Letter to Charly

Dear Charly,

How are you? I love starting letters off with that phrase. It's so overused that it makes it fun to use it more. This is a letter in a blog! Yay. Remember when I wrote you an actual letter? If that isn't true love than I don't know what is because you know how I hate stamps. The good news is that I don't have to buy stamps anymore to write you real letters. I can just write them and then hide them under your pillow or something.

You want to know what is fun? When we skip class together and watch movies. I really love spending time with you like that.

Also, can we make a green smoothie sometime soon? I feel like we haven't done that in a while and I miss them.

I hope you know how much I love you because... I love you. I'm so glad that I married you. I'm going to try my hardest to keep you happy your whole life because I love to see you smile.

I'll see you soon, really soon because I'm sitting right next to you right now.

Love, Ben.

P.S. This is the end of the letter.

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 day my husband locked me out of the bathroom ...

After Ben and I got married, I learned that Ben always locks the door. Always. Normally, this is fine. This week, it proved to be slightly problematic. 

Tuesday morning I woke up very groggy. Ben and I had had a very late night Monday and I did not want to get up early to catch the bus. While I was at dance the night before, Ben had fixed our car and it was very tempting to sleep an extra hour and simply drive. 

"Ben," I asked, leaning across the bed. 

"Hmmm?" Benjamin asked, his eyebrows pinching together. That's his I'm-tired-why-are-you-talking face. He doesn't know he makes it. 

"Can I drive today?" 

"Why?" Ben didn't even open his eyes. 

"So I can sleep in a little." I said, a little impatiently. 

"Oh. Yeah, that's fine." Ben rolled over and fell back to sleep quickly. I rolled over too, but didn't find sleep as fast. I needed to go to the bathroom. 

With a sigh, I got up and found my way through our maze of clean and dirty clothes strewn around the room (I hate putting away laundry ...) and found the bathroom door shut. Ben likes to keep the doors closed in our apartment so it looks nicer. I turned the knob only ... it didn't turn. I turned it again, no luck. I fumbled back into the bedroom. 

Uh-oh, I thought. I went outside to get a broken piece of hanger, attempting to use it as a lock pick. No luck. 

I fumbled back into the room and said in a loud, half whisper, "Ben!" 

"What?" he asked, his voice slurring sleepily. 

As I answered, I knelt down next to the alarm we had set the night before. It was supposed to go off at 6:30. It was 6:23. "The bathroom door is locked." 

"Turn it really hard, sometimes it just gets jammed." At this point, Ben was probably mostly asleep still.

"Okay," I said, doubting it would work even as I agreed to it. "I'll try it, but I turned it hard before." 

After shutting off the alarm so it wouldn't wake Ben up, I went back to the door. and twisted the knob with all my strength. Once, twice, three times. It still wouldn't budge; I could tell it was locked. I knew I needed to get the door open so I could go to school ... I'm not the kind of girl who spends a ton of time in the bathroom, but there was no way I would go out in public without at least doing my hair first. I decided to take advice from Ever After and got a screwdriver out. 

I was trying to get the screws off, but it was tricky with how they were positioned when Ben came out of the bedroom, still half asleep. He must have heard my clumsy attempts with the screwdriver. He took over and had the door handle off and the door unlocked in less than five minutes. 

"Thanks Ben," I said, rewarding his efforts with a kiss. "And now that I'm awake, I can take the bus!" Ben just laughed and went back to bed. 

11 Dollar Soap

Ben and I were in the bathroom one day when Benjamin grabbed my bottle of body wash out of the shower.

Holding it up to show me, he asked, "Was this really eleven dollars?" 

"What?" I asked. 

"I was using is before, until I saw this--" Ben pointed to the price tag on the back of the bottle, clearly labeled $11. 

I laughed. "Yes, it was eleven dollars, at Bath and Body Works. It was probably on some sort of sale though." 

Ben thought for a moment. "I'll just use the other soap." 

Girls love weddings; boys don't.

That means that I, as a girl, love weddings, and Ben, as a boy, doesn't.

This weekend, we came to Vernal for Benjamin's cousin's wedding. It started off with the temple sealing, in the morning. That was beautiful and the one part of the day which Ben didn't grumble about. Pictures afterwards were not too long, either, since we we're just cousins. 

While we were standing outside, waiting for pictures to start, Benjamin said to me, "I am never getting a divorce ... Weddings are such a pain. I do not want to have to get married again." 

He got whacked for that one.

Then we went to the luncheon. After the luncheon, Ben took a three hour nap. When it was time to go to the reception, Ben was dismayed. He had forgotten there was a reception. 

"How did you forget?" I asked with a laugh. 

"I thought the luncheon was the reception ..." 

After we finished getting ready for the reception--Ben had to change back into his nice clothes after forgetting about the reception--Ben said to me, "So we're in and out, right?" 

"What? No," I said. 

After a lengthy discussion on why (or why not in Ben's case) we should stay at least for a decent amount of time, we discovered the problem.

"Why not? They don't even want us to stay long anyways," Ben said.

"That's not true," I said. "Have you ever been a girl at her wedding reception?"

Ben gave me a look. We both laughed. "I think we're just looking at this from different perspectives," Ben said. "You are thinking of this from a girl's mind, I'm thinking of this from the guy's side of things."

We ended up staying a little longer than Ben would have liked, but leaving earlier than I normally would have. It turned out to be a fun night though, and we were both glad to be there for Gavin's wedding.

Fast Sunday ... Oops.

I woke up this morning at 6:30, due to daylight savings. I thought I'd get up and surprise Ben with a clean kitchen and delicious breakfast. 

About an hour later, I came to wake Ben up. "Ben," I said, "Wanna get up now?" 

"No," he said. Of course. 

"Why not? You've slept plenty long." I wanted him to get up and come see my surprise. 

"My alarm hasn't gone off," Ben said. It was 7:19, his alarm was set for 7:30. He seemed perfectly awake to me, so I jumped off the bed and set the alarm for 7:20. 

"No fair," he said, as I came back to snuggle with him until the alarm went off. "You changed my alarm." 

"How do you know?" I asked in my most innocent tone of voice. 

"Because you went over there ..." He said in his I'm-picked-on voice. 

"I could have had many reasons to go over there." 

"Yeah," he agreed. "To change my alarm." 

"That is one reason I could have for going over there," I agreed, still claiming innocence. Just then, his alarm went off. "Oh, that's your alarm. Better get that." 

"Will you get that alarm for me?" Ben asked me, grinning. 

"No," I laughed, pulling his blanket off. "Come on, come see!" 

"Come see what?" 

"Just," I said, jumping off the bed and turning off the alarm. "Just come see." 

I took him by the hand and led him to the kitchen, where I had his favorite breakfast of fruit smoothies and German pancakes set out and ready to eat. 

"Ta da!" 

Ben looked at me with a funny look on his face. Then he moved towards me, pulling me into a hug. 

"Charly," he said. "Do you remember that it's Fast Sunday?" 

I slumped, dropping my arms to my side. Somehow I had totally forgotten Fast Sunday. I don't know how; I'd been reminding Ben all week. Literally. "No ....." 

I tried to pull away from Ben, but he kept a tight hold on me. 

"I knew you'd need a hug when you found that out," Ben said. 

I guess we'll be fasting next week. As long as I don't make breakfast, that is. 

A List of Charly's Gifts and Talents

Charly and I are taking a marriage class at Church. It's really fun. This week we decided to take some advice from the class and list each others talents and gifts. We are starting off with 5. We will update this as we go.

1. Charly is supportive. This is something I learned about her just recently and I love it about her.

2. Charly is great at dance and great at teaching it.

3. Charly is an amazing writer. I love everything she has ever written.

4. Charly is loving. Not just with me but with everyone she knows. She cares about people.

5. Charly is a great wife! I'm serious. Other men should be really jealous of me.

A List of Ben's Gifts and Talents

This will not be comprehensive or the list will never end. I'm serious; my husband does EVERYTHING. I've never met anyone so talented. 

1. Patience. Benjamin has this gift as no one else I know. There have been many times since we've gotten married when Ben has needed to patient with me. Those times come mostly when things don't go according to my plan and I get grumpy. Those are the times when, even though I don't show it, that I am most grateful for Ben and his patience with me. Our relationship thrives on his patience. 

2. Believing. Ben has a talent for helping others believe in themselves.  

3. Learning. Ben has the gift of learning. I attribute this in part to his home schooling and the way his mother taught him to learn. He isn't afraid to try new things, he is observant enough to pick up the tricks of how to do things, and he is just naturally good at new things. 

4. Love. Ben has the gift of love. He is always serving, always looking for ways to help others. There are so many times when I catch him thinking of others, especially his family, before himself and I don't think he even realizes it. 

5. Everything. This one might be cheating, but Ben seems to have the talent of being talented at everything. This probably is due to his ability to learn and his fearlessness in trying new things. If you know Ben, you know that Ben also really gets into things. He goes through phases, but during his "piano phase," he does piano all the time. When he goes through his "art phase," art is all he does. 

This is Not a Date.

Friday night is my favorite, because it is date night.And I am very pro-dating. 

Now, if you know me, you know that my definition of dating is different than most anyone else. It has to fit all the criteria for a date--planned for as a date, paid for by one person, and paired off.  On top of that, though, a date is only a date if it feels like a date. 

Lately, because of school and being sick and other obstacles, our date nights haven't exactly met my "date criteria." Don't get me wrong, I love spending time with Ben and, since we pretty much everything together just as a couple, we go on a lot of dates, in Ben's definition of a date. I was excited for our date this week, though, and had it planned out flawlessly. 

While I was at school in the morning, I stopped to buy tickets for BYU's Humor U performance that night. That's when everything started going wrong. 

Our one and only car wouldn't start for me after class. I just walked the hour and a half home. Then Ben got home late from work. That, on top of our need to figure out the car (as well as a paper that Ben needed to write for school) meant that we missed our already-paid-for-show. We spent the early evening with our Bishop, trying to get the car to start. 

We finally got it to start and drove home. On the way, Ben remarked, "Well, this was an interesting date." 

"This isn't a date." It had been a hard, stressful day for me and I was very disappointed that our date was, once again, turning into what I considered to not be a date. 

Luckily, we had a gift card to Coldstones Creamery. When we got home, I asked Ben if we could go  out for ice cream. He, of course, agreed. The Coldstones we ended up going to was in the same parking lot as the Provo dollar theater. Before we went inside, we noticed that Monster University was playing in the dollar theater. Neither of us had seen it yet, but we both wanted to, so we went to the 10:30 showing, getting a discount with our student ID's.

It started off as a really awful date for me. Nothing had been gong the way I had planned and I was frustrated. Things turned out perfectly, though, and it was a really great date night. I love my husband. He's not a huge planner and he and I might not agree on the definition of a date. When it's really important, though, Benjamin is so sweet. 

When I got married, I thought it was important to have a husband who would take me dancing and sing me songs on the guitar and plan romantic, fun dates. Those things are nice. I still enjoy listening to Ben play guitar, I love dancing whit him, and I wouldn't mind if he planned more dates. That's not what actually matters, though. 

It matters when I'm upset and he just holds me. 
It's important to me that he takes the lead in finding a way to fix, say, the car. 
I'm so grateful for his patience with me when I'm grumpy that something didn't work out. 
It is perfect that he doesn't get frustrated or stressed like I do. 
It's the little moments in everyday life that are important. And let me tell you, singing romantic songs on the guitar isn't what it's all about.  

My Favorite Picture of Charly

This is my favorite picture of Charly because it reminds me of before Charly and I were even dating. I remember looking at this picture and just thinking how beautiful Charly is. I wanted so bad to go on a date with her.

I'm such a lucky guy.

Meeting my Favorite Author with Charly

About two weeks ago Charly and I were in Barnes and Noble (surprise right?) and we notice that they had a sign up announcing a book signing with Brandon Sanderson.

Both Charly and I LOVE Brandon Sanderson and pretty much all of his books. We were bound and determined to go to the signing and meet him.

Unfortunately the night of the signing I had classes, a pretty hard assignment, and a meeting with the Dean of UVU sooooooo.... yeah. I figured that at least Charly could go and get the books signed for me. I was pretty down about it though.

That night, after my meeting with the Dean, and during my last class Charly messaged me and told me that she was still in line at the store and that she needed me to come pick her up. After reading the message I looked up at my teacher, who was going on about assembly language, and I decided that I was going to leave class early so that I could meet Brandon Sanderson.

It was pretty awesome for me actually because by the time I got there Charly was like the 8th person in line. We had gotten special bands earlier marking our spot in line so I was able to walk right up and start the line where Charly was! The first thing I noticed is that Brandon Sanderson was very polite and kind to everyone in line. The thanked them for waiting and always took time to talk with them. He would even ask them if they had any questions about any of his books. Needless to say, I was impressed.


When Charly and I got to him he signed the book that we were buying that day, and all of the other books that we had by him. He let us take a picture with him and thanked us for coming. Yeah, I know his eyes are closed. Of course he managed to blink... oh well..  Both Charly and I were super excited. It was a great night and I'm so glad I skipped class to go!

The Day We Met Brandon Sanderson (Our Favorite Author)

Once, about a month ago, Ben and I were (of course) at Barnes and Noble. While there, we saw a poster announcing a book signing with Brandon Sanderson for his newest release, Steelheart. Now, in case you don't know, Benjamin and I love Brandon Sanderson. 

We. Love. Brandon. Sanderson. 

We've read all his books.

We own almost all of his books. 

We've watched his lecture series on YouTube. 

When we were dating, his books were one of the many things that brought us together. 

We really, really love Brandon Sanderson. 

While we were at it, we had to buy a nice, hard copy of 

The Way of Kings for Brandon Sanderson to sign. 

So, we marked the day on our calendar and decided that even if we had to take work off or miss class (at the time, both our schedules were up in the air), that we would make sure we were there. 

The day approached. It was on Tuesday from 5:00 to 8:00. Sure enough, with how busy our schedules are, we both had conflicts. I had class until 5:30 and then I had work until 6:00. I was already planning on asking for work off because the SFLSA opening social was that same day from 6:00 to 7:30, which I wanted to attend. Ben had a class from 7:00-8:30. 

When I looked online to double check the time, hoping maybe we could work it out with our schedules, I saw that they were handing out wristbands on Monday morning starting at 9 AM. That was just awful timing for us, because Ben would be at work all day and I would be in class. 

We decided that night to stop by just to see if they had any wristbands left. They had plenty. We were 132 and 133 in line and we got the 94th copy of the book. 

We had decided it would be worth it to just to skip out on our other obligations to meet Brandon Sanderson. Then Ben remembered that he had a meeting with the Dean of the school as part of his responsibilities as the student rep for UVU's computer science department. It was at 6:00. Of course. 

I didn't want to miss it but I definitely did not want to go alone. I dragged my friend Janessa with me. It was crazy. There were quite a few people there and we had to wait for our number to be called out to pick up our copy of the book. Then we got to stand in line. For, practically forever. 

At 7:00, Janessa had to leave for a class. I waited in line for about an hour by myself. I made friends with the two girls in front of me--one of them is leaving in December to Charlotte, North Carolina! Ben and I were talking back and forth the whole time on Facebook and I convinced him to leave his class early to try to get to the store before I reached Brandon Sanderson. 

It was so close. I had probably five people in front of me when Ben arrived. It was close enough to make me sweat. Ben got there in time though, and we were even able to get a picture with our favorite author! 

Here we are, with Brandon Sanderson! 

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.

Charly in One Word

Charly is determined.

"having made a firm decision and being resolved not to change it." - Google

I chose this word to describe Charly because it is the word that stands out to me most. Charly doesn't give up. She stands strong for what she believes. If there is something that needs to be done she will work until it gets done. If something isn't working out for her she will try multiple different ways of trying to get it to work. I see this as a glimpse of her faith.

One time on my mission I asked an investigator what the word "faith" meant to them. The investigator said, "faith was never giving up."

Charly is determined and she has that kind of faith.

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.

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words (My Favorite Picture of Ben and Me)

Ben and I decided we wanted to do a short and sweet post this week, since nothing particularly exciting or funny happened to us since we last posted (unless you count Benjamin pretending to be a dinosaur as he ate his broccoli at the restaurant on date night ...). 

This is my favorite picture of Benjamin and I.

I know, I know, it has someone else in it. But here's the thing. This is one of the first pictures Ben and I took together, back before we were even dating for the first time. Also, the guy on the left is my very best friend Jeremy, who is currently on a mission. 

After Jeremy left on his mission and while I was long-distance-dating Ben, I would look at this picture and it would break my heart, I missed them both so much.

But looking at this picture, that's when I knew where I always wanted to stay.

Right there, between Jeremy and Benjamin. Forever. 

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.

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