Our Story Continued

Here I am, blogging again when I should be writing a paper. In my defense, this is developing my writing skills, right?

Our First Kiss:
It was June 7, 2010. No, I am not one of those girls who documents every single kiss she ever had (...not that there's anything wrong with that). I was just able to look back and figure out what day it was because of surrounding events. Sean and his friend Logan drove from Rexburg straight to our apartment. Sean dropped Logan off to hang out with my roommates while we went to the theater to watch Prince of Persia. The whole night I knew he had plans to kiss me. Sean claims he didn't have any plans, but I could tell from the way he was acting. After the movie, we took a walk up Rock Canyon. There is a little bridge over a river we walked to and talked for a while. It was there that he kissed me. Apparently we kissed a little more than Sean was expecting. He thought it would be a little peck, but I sure surprised him. While we were on the bridge, we heard a noise in the bushes, I got scared and despite Sean's wishes, we left. We started driving back to my apartment, but I saw sprinklers and told Sean how much I love running through them. He pulled the car over and we ran through the sprinklers together. Lame? Well I think it's cute. I came home from the date feeling really thrilled, but also guilty. Remember that girl that liked Sean, and the guy that liked me? I wasn't sure how this was going to turn out without someone getting hurt. I talked to Ashley about it and she was sure it would all work out okay.Well, it actually did. I was able to talk to the girl and she was so mature and sweet about the entire situation. I was still stressed out about the guy though... A few days later we went on another date, but it was a double date this time with my friend Chloe and his friend Logan. These boys were so creative, they wrote three date ideas down on three pieces of paper, then we picked one and did that activity. The one we picked was playing games in a park. To this day, I still don't know what the other two were. While we were playing games, it started raining, so we put the blanket on top of us...

The four of us spent a lot of time together.

How He Became "Mine":
Sean asked me to visit him in Idaho again, so I took Chloe and Bryn with me this time. We had a complete blast! We went to parties, climbed on top of a train to watch the sunset, and hiked 6 miles to a beautiful lake with an awesome rope swing.

Can I be totally lame and cheesy for a minute? While Sean and I sat at the campfire by the lake (see picture above) all I could think about was a Taylor Swift song called "Mine". It fit our situation perfectly. We were sitting by the water with his arm around me and I knew he was the "best thing that's ever been mine" (even though he wasn't mine yet). 

While we were in Idaho, Sean and I had many, MANY long conversations about whether or not we wanted to become "official" or if we wanted to date other people. I remember one night at his apartment in Idaho after watching Across the Universe everyone fell asleep and Sean carried me to his room so we could talk about us. We both knew we wanted to exclusively date each other, but I told him I couldn't do that until I was able to talk to my 'long distance guy' so I wouldn't hurt him. Being the sweetheart he is, he understood and allowed me some time. Little did he know it would take about two months. I was really scared to give my heart to someone. Fast forward two months, Sean flew out to Colorado to be a groomsman at his step brothers wedding. While he was gone, I sent this guy a letter and told him I had met someone else. When Sean came home from Colorado, on July 4th I surprised him with the good news. That same day while we were sitting on the letter "U" in the mountains (one of our favorite places), we became "official", "boyfriend and girlfriend", "exclusively dating" whatever you'd like to call it. He was "Mine".

How We Said the L Word:

When we started dating, we were definitely in that puppy love stage, but we never said "I love you". We both had the exact same viewpoints on that: It's special; when you don't mean it, don't ever say it. When you mean it, say it a lot. We both knew we weren't in love yet, so we never said it. We really had a good time together. Sean's semester ended mid-July and he moved to Salt Lake to his sister's place. I was living at home for the summer in Centerville. There was a 20 minute drive between the two of us, but one of us drove it every single day. Yes, we spent everyday together. We went boating, went to arcades, took walks, hiked, went to hot springs and hot tubs, drove to a cute town called Daybreak (where we had our bridal pictures taken a year later), went to parks, and spent a lot of time with his sister and brother in law Ashley and Karl. When we weren't together, we were talking on the phone or texting. Obsessed with each other? Yes! And dang proud of it.

At Daybreak, can you see how happy I am? I knew Sean was special because whenever I was next to him in a picture, I got a huge, really cheesy smile.

This picture right above is quite a hilarious story. It was a Sunday afternoon, and we took a drive to this pretty river. We were just playing around and Sean found this 'playground'. It really wasn't a playground, but he made it one. It was a little area of wheels and bars. He was sitting on a ledge, grabbed a bar, and swung on it. Well, he swung really fast, right into a pole.... that went between his legs. Poor Sean was on the floor almost in tears and I was up on the ledge laughing so hard I had tears too. Well, he recovered, and we were able to get this picture of us. On to the purpose of this part of the story, how we said the L word. About 2 weeks before we told each other, I knew I loved him. I can't pinpoint one moment when I found out I loved him, it just came to me gradually. It was a feeling I had never experienced before. Every time I was about to see him, I'd get so nervous and have crazy butterflies, but the second I saw him I immediately became calm and relaxed. He made me so comfortable. He was my best friend. I knew I loved him when I realized I wanted the very best for Sean, even if it wasn't me. I wasn't going to be the first to say it, so I just waited patiently until he did. I knew I loved him and I could say it back whenever he was ready. It happened on a Sunday afternoon, I can't remember when, probably around the month of August or maybe September. We were in Ashley's basement (Sean's room for 6 months) falling asleep to a movie. I was half asleep when Sean said "I think I love you." I woke up fast. Real fast. My heart was racing. All I could say was, "Really?" He said he did, and I told him I loved him too. From that day on, we have said "I Love You" about a million times a day. It never gets old. No matter if I hear it in person, over the phone, even in texting, or when he mumbles it while he falls asleep, it means the world to me.

Dating:
I could talk about our year of dating for hours. I'm just going to share a couple of good memories. Something I'm so happy we did, is we never gave up. Not once did we break up, or even have a conversation thinking about breaking up. I don't think we've even said that word. Ever since we started exclusively dating on July 4th, we've been in it together. We had a lot of difficulties, problems, and differences to get over. It hasn't been easy, but we've been in it for the long haul. Even before we thought we'd get married, we were fully committed to each other. As for the whole marriage thing, we were not in sync. When he wanted to get married, I didn't. When I was finally ready, he wasn't. I'm a big believer in timing. When we were both ready, we got engaged, but that's a story for later. One of my favorite memories with Sean is when we went to Del Taco at midnight. It was a Sunday night and we were starving, so we waited until midnight, got bundled up in our hoodies, and went to get some gross mexican food because it was the only thing that was open.

Why is this one of my favorite memories? I don't know. It just was fun. I felt like I was with my best friend, not my boyfriend. We were tired and silly and I looked absolutely awful. Another good memory was Halloween. We carved pumpkins (Sean had to buy the biggest pumpkin that weighed over 20 pounds) and dressed up together as a cowboy/cowgirl when we went to the Utah State Howl party.

To be continued again... Sorry.