Engaged! Thats Right, I'm engaged! :D

So, here is a dual post from Becca and me. Enjoy!

Becca's Side of the Story.

Hello all of Daniel's faithful readers and those who have stumbled to this blog! I still haven't found my blog in case you were wondering, I am sure it's doing well though. I ended the last blog with a few questions. So I think this next story will answer quite a bit of the ones you may be wanting me to answer.

  Over the summer I have moved to Utah, worked two different jobs, lived out of my car for a little, have gone rock climbing a little, and visited Daniel. Oh yes, and we're engaged. What? oh yes, we are engaged now!! :D ( this smiley is not nearly an adequate substitute to show how happy I am, but it will have to do) I guess that answers the " What does Daniel think about all this?" question I asked. How? You are full of questions aren't you? Okay well if you really want to know here is the story...

 Stardate 07/14/2012
My birthday is on the 15th and Daniel decided to come visit me for my birthday weekend. When I have a birthday I automatically figure that the days surrounding my actual day of entering this world count as celebration time as well. So I was really excited that Daniel would be coming to visit me, because not much of my family could celebrate my birthday with me. Except my older sister Christine, her husband Josef, and their little girl Makayla who also brought my delicious birthday pie which was home made! Plus any time with Daniel just seems to hold a lot of unexpected turns. Well on Friday when he arrived we decided we were going to go for a hike together the next morning. It  turned out to be grey and drizzly which is perfect weather for a hike. We woke up a little late that morning and didn't meet for breakfast until around lunch time. We had really good blueberry pancakes that I made. I got to see one of my favorite families who stopped by and celebrated a little birthday fun with me. Finally Daniel and I went on our hike to Battle Creek falls in Pleasant Grove, Utah. We passed a beautiful waterfall and a really beautiful view of the valley from the canyon. We came to a point on the trail where we could see most of the peaks of the mountains and I was struck by how much detail is in everything. The mountains had the clouds touching the top third part. I realized how much love Heavenly Father must have for us to put that much care and detail into the world we live in. He wanted us to look around and always be able to see the love He has for us. Even the very layers of the earth contain a color and beauty. I told Daniel this he looked around and studied everything. I love that about him he really does consider what I am saying he doesn't just agree to pacify me. He held me close for a few seconds and then said he wanted to give me something. He was taking some time to rummage through his backpack so I kept looking at everything when he pulled out a little red box. At first I though it was going to be some joke he was pulling and there would be a keychain or something. Or a medal he promised to make me because I am so awsome. But then he pulled out the box and showed me the sweetest ring it was so clear and bright that right then when the clouds came out it sparkled!!( No joke that really happened) He said" Becca I love you, and I want to be with you always, Will you marry me?"  I completely forgot about the ring and was just so happy to hear that that was really what he wanted. So we kissed and then I said..."No.." Which he looked at me with a " Becca this is not the time" look that really set me straight becuase he never looks at me like that. I repentantly kissed him and smiled and said" Yes, I will I'll marry you." The sun was still out through all of this and finally it started to get a little cloudy again. We started to walk down the mountain and he said," I wanted to show you this part because we are going to have a lot of mountains to climb together in our lives and I wanted to show you how beautiful it can be."  I know I was quite taken by that too. He can be really clever.

  So then we went to a birthday bar-b-Que for me with some of my dearest friends where I got to sneakily show people my sparkly ring! I loved doing that, because even though Daniel isn't with me and I can't introduce him I can show the ring he gave me to remind me of how much he loves me.

 I love him. I can honestly say that I haven't ever felt this way about anyone and every time we get to talk and be around each other it just grows more and more. All his little quirks all those things that some people may find annoying, I don't care about. Because I choose to let them go and remember the choices lead by the Spirit that brought me to him. I hope all of you are enjoying your time with your eternal families. I hope your all living each day to prepare to be eternal families. I am so happy to be able to share this journey at the beginning of my eternal family.

 Daniel you are everything I need in my life to help me be happy, steadfast, and diligent on my journey in life, I love you.

And my side of the story

So, I love this girl. Her name is Rebecca Suzanne Askren. She is amazing, and is everything that I’ve been looking for. I’m so blessed that the Lord let me find her, and put us together, and that we both were willing to work to continue a relationship. I knew pretty early on that I was in love with her, and that I would do a lot to be with her. I had decided to drive out and see her memorial day weekend, and that drive was the kicker, I knew that if I was going to be driving 1500 miles round trip to see her, that I wanted to pursue a more serious relationship with this wonderfully smart, attractive, and virtuous young lady. I’m glad she felt the same way, although we both had doubts about how things were going to work out, we chose to pursue a relationship, and let things happen however they would, and trusted that the Lord would help things to work out for the best of both of us.

So fast forward a few weeks, and she is planning to come out and see me in Colorado for a weekend. I couldn’t have been happier, then I hear that she got sick the day before she was planning to come, and had been puking almost the whole day. I was a little depressed, and prepared to drive out there to see her that weekend if she couldn’t come because she was sick. She started feeling a lot better though, and so she decided to drive out still, but didn’t tell me this until she sent me a text saying that Wyoming was brown, flat, and boring. I was thrilled that she felt I was worth driving all that way to come and spend time with. We had a lot of fun that weekend flying kites, playing with Ben’s telescope, listening to the coyotes howl, ad going to the singles branch here.

The next weekend I was able to see her because I made a stop on the way out to Idaho for Grandma’s funeral. I had mixed feelings. I was really excited to see her and spend time with her, but was a little sad that it was because Grandma Butler had passed away. She was an amazing woman, and I’m glad Becca got to meet her when I was out there Memorial Day weekend. We had a lot of fun that weekend, and Becca was a great comfort to me.

After that, and after the spirit telling me again that I needed to continue to pursue my relationship with Becca, I knew that I wanted to marry her. I thought that right before her birthday, when I was already planning on coming out to see her, would be a good time to propose to her. It would be the last time I would see her before our longest time apart. I wanted her to have a symbol of my commitment and my love for her. So I started looking at rings (I had looked some before this as well but now I was really looking). She told me that her grandmother was going to give her a few rings to choose from, but I knew that she wouldn’t like any of them and I was still planning on buying her a ring.

So the week came, and I picked out the ring that I wanted for her. I felt great about buying it, but it was still a nerve wracking process going to jewelers and looking at buying an engagement ring. I found an amazing ring to give to her (sorry I forgot to take pictures of the ring). I had called her mother that week as well, and told her I loved her daughter and wanted to propose to her. She was excited to hear me wanting to propose to her daughter. But back to leaving to propose to the love of my life, I left work early on Friday and went to the jeweler’s to pick up Becca’s ring. It was beautiful and I was excited to give it to her.

I had decided that I would propose on Saturday morning/afternoon while we were out hiking (Becca had planned that we could go on a hike that day). So Saturday morning came, and I went to Becca’s. She had just made blueberry pancakes and they were delicious. We then started talking about what we were going to do that day, and I kept saying that we should go on a hike, but it took a little bit to convince her that we should go on the hike. She found one that was really close, and had a pretty waterfall to go and see. It was called Battle Creek falls. So we headed out and started up the canyon on the hike. It was a cloudy day, but it was beautiful. We hiked to the waterfall, but there were a lot of people there, and I wanted it to be more of a private intimate setting where I proposed, I also wanted a better view of the mountains when I proposed. So we kept on hiking until I found a spot where we were alone and also had a great view of the mountains. I stopped, and told her that I had something for her, and pulled out the ring from my pack. I then told her that I loved her, and then asked her to marry me. She was so excited, and started to kiss me, and then pulled away, and said no (with a mischievous look on her face), and then said yes. The sun came out right then, and then I told her that I wanted to propose to her there because we could see the mountains and that we would have a lot of mountains to climb together. It was wonderful to have proposed, and to hear her say yes… after teasing me. I love her so much though, teasing and all. The only thing that could make me happier now is if we weren’t separated by an 8-hour drive.