it up into little pieces. Ben then cooked it in just a little bit of oil over the stove. That's our favorite way to eat chicken. When he was finished, we put some of it into a casserole I was making. Then Ben started eating it straight out of the pan with a fork.

"What are you doing?" I asked, glancing at him while I scooped the casserole into a pan.

"Eating chicken," he said. I, of course, had already deduced this. When I had asked him what he was doing, what I really meant was, I don't actually want you to do what you are currently doing.

"Okay," I said, compromising. "Just don't eat all of it."

"I'll save some for you," he said.

"Okay," I agreed. "But I also want to put some of it in the fridge for later."

"Why?"

"Leftovers," I raised my eyebrows at him.

"Leftovers?" He asked, shaking his head. "That isn't leftovers. It's rations."

I laughed. "Yes huh. I put extra chicken in the bag for that exact purpose."

"Charly," he said, putting on his most serious face. "Leftovers is when you eat all you want and whatever is leftover you put in the fridge. This is rations."

"Benjamin!" I said exasperatedly. I was mostly joking. "I just want to save some chicken for another meal." I started towards the pan with a container in hand. Benjamin was still standing next to it, a piece of chicken stabbed onto his fork. He grabbed the handle of the pan and started moving away from me. I followed him and we started moving more quickly around the island counter top.

"Benjamin," I said again, my tone less of a joke now. "If we put this in the fridge, then we can eat it tomorrow, or I can put it in something else."

"Charly, do you know how much protein I need?" he asked.

I faltered. "No."

"A lot. Besides, look at this chicken. There isn't even enough left to make it worth saving."

"Thanks to you," I pointed out with a laugh. He shrugged, giving me his I-just-won-and-I-know-it face. I rolled my eyes.

"Fine," I set the container on the counter and stabbed a piece of chicken with my fork.

"Trying to put me on rations," Benjamin said, shaking his head as he set the pan back down.

"Benjamin!" I said again. He grinned at me as I popped a piece of chicken into my mouth.

The Rain Adventure

Well, I'm not going to write about the time the Charly chased me through our apartment with a spray bottle... Even though I'm quite proud of the evasive maneuvers that I used to escape.

What I will write about is the adventure that we had Saturday night.

We were in Vernal. I was with Hannah and Charly was upstairs reading. Hannah and I went outside to jump on the tramp and it was raining. The cool air and cold raindrops felt good against my skin. I looked over at Hannah, wide eyed and excited.

"We should go get Charly," I said.
She looked back at me and grinned. "Yeah!" She answered excitedly.

We ran upstairs. I grabbed a paper on my brother Dalin's desk to use as a bookmark, I didn't want to loose Charly's spot when I kidnapped her. I ran from the desk over to Charly and put the bookmark in her book. Then I grabbed her hand and started dragging her out of the room.

"Where are you taking me?" She said smiling.
"Come Rook!" I answered in my silly voice.
"Benjamin, where are we going?" She said resisting my pull.
"An adventure!" I said.

She reluctantly followed me downstairs and outside onto the tramp. We started jumping in the rain. my little brother Caleb joined us and we played ring around the rosy.

The rain was making dark spots on our cloths.
"We are leopards!" I said. It took Charly a couple seconds to get the joke. She gave me her that's-ridiculous look.

I jumped off the tramp and grabbed a soft ball that was on the lawn. I threw it at Charly, Caleb and Hannah. It hit Caleb, bounced off and hit Charly.

"You're it Caleb!" I said. Caleb jumped off the tramp and I got back on. Caleb threw the ball at me and I dodged it just like the matrix. Charly was obviously impressed. The ball landed in some big green horse radish plants.

"Where did it go?" Caleb asked.
"It went in the Dinosaur plants," I answered.
Caleb got the ball and hit Hannah. We continued playing our game. It was still raining and we were getting quite wet.

Close to the end of our game both Caleb and Hannah were hit. They both got off to get the ball.
"It's you two against Charly and me!" I announced. "But don't expect to win because we've been to college." I said the last part in the most confident voice I could find.

I managed to do some more amazing matrix dodges but eventually I got hit.
"Charly and I lose." I said.

After our game the little adventure came to an end. I had a blast though and I'm sure that Caleb, Hannah, and Charly did as well.

The End

Adventure wanted.

Being married is great. Serious. You should all try it. Ben and I, though, recently realized that we have become somewhat boring since getting married. We haven't had too many adventures in the last little while. And we love adventures. 

So, Ben and I left our little home in Orem to come to Vernal for a week. We're currently staying with his parents. And upstairs, they have a wonderful little bookshelf of books. Last night, I picked myself a nice little book (the second The Work and the Glory, since I just finished the first one) and was reading upstairs. Ben was off playing some Nintendo games with his younger siblings, giving them some much-missed attention. 

My quiet reading space was disturbed when Benjamin ran into the room that I was reading in, followed by his little sister Hannah. Ben ran to the bed where I was sitting, stopped like he was looking for something, and then ran over to the dresser. There he picked up a folded piece of paper, which he proceeded to stick in my book before closing it. I get pretend-mad at him when he loses my spot in a book; it's an almost-daily occurrence.

He grabbed my hand and led me towards the door, not saying a word to my bewildered questioning. Hannah and Ben were both racing so fast, they were acting like the house was on fire. 

"Ben," I said, before willingly following. "What are we doing?"

He gave me one of his mischievous smiles. "Come on." 

"Ben," I laughed, letting him pull me to the door. "Come on to where?" 

"Come on," he said again. Hannah had disappeared down the stairs, so I followed Ben down the stairs and out the front door, Ben never letting go of my hand. 

It wasn't until we were outside on the porch that I realized what they wanted of me. I saw the rain, coming down in splattered clumps and Caleb already waiting on the tramp. My smile now matched Benjamin's. 

"Oh," was all I said. Hannah joined Caleb, then Ben. I was the last one on the tramp. We jumped and laughed, rain falling down on us. Ben grabbed a ball and we started a game. We had a grand old time of it. Ben's parents even came out and sat on the swing under the porch roof to watch.

Ben and I needed a good little adventure. Vernal fits the bill perfectly. 

A Love Story in 20 Lines.

Our Story in 20 lines. It's a complicated story but it's a good one and it's ours.

1. Charly and I first met before my mission going to a dance with my best friend Jeremy.
2. It was love at second sight when I ran into her again after my mission at Jeremy's Birthday.
3. I started subtly stalking her on Facebook because I had a huge crush on her.
4. I was very sneaky about it.
5. I got her number from Jeremy and asked her on our first date. We planned the date as a puppet show.
6. She was going on 100 dates with different guys and I was number 71. My plan was to be her number 1.
7. We laughed a ton on the first date and sat next to each other in the back of the car.
8. We didn't go on another date for a long time. I missed her but I also liked a different girl.
9. I started dating the other girl because she was closer but I still liked Charly.
10. I broke up with the other girl and asked Charly to go to a dance with me in downtown Salt Lake.
11. We started dating only each other. I wasn't ready to get married though and just wanted to date for fun.
12. We would always dance together to the music on my iPod. It felt so good to be together.
13. Charly decided to transfer out to Weber State University because that was where I was going to school.
14. We broke up before she transferred out and both of us moved home to stay with our families.
15. I tried dating other girls again but they all made me miss Charly. We were living more than 3 hours apart.
16. After about eight months I wrote her a letter telling her that I still loved her.
17. Charly sent me a story that was about her life after we had broken up. She already had a mission call.
18. When I read her story I fell in love with her all over again and decided that I would ask her to marry me.
19. Luckily for me she said yes and we were married for time and all eternity in the Bountiful temple.
20. This is the last line but it's not the end. Our story continues on and I'm excited to be writing it with her.

We Buy Books, Not Food.

I had never before bought a book. I have spent more time than anyone I know in bookstores and libraries. Half the dates Ben and I have gone on have been spent in Barnes and Noble. One of my hobbies is searching out little used bookstores and libraries in little towns. I look and look at books, browsing and reading and drooling over them. But I've never bought one. Until last week.

For date night last Friday, Ben and I decided to visit Barnes and Noble. Just to look. We'd done it so many times before, it didn't even cross my mind that it would turn into more than that.

There were so many books and every single one, one of would say, "That book looks so good, I want to read that ..." or "Oh man, I love this book. This is one we're going to buy someday for our library." So we pulled out Ben's iPod and started making a wishlist of books.

I was about getting to the going-home point when Ben looked at me, his smile telling me he was about to suggest something that I might say no to, but would probably say yes to. "What if we splurge and each buy one book?" I smiled at his suggestion and we did. It was my first taste of buying a book and I liked it. We made a new tradition of buying one book each every paycheck.

The next day, I talked him into going with me to a used bookstore that was having a good sale--up to 70% off everything.

"Charly," Ben told me, "if we go there, we will end up buying more books, and we can't for another two weeks."

"We won't buy anything," I assured him. "I just want to see what deals they have."  And if they have good ones, then maybe we'll get it, I thought to myself.

"Charly." Ben didn't look convinced. "We can't walk into a bookstore and walk out without buying books."

"Sure we can," I argued back. "We used to do it all the time when we were dating."

"That's because we didn't have money when we were dating."

"We still don't have money," I pointed out.

And with that, we went to the bookstore. At first, there were no books that we were even slightly interested in. We split up and then I found the classics section.

By the time Ben found me, I had a pile of books--Jane Eyre, Charles Dickens, The Count of Monte Cristo ... and I wasn't half way through the section. Ben found a couch and took a nap until I was finished going through the books. He helped me carry my pile up to the register.

Before we bought the books, Ben and I went through my pile three or four times, weeding out the ones that I wasn't absolutely dying to buy. We ended up with fifteen books, and the guy at the register threw in an older book that I was pining over. Sixteen books total. We got some good deals, especially on The Mistborn Series, in brand new condition for only sixteen dollars.

"One book a paycheck?" Ben said in the car.

"Oops," I said, smiling one of my most innocent smiles. "We'll stick to that from now on."

Ben raised his eyebrows. "How about, we can buy another book after you finish reading all of those."

"Okay," I agreed quickly. I knew it wouldn't take me long.