We had to try our hand at apple dipping.

Turns out it's easier than it looks, and they taste just as good as they look.

I love enrichment. Painting pumpkins,

and....caramel apples! (Thanks to Emma).

October Harvesting

We loved having a garden....even if the produce was small.

Here is Kris at work.

Vacation!

Serena and I had our 2nd anniversary on August 18th, so we took the week off and went to Mesquite, NV. During the day we hiked till we were exhausted at Zion National Park and in the Zion's Backcountry where we hit The Subway!

The Subway was the best hike I've ever been on and I highly recommend it. It's a little tricky- you have go get a Zion Park pass (usually about $25), go into the park, then buy a back country permit at the desk. Those permits cost $10, but you have to get there fast because they only offer a limited amount of backcountry permits. They were sold out the day we went so we bought one for the next day and came back.

After Zion National Park we drove up to Rexburg, ID where we went to a Family Reunion with Serena's Family. I'm uploading some pictures to an online photo album so you can see all the pictures here:

Click here for Zions National Park Pictures (and a video)

Click here for Family Reunion Pictures

Hiking-I almost forgot how much I love it.

So the Browns invited us hiking. We did the Crimson trail as a warm up earlier in the week and the Wellsvilles on Saturday. What was anticipated as a 6 mile peak hike, was actually a 12 mile mountain range adventure.






The view from the top of the wellsville mountains is unbelievable. We were warned that there was no vegetation..............we bushwhacked through nearly half of our hike.


We loved every minute of it........except for the last 3 miles or so.:)

Serena and I went to Provo last weekend for the wedding of one of my best friends growing up, Dustin (D-Dawg) Roberts. We had a great time. Here are some pictures from the visit.

Here they are just coming out of the Mount Timpanogos Utah Temple. It really was a fantastic day.


Here are some of the friends that were there. (We missed you Nathaniel and Bryce.)




Here they are not smashing cake into each others faces. That came just a second after this picture.


Here's one of me in front of the car we decorated. Dustin asked us not to do anything, but what kind of a friend doesn't decorate his friend's car at a wedding? Actually, the bride's maids kinda took over. I only added the streamers, but those were even taken off before he got to the car.



Well that's all. Congrats to my old friend Dusty.

Hiking!

Last week was a really great week. Serena and I had 4 entire days off together.

First off, we had Sunday- that's normal. We did just one thing super spectacular- we started a dinner group with our friends Geoff and Cami Brown. It was AMAZING!!!! Cami made super amazing BBQ Beef Sandwiches and this perfect fancy potato salad!

Then we had Monday. That was better. We went hiking in the morning. Not a big hike- just the Stokes Nature Trail. I think we went 4 miles, ate lunch then hiked back. We had a full day of cleaning the house, cleaning the car and going shopping... then we played "The Farming Game" with some friends.

Thursday was the best of all. Thursday Serena and I woke up really early and got ready to hike "Jardine Juniper". It's an 11 mile hike to an old tree. I guess it's 3200 years old and still alive (barely). The whole hike was really pretty and the day was nice. The tree itself was really neat too (but just so ya know, it wasn't like the redwoods or anything- it's just a normal sized tree that happens to be really old). One really fun part of the hike is that there's a box of notebooks there where Serena and I drew pictures and wrote poetry. That was really fun.

If you want to know how the poems went you'll have to hike there and look for an entry on the date we were there.

After the tree we went further up the canyon headed to bear lake, but along the way we made a couple stops.

First we stopped at a cave off the side of the road we hadn't really noticed before. It was insane- this whole huge cave had a huge river coming out of it. We had to stop to look around and take some pictures.

Next we stopped at a place where we carved our initials in an Aspen Tree just after we got married. While there we put two tick marks since we've almost been married two years... I think we're gonna just keep addin tick marks over the years.

Finally we made it to Bear Lake where we stopped at at a local burger place to eat lunch and grab a Famous Bear Lake Rasberry Shake. It was really good... then off to Bear Lake. The Lake is this perfect aqua blue. It's amazing really. Also, they have great sandy beaches that are totally free. The only catch is that the water is really really cold. That's okay, we didn't do a lot of swimming. We ate snacks, napped, read and when we got way too hot, we took a dip in the lake. We had a fun time playing frisbee with an arobi I found in the lake too.

Eventually we went home and met up with Nate and Lina Hardman. They took us out for a Little Ceasars Pizza, Ice Cream and X-Men 3. Serena and I have been watching all the old X-Men movies to get us ready to go see Wolverine.

Saturday we had off together too. We went to the temple in the morning and when I came home Serena had gone off to help a family clean their house cause they were moving. When she came home we cleaned up, had a quick picnic lunch and then went for a bike ride in North Logan... mostly loooking at houses. We like to see houses and decide what styles we like and get landscaping ideas... it helps us stay sane while we wait for graduation when we'll actually join the modern world... air conditioning, TV's and normal height ceilings.

All in all it was a great week. I hope it was a great week for everyone all around... Memorial Day is great.

P.S. I was in charge of the Anniversary this year and I finally made up my mind- we wanted to stay somewhere decently nice, but we didn't have buka bucks so I decided on Mesquite NV. It's a small resort hotel so it has some fun stuff on the grounds and it's not a casino and there's no smoking allowed. I'm thinking we're gonna try to hit some fun places nearby. Zions is only 2 hours away and the Grand Canyon isn't too far either. Maybe we'll visit Vegas if we feel like it.

The tulips at the Temple are so pretty right now...

Kris and I were at the temple today and wanted to take some pictures with all of the beautiful flowers. I was able to go through a session today where my friend Colleen was receiving her own endowments. She is headed on a mission to Florida.

Cody Playing Baseball

Here are some pictures of Cody playing baseball. Cody is my little brother, he is so cute. I hope I get to see some of his games. Thanks for the pics mom.
Cody is in the middle....



Here he is trying out some pitching.

Wind Caves with the Browns

The other day Cami came over and asked if we wanted to hike the wind caves with them so off we went. Here are some of our pictures and some for the Browns.











The other day Cami came over and asked if we wanted to hike the wind caves with them so off we went. Here are some of our pictures and some for the Browns.

BORED and the Garden

So I told Serena that my new role on the blog was technical support and that she was the content manager... but I'm so bored.

For the longest time I thought that some of my coworkers were just lazy- that there was always something to do at work. This week though, that's not the case. Today I went into work and there was littlerally no normal work to do. I've spent the last 6 and a half hours cleaning things that should never be cleaned- I swept the parking lot!!! among dozens of other similarly pointless tasks. The only reason I'm here is for support for the production line. I need to be here to get them something in case they need it. Guess how many things they have asked for today- 0. I even called them and asked if there was anything they could think of that any shift would need for the next twenty four hours... they said no.

I guess I'm just trying to justify blogging while at work. Really though, I can't think of another thing to do... except scrubbing each of the racks in the warehouse.

But I refuse! They asked me to twice now and both times it seemed like a painfully horrible waste of time. They only have dust on them and since I have no dusting supplies besides water and paper towels all I do is attract more dust. Even if I had supplies... it's a warehouse! It goes back to being dusty in less than a day and it takes more than a day to dust everything.

I just won't do it voluntarilly. They'll have to specifically ask me to do that.



Guess what though... We planted a GARDEN! We and our neighbors Geoff and Cami Brown tilled the whole thing by hand... we hauled out tons of garbage. We removed two telephone poles and 8 parking blocks... and now we're done!

Here's what we planted:

Watermellon
Strawberries
Cilantro
Jalapenos
Green Peppers
Tomatoes
Potatoes
Corn
Butternut Squash
Crookneck Squash
Zucchini
Carrots
Cucumbers

I think that's all. We're not sure that the cilantro or peppers will grow since the package said to plant indoors first and we didn't. We just don't have anywhere in our house to grow them... and we certainly don't have a green house.

Before the garden was there it was just a big empty field that was accumulating trash. I recommend finding a big empty field by your house and making it a fantastic garden!

Spring finally came......

Doesn't it seem like winter lasted an eternity???
At least now Spring is so appreciated.
One of my favorite things about this time of year are the tulips that pop up in front of our house.

What happened to the Easter Egg hunt?

We live across from Old Main Hill and today we woke up to hundreds of hungry seagulls.

It is apparently tradition to roll hard boiled eggs down Old Main and wait for the flocks to arrive.

I was skeptical at first, but today we went and checked it out. It is actually really cool. There are seagulls covering the sky and chasing the eggs as they roll down the hill.

Enjoy the pics.

ok-I'm taking charge.........

Kris is sick of blogging, so I am taking over. We'll see how it goes, wish me luck.

Passing the buck

Serena read my last blog and thought that it should be deleted. I told her that instead I would just delete the whole blog since I didn't like blogging anymore. She didn't like that idea so I told her if she liked it so much she could have it.

So I'm pleased to announce this will be Serena's blog from now on... I'm changing the pictures and title and things like that so that it reflects that it's hers from now on.

Adios!

No Comment

I've noticed I rarely get any comments and I have no idea how to see if anyone is actually reading these or not....

In light of that...

This is my last post.

Goodbye cruel blogging world.

New Number... & New Shoes... & 6 things

Hey all, I got a new phone number:

435-232-8820

That's really all that this post is about... but I also got new shoes...

I went from something like this:

To something like this:


Also, Lina Hardman tagged me for 6 things... I'm not really sure what I'm supposed to do.

I guess I'm supposed to write 6 random things about myself:

1. I'm a Civil Engineer... major. Three more years till I can stop saying major.
2. I'm 130 pages into reading the Old Testament... 1070 left. I want to finish before 2010.
3. I'm drop dead in love with my wife.
4. I'm a Temple Worker at the Logan Utah Temple.
5. I work at a Medical Supply Company called Thermo-Fisher Scientific. I drive a forklift.
6. I just bought these way cool new awesome shoes and got a new phone number.

Title Switch / Some book Recommendations.

Serena and I made a deal- this will now be my blog until she wants to post for the first time (she still has never posted).

So effective today I'm changing the name of the blog from The Bennett Family to Just Kris.



In other news...

I'm right now reading Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Someone recommended it to me so I started it over Spring Break. I thought for sure that it would be sort of a dumb scary novel. As it turns out though, it's actually a piece of British literature. All of the Hollywood movies completely misrepresent it. Nowhere are there bolts in the neck of the monster or scary lightning scenes. The monster may or may not groan at any point in the book- instead the moster is a very intelligent and introspective person.


Anyways, depending on the last 75 pages, this book is sure to be on my top ten list.

Next to read- Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde. I've heard its way good in the same way this one is- sort of an unexpectly smart read. Also, I'm planning on reading, by the same author, The Bottle Imp. Both of these were recommended by the same guy who recommended to read Frankenstein.


I'm really happy to find some really fun books to read. I was kinda put out by trying to read A Tale of Two Cities. It came highly recommended by a half a dozen people, but my first impression was a really wordy novel in the most annoyingly high diction on a subject matter that couldn't hold me at all (political romance- I'm not joking). How did a political romance novel become a classic?

No Sweets

Two months ago I made a goal of exercising every day. The plan was to wake up at 6 am every weekday morning and exercise till about 7 then get ready for the day. This plan lasted a surprisingly long time- one week.

I got a lot busier after that week and it became almost impossible to keep going. After a few weeks of no exercise I decided that it was time to try something new- diet. I'd never felt a need for dieting. I've never been safely thin, but I always felt like I was active and got enough exercise so I didn't need to diet. Things had changed. I was eating tons of junk food and had no exercise plan- this was a recipe for disaster.

I've seen diets though. They don't work. There are those one week binge diets that I don't think do much good and most are just plain weird and take far too much work. There are also those two month impossible diets- cutting out the carbs in your diet.

Excuse me if I'm wrong, but wasn't that the foundation of the old food guide pyramid? Also, isn't it in the word of wisdom that grains should be a staple to your diet? Somehow I doubt those diets yield much more than quick results and poor overall health.

My diet is simple and addresses the main obvious problem in my diet- SWEETS.

Oh, how I love desserts, sweets, sodas and chocolate! I had to put a stop to it though. I was doing the math:

SWEETS + lazy = FAT

... and it just didn't look good to me.

So it's now been almost a month since I've been on this kick. I wonder how long I'll last.

I should make a confession- there's a loophole to this diet. Since I began this diet because I don't exercise enough I finally decided I could reward myself. Every hour of exercise yields a serving of sweets or desserts. Also, I made ONE other exception- on Valentines day I let myself have the desert they served at a catered dinner... I gorged. It was great.

Jury Duty?

I can't believe it. I got summoned to Jury Duty today. Isn't that something that they want real people to do? I'm not a real person yet- not for 4 1/2 more semesters. What do I know about anything?

Actually, come to think of it, why do they need a jury in Logan Utah? There aren't any serious crimes that people would want a jury for. If I have to do jury duty because a pedestrian got a ticket for crossing illegally I'll be so mad.

Oh, I know. Parking! Parking is the biggest problem in Logan. The city, the school and all the apartment complexes are ruthless. If this is a parking issue I'm sure to side with the defendant- unless the defendant is a parking enforcer... then he's dead meat.

I'll be playing a lot of clue over the next few months to prep for this.

Beginnings and Ends

My sister Lynn says that it's not what a blog looks like, but what's on the inside that counts.

So, here's what's new with Serena and I!

Our biggest news is that we just paid off our debt! Some loans/grants came in that made it so we could pay off my student loan from a year or two ago.

We wondered for a while about whether or not we should because it was subsidized so I wasn't paying interest, but we finally just decided it would be nice to have nothing hanging over our heads.

The next big thing is that Serena and I were released from our callings as gospel doctrine teachers and we were asked to be ward temple coordinators. Along with that they asked if we would be willing to be temple workers. I went in to meet with a member of the Temple Presidency on Tuesday and so on Saturday Morning I start as a temple worker at 8 AM.

Because of some of the logistics, it turns out the temple won't need Serena to be a temple worker so she said she would come along with me on Saturdays to just do a session while I do my thing. My shift is only about 3 hours long so that will work out all right.

One other big thing that just ended- Serena and I just finished reading the Book of Mormon together for the first time. We're glad we're done because we were reading with the stake and they had us reading at a breakneck pace. Now we can go back to reading a more comfortable amount per day. So, now we're starting it over.

Other than that, everything is going on just the same as always. I'm doing well in two of my classes and depending on how you look at it I'm doing okay in my other three. It's nice to know that I'm doing very well in all of the important classes- all of my engineering classes. In all of my non-Engineering classes I'm doing just okay. My non-Engineering classes are in Math, Physics and Computer Programming. I'll probably get B's maybe C's in those, but I'm smoking my Engineering classes. It turns out I have a little bit of a nack for some Engineering subjects.

Help! I'm no good at blogging!

I have no time to blog.

I go to school and work all day and even on Saturdays I do school work all day.

Even right now I'm supposed to be trying to get a physics assignment done.

Here's my 2nd problem- I'm not such a good blogger. I really want to make everything look nice, but I don't know html very well.

Someone did share a really good link with me the other day: http://sjhblogdesign.blogspot.com/. It teaches you how to do some different stuff with your background.

One thing I would really like to know is how to make your middle back ground semi transparent.

I'd also really like to know how to make my header picture look nicer. Whenever I set the picture up to replace the blog title it looks really funky and doesn't work.

So, I'm calling for help! If anyone has any links or tips to get a blog to look cool in no time at all let me know. Noel, I know you are brilliant with stuff like this! Does anyone have any links like the one above?

Kris

P.S. Lynn, I'm sorry I don't update this blog ever.

A Kris Creation

Our Christmas Vacation

Just before Christmas we went cross country skiing! We found some sweet deals at a couple thrift stores in town and off we went. The nice thing about cross country skiing-it's FREE!

Here are Serena and I at the start of the trail...

This is Serena at the start of the trail.

Before Serena and I headed up to Rexburg for Christmas, we decided to have a sort of Christmas Eve celebration with just the two of us...

This is Serena about to open up a couple presents

Here's us in front of the Christmas tree.

After our own little Christmas we headed off to Rexburg for Christmas and had a blast. Here are some pictures up there...

Keisha and Cody, Serena's little sister and little brother. They're listening to their new MP3 Players- they were pretty happy about these.

Christmas Morning: The big one. Keisha and Cody got a new combo Air Hocky/Ping Pong table. You should have heard the screams- and all at 7 am.


This is Serena opening a present from me.


This is Clark and Serena's sister Tawnya. As you can see Clark got a gun. You know you're a man when your wife buys you a gun. You know you're a geek when your wife buys you electronics... and you LOVE them.

Winter!

Winter finally came yesterday morning. This morning Serena and I went for a walk and took the camera along- here is what we saw...

This is our back yard... as you can see, we got lots and lots of snow!













This is me. What can I say?

This is Serena. She's cute huh?

What's that behind her?
...

It's a Snow Cave! No, we didn't build it. I wish we did. We built one last year- it wasn't as cool as this one though.

This is me by the snowcave. I look a little dumb. Don't mind that.









Here's Serena by the Snowcave. She looks a little silly too, but more in a cute way. That's okay- we Bennetts aren't perfectly photogenic all the time, but we have other good qualities. Like... a sound appreciation for a good snow cave!

Hope ya'll have a real fun winter!

Making Fudge...

A few days ago our friends gave us some FABULOUS fudge along with the recipe so today we tried it out...

We had to boil it to 230 degrees (farenheight) exactly in order for it to come out right. We didn't think that would be so difficult so we went out and bought a thermometer. Turns out it was pretty tough. When it started to splatter lava hot sugar Kris dropped the thermometer in the pot... notice the melted handle on the counter...

We have yet to try the fudge.
It's still cooling in the fridge.

Here's Serena Licking the bowl.

Christmas at the Bennett Home

It's our second Christmas together. We love this Christmas tree. Kris's mom gave it to us last year. It barely fits under our roof, but makes it really cozy inside.








Kris is Looking Good next to the Christmas decor.









Here's one more of us.

The adopted Cat named Tide

So our house has acquired a cat. She's pretty, and apparently loves laundry. Thus the name, given by Geoff. We all feed her and house her occasionally. She waits for us in the tree.

We forgot the camera... AGAIN!!!

Yeah, it seems like we always forget the camera for the holidays. It's a miracle we have any pictures of anything at all. This year I had it! I decided that the camera may elude me, but I won't miss out on memories... so I DREW a holiday picture!!!

COMING SOON!!!!

CHRISTMAS DECORATION PICTURES (and maybe even a video!)

That's right... we decorated (and early too... AHH!!!).

We're seeing my mom this weekend and if she hasn't put up her decorations then I'll never live it down that I put mine up before she put hers up.

She once put them up WEEKS before Thanksgiving and left the decor up till Valentines day!! It was so long she had to clean each limb of the tree off because of the dust (yeah... it was fake-a real tree wouldn't have even been orange needles by then... it would have been a big stick).

I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas...

I finally decided it's time to decorate for Christmas. I'm not proud of breaking the Thanksgiving day barrier by 2 days, but we'll be out of town so we're doing all of our decorating before we leave.

Our Travel Plans...

We're heading to Provo Utah for Thanksgiving on Thursday morning (aahhhh... traffic!!!). I hear that Thanksgiving is the most traveled on holiday. Is that true? We'll find out. We had been thinking of going to both our family's houses for Thanksgiving, but that would have meant 5 hours in the car over our Thanksgiving break... I just didn't think that sounded so hot. That Means that we're headed to Rexburg Idaho for Christmas. Hopefully we can get some real time off work for Christmas... I don't like 2 day breaks.

Our Big Plans for Thanksgiving Break...

You guessed it... Twilight the movie. We're hoping to watch it with my mom on sometime over the break. I know... but I've actually heard it's pretty good.

One teacher in a class Serena and I are taking said that while his wife and daughter went out to lunch he waited in line for two hours to get good seats for them. Another student in the class said that they were also there and saw him litterally RUNNING to get good seats. What a Saint. It's bad enough for a guy being one of only two or three men in the theater... much less being seen for 2 hours saving seats.

Can you believe even I have read Twilight- My sister and my wife both read it and loved it so I had pressure from two sides. My sister said, "If you really want to understand Serena you have to read this book..." so I had no choice.

My review: This is not a book for men. If you want to understand women... give up now. Nothing can help you, least of all a book that will make you wonder about yourself. It's honestly a PG-13 rated Harlequin Romance novel with a twist.

But To be Fair... I was actually really addicted to these books. I put off a lot of class time and homework to read them... and I've read all of them and I'm even starting on The Host. Serena promises that the Host is much better. I tell you what though, if I hear one thing about "Edward's rock hard chest..." in this book it's going back on the shelf.

I'm home alone on a Saturday night. I just finished my homework so I'm bored and I realized we haven't posted anything in a couple weeks so... maybe I'll tell you about what I've been working on all day.

I've just designed a bench. Well... part of a bench. A team of us designed the bench. I just designed the end pieces after the group decided on some general qualities they wanted to include. Here are some pictures...

This is a 3D model of the bench that my teammate Marc made.

This is a screenshot of the dimensioned drawing I made for the endpiece.

All in all it was a really fun project. Obviously it's not a screaming new design or very complicated, but it was good practice.

Fall 2008

Today Serena and I went out and took some pictures on the hill by our house (Old Main Hill). We heard that tomorrow was going to be a little stormy so we might have done this just in the nick of time...


This is Serena and I under a beautiful tree that had just left some really nice leaves on the ground. I also really like the Logan Temple in the background.



This is on the steps of the Amphitheater on USU campus. It's a little less "fally" but I really like the amphitheater. This is where Serena and I came here while we were still dating to "look at the stars" and she told me she loved me for the first time (I had told her a week earlier). It was funny. I coaxed her into it. We were playing "Just Truth" like Truth or Dare, but without the dares. I asked her, "How much do you love me?" She said she loved me 100 kilograms and then told me that she did love me... then we went back to "looking at the stars".


And here is Serena. I hope no one minds too much PDA via blogging, but I just LOVE this gorgeous woman! Isn't she BEAUTIFUL!?


One more just for fun...
You guessed it... BLUE STEEL

Kris

Here is a hot picture of Kris

I love Serena

Here are just a couple reasons why I love Serena...

Our multi-daily congratulation HUGS.

DELICIOUS smells from the kitchen when I get home.

Words of ENCOURAGEMENT.

Your perfect words of WISDOM when I'm mad and need some good advice.

You WORK so hard at so many things.

I love you babe!

Kris

Caspers Ice Cream

"A Little Ice Cream Sure Sounds Great!"

This is Serena's and my philosophy. We took this picture at, you guessed it, Casper's Ice cream shop in Providence Utah. If you're ever in Logan you'll have to make us take you there. It's one of our favorites. It was one of our stops on our first date (our first stop was Takara Sushi where Serena works right now). It's definitely a great special occasion place. The atmosphere is absolutely unbeatable and the Ice cream is up there with the greats.

That's all for our rainy fall Sunday evening post.

Fall pictures

Here are some fall pictures we took...

Romantic huh?


Here's the Logan Temple as seen from Old Main Hill near our house.

And here is Old Main as seen from in front of our house.

Chemistry Video

This is a video I made for my chemistry teacher.

He gave me a T-Shirt that said, "I impressed the professor". I almost added (I still might), "And all I got was this stinking T-Shirt."

The Proposal

Serena and I had been officially dating for 1 week-- We had been unofficially dating for like 2 months. Either way, Nathaniel called me at work one night and told me that he had heard that there were great deals on wedding rings at a store called the New York Jewelry Company. Well, I went straight there after work in my paint covered clothes and hair and all. Sure enough, there were some great deals. I thought about buying a ring right there, but sales were final so I thought I should get some input from Serena.

So I went home and cleaned up then ran over to Serena's apartment. We had been planning on going out that night, but we weren't exactly sure what we wanted to do. I suggested that we either go mountain biking or we go (ahem...) ring shopping. She was hestiant and asked me if this meant anything and I assured her it didn't. She finally agreed when I told her it was no biggie and that it would be 10 mintues tops. We ended up going all around town and taking like 2 hours. Our last stop was the New York Jewelry Company. Serena found one there that was her favorite. As we left I gave the sales person a little wink wink while acting to Serena like I thought that was interesting information I would tuck away for some distant future possibility.

Serena and I had a date that night so I dropped her off to get ready for it and then I ran home and cleaned up and took my friend Craig with me to buy the ring. He thought I was NUTS (since we had only been publicly dating for about a week).

I didn't know if I would propose very soon, but I couldn't pass this ring up. As it turns out, you just can't have a ring in your pocket and not propose. I thought it over, talked to some close friends, went for a long prayerful walk and then pulled out my phone (scariest phone call ever) and called Serena's Dad to ask if I could come by his house to talk to him that Friday morning. He said that would be fine.

Here was the plan: Serena said that she and her dad were going to go horseback riding Friday morning to a place called Union Falls, but she had to clean her apartment and check out first. I was going to check out Thursday and leave early Friday telling Serena I was off for the summer. Instead, I was going to turn around and beat her to Rexburg where her parents live and I was going to borrow a horse (and maybe a guide) to beat Serena and her dad to Union Falls where I would be waiting with a rose and a ring.

That all didn't work out so hot. I still did the plan with telling Serena I was leaving Friday at 6. I packed everything in my car and she watched me drive off. Instead though, I unloaded everything at my friends house and turned around back up to Rexburg. The problem was that it snowed that morning in Rexburg (May 5th!) so we couldn't take the horses out. Instead Serena's dad suggested I take her to a place called Mesa Falls. It was a two hour drive away, but you could get there by car instead of horse and it was really pretty and romantic. Here's a pictures:So I waited with Serena's family till she showed up. While waiting Serena's mom, who had only met me once when Serena introduced me as just a friend a month earlier-asked me if I really thought Serena would say yes. I thought to myself, Until just now I did.

Finally Serena showed up. Everyone in her family pretended that it was just another morning and nothing was up. Serena came into the living room where I was waiting and started showing pictures... then she looked up and saw me and was really really shocked.

I asked her if she wanted to go for a drive and she said sure. I thought the gig was up right then and she knew what was coming. In the car Serena told me a story about a guy who proposed to a girl at Mesa Falls and the girl didn't believe it so she threw the ring over into the water. I was certain she knew what I was doing so I said, "Wow, I hope that doesn't happen to us!" She was really confused when I said that so I played my statement off as a joke or something.

Finally we got there and took a walk down to the falls. We stood and talked for a while then I asked if she was surprised to have me show up that day. She said she was shocked. I told her that the only thing better than one shock was two then I got on my knee. She started trembling while I got the ring out. I asked her if she would marry me and she nodded followed by a great hug and kiss.

How We Met: Kris' Story

It was a cold crisp January Morning- my first day at USU. I walked to the bus stop to join a throng who had also gathered in the cold to wait for the bus... and there she was among the throng-the beauty that made the frost of the season melt away, at least for me (and probably for about half of the other boys waiting out in the cold).
Just joking. That's the funny semi-fake story that I tell people when they ask how we met. Actually, I do vaguely remember seeing Serena that morning and then again I remembered seeing her in one of my classes and thinking that I should take her on a date.

Soon, however, I found out that she was dating someone else and so I decided I should keep my distance so the date idea was suspended and I started dating other girls. In the meantime Serena and I ended up becoming good friends.

Still thinking that she looked cute and nice (despite her undatability), I found a way to get to know her by eavesdropping while walking by her at church. Her friend (now one of my friends) Jen mentioned plans to go to a Choir Concert that night. That was all I needed. I stopped and told them that the concert seemed really fun and Serena and her friends asked if I wanted to come along. I eagerly (but carefully not over-eagerly) accepted the invitation and thus began our budding relationship.

One day after a test in the class we shared together Serena and I went to The Hub with some friends to celebrate finishing the test over some hot chocolate and sweet bread. The conversation became a big one for me when Serena mentioned that she told her boyfriend that they would start dating other people.

This changed things.

I was dating another girl, but that eventually fizzled out and I finally took Serena on that first date.

I took Serena to a Sushi restaurant on 10th North in Logan now called Takara Sushi. We marked down a couple inexpensive rolls of sushi that we wanted and were confused by the waitress asking if we were sure we wanted all that sushi. We chatted for a while till finally we were brought a monstrously large feast of sushi including a roll that was inside a salt and vodka bath that was lit on fire! It wasn't cheap. The total bill came to about 80 dollars!!!

A few dates later I finally decided to pop the question. And the rest is history.