I'm in love, I'm in love, and I don't care who knows it!

Just thinking about my love at work. Here's the past year of our life in pictures!

August

This was our first "date." I invited him up to SLC to a Cervical Cancer Awareness Awards Dinner which ended up being about ten people, all women, and me and Austin. He was such a good sport. :) It only counts as a date because he bought us cheese fries afterwards. Haha.

September

Austin took me outdoor climbing for the first time! It was suuuuuper fun. No that is not sarcastic. It was also our birthday month!

October

We went Halloween dance-hopping then watched a scary movie at my apt. I was a cowgirl and he was a fat bloated constipated man. I saw him bump and grind for the first time and the last time (at least for the next 2 years).

November

No pictures of us together! How odd. But we were definitely together every single day except when he left for AZ over Thanksgiving. But he helped me a ton with my texting awareness campaign, shown here.

December

Uncle Mike! Austin's bff Sam's uncle is Michael McLean, of the Forgotten Carols. He scored us tickets to the show and we got to meet him afterwards!

January

Ooo, a good month! Hard to pick. This is from my first overnight camping trip with him to Snow Canyon down south. My favorite climbing trip with him so far. :)

February

He's good at being romantic when it comes down to it. One of our Valentine's Day activities was ice skating in the snowfall. Very romantic, haha.

March
Another packed month! We flew home to Seattle to meet my parents for the first time. Tons of fun!

April

I graduated!!!!!! Austin met my Aunt and Uncle and my parents for the second time. He also had very long hair.

May

I ran my first half-marathon! After being a good motivator through four months of training, Austin helped me through this crazy weathered race.

June

One of the coolest things about dating a Utahn native is that they know all the secrets of the place. Aka I got to do such cool things!! (Don't worry, I love him for better reasons than that!) One of these cool things is Mona, the waterhole pond place that you rope swing into! He was awesome and took me and my friends that were visiting that weekend there. So fun!!! (note: the boy in the picture is Austin's friend, not him. Or me.)

July

We headed to the Uintas, the beautiful yet mosquito-ridden land for climbing and camping and fishing. Look at him go!

August

At long last... we are engaged. A wonderful proposal from a wonderful guy, I can't wait for October 23!!

I just had the strangest experience

This old woman, over 80 years old, just came in to get her blood drawn. She is the sweetest old lady, so nice and happy regardless of her painfully arthritic hands and inability to lift her arms up on the chair to get her blood drawn. So I had her lay it on her lap and drew her from down there. The son, still old enough to be my grandpa, was so incredibly grateful to me for getting her the first time and for being so careful with her. He just emanated gratitude from his face! Now the strange part, is it almost made me tear up!

I think it is because he was so grateful which made me think 1) he really loves his mother, also evidenced by his taking her to her doctor's visit and 2) his mother must have gone through lots of painful procedures in her life. Both of which made me tear up, almost.

There are so many people in so much pain in this world! I see so many every day just through patients. Some are cranky about it but some are so kind and wonderful and happy regardless of their many problems. I hope I can be that way too!

the times, they are a-changin'

Holy busy busy busy. Holy change change change. Holy holy holy.

There are so many big events coming up, and therefore tons of things to do to prepare for them!

So far for the wedding I've got the venue booked, colors picked, plane tickets purchased, a guest list started, a music playlist started, photo slideshow started. What do I need done? My word. Pick a photographer, pick invitations, gift registry, doctor's visit/birth control, book the temple, HOUSING, cake, flowers, dress, bridesmaid dresses, wedding band, oh, and all the things I've started yet not finished.

Time is ticking away...

Also, I just got my first PA school interview!!! With Wake Forest in North Carolina. I just purchased my tickets right now and I'll be there Nov 14-16, right after Austin's brother's wedding. Let me tell ya, the weeks forthcoming are absolutely insane. I'm flying to Seattle in about a month, then running a half-marathon with the Goffs, then running like 15 miles in the Grand Canyon with the Goffs, then we're getting married, then Tanner's getting married, then the Wake Forest interview, then potentially a U of U interview, during which I have to take a basic anatomy, physiology, and medical knowledge test. Oh and they don't provide a study guide.

It's kind of crazy all of the things that are piling up. This is going to be the busiest fall ever. I can't wait until our honeymoon (planned for Thanksgiving break) when I can just relax and breathe. Everything will be done by then. Well, unless I get interviews with any other schools. Which would be awesome! But just expensive and stressful at the same time. But I guess all good things can't be entirely good.

I'm getting married!!! I'm flying around the country for interviews!!! Is this what growing up is like???

We're engaged!!

Austin proposed to me last Thursday and we are engaged!!!!!!

We had picked out a ring the week before and he picked it up on Tuesday but said he wasn't ready and probably wouldn't propose for a few weeks so I was just DYING because I wanted to see the ring and of course be engaged so it was hard... but then, the little trickster, he takes me to his new apt to drop off a TV and we walk inside to see the kitchen table covered in pictures of us, music playing, it's set for dinner, so I start freaking out. I just kept thinking OMGOSH IT'S HAPPENING RIGHT NOW RIGHT NOW RIGHT NOW!!! And then he starts reading me the following sonnet by Pablo Neruda and featured in Patch Adams:

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.

I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you simply, without problems or pride:
I love you in this way
because I don't know any other way of loving
but this, in which there is no I nor you,
so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand,
so intimate that when I fall asleep
it is your eyes that close.

So I started crying because it is just so beautiful... and he leads me over to where the ring was... and asked me to marry him. :):):)

Oh it was so wonderful. I was giddy all that day and the next, couldn't stop smiling, etc... :) It's so fun! Anyway, the date is October 23 which is coming up way fast I know, but no other dates worked out (his brother is getting married in Nov and his other brother has finals for law school in Dec). So we already took some of our engagements last night with my WONDERFUL photographer BFF Becky Leung, and this picture is one that she worked on because she couldn't wait. :) We'll get them back in a few weeks. I'm so excited!

Things are a whirlwind but I am so happy! Yayyyy everything is so great!! <3

first August post on the 16th??

It's not like I haven't had things going on, but just nothing for posting. It's been a crazy few weeks (hahahha I just typed "phew") But I guess I can write about this weekend!

Saturday was Austin's and my one year anniversary of dating. :) So after I dropped Caroline off at the airport, spending a sweaty two hours in my little non-air conditioned car, Austin picked me up and we did some shopping then made bacon wrapped jalapeno peppers for dinner. We ate while watching Pure Country, a movie starring George Strait, one of my new favorite country singers, then headed out to a surprise destination! I'm so glad it warmed up that night, because we went to a pond by his work to feed the ducks!! May sound silly to you, but it was a lovely gesture seeing as he absolutely has refused to ever feed the ducks (or the birds) with me. So I was happy as a clam of course. :) Ooo we also saw this crazy snake looking thing in the water, it was so fast! And eating the bread too, but it was so dark we couldn't see what it was... kinda creepy. I want to go back in the daytime to see what it is.

Then we did this thing that he had actually planned for Valentine's Day (exactly 6 months earlier) but we never got around to doing. He brought a jar and we wrote down three things then put them in and read them. 1. One thing you love about the other person. 2. Where you want to be in 15 years. 3. A favorite memory with the other person. (I feel okay writing this here b/c none of his friends read this so he can't get ridiculed for the romanticness) How adorable is that?! To top off the night we went to his new apartment and made brownies and had them with ice cream. All in all, a wonderful day and night!

Other news: I'm leaving Heather Cove Condos finally this week, after a lovely long year living in them. I'm moving in with my friend Jamie, her family lives in Orem and they're letting me rent out the basement bedroom (which apparently is HUGE! the size of my kitchen and living room put together. holy holy) and eat there, etc, so I'm way stoked! It's also literally 2 minutes from my work so that'll be awesome. And I think that's all to report!