Little (and big) Moments by Cameron

Wow, we are down to less than a week when Anna and I will be reunited from being thousands of miles apart for the past few months. Anna in Romania and me in Texas. Next Wednesday (May 18th) we will be meeting back up  at the Salt Lake City, UT airport. This will be a great day to say the least. Will it be a little bit weird? Maybe. Awkward? Possibly, since my parents will be standing right next to us. Awesome? ABSOLUTELY. 

As I anticipate our reunion, I can't stop thinking about so many great memories that Anna and I have already had even though we have been together only a year. I thought I would list eleven of them. Why eleven you ask? I don't know, I just think the number eleven is pretty cool and it's one of the easiest numbers in the multiplication tables.... except for one, ten, and definitely zero. Well I guess it's easy until you get into multiplying eleven with double digits, then it gets flat out confusing. Rambling.

Here's my top eleven favorite memories with Bananas in really no particular order. There are a lot more but some of them are more personal than others. ENJOY!

1. Synthesis
Our second date together was to a BYU concert featuring, Synthesis, an incredible jazz group that can really  get down. Although it was one of Anna's longest school days, we had a great time. There was great music, interesting people to look at, fun things to yell at the band, and well, I had Anna by my side so of course it was a fun experience. The highlight of the night is when we conspicuously played footsie while watching the concert but didn't acknowledge it all, tehehe. This night was definitely a memorable one and here are some pictures to remember it by.

We'll see how long this pic of Anna stays up.... tehehe.

2. Walmart Excursions
As most poor college students in the Utah Valley we near worship Walmart. Not only is this apocalyptic retail powerhouse great to buy sub par produce, killer deals on electronics, and Mcdonalds, but it also makes for great dates with a significant other that shares the enjoyment of people of watching as much as me. Who needs Netflix when we have all of the entertainment we need at a local grocer? I deeply cherish Anna and I's late night Walmart runs to ease frozen pizza and Sour Patch Kids cravings. Many laughs were shared in the aisles of that store in Orem. Here's a picture from one of our adventures there. I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

3. First Kiss
I will never forget our first kiss. Anna had this thing about our first kiss being in an interesting and exciting place rather than in a boring apartment or in my mini van (which I think is pretty sweet). Thus, I planned an evening where I blind folded her, took her to Rock Canyon Park, hiked up one of the inclines to a small cave (yes, still blindfolded), and in that spot revealed to her the beautiful view of Provo and Utah Lake with just the moon lighting our surroundings. You would think this would be enough right? Wrong. It took about the next twenty minutes for Anna to be able to kiss me. This twenty minutes included laughing in my face, sitting and talking about it, and just standing there and looking at each other. Yes it finally happened and yes it was amazing. As ridiculously frustrated as I was at points during that evening, I loved it and I wouldn't trade our first kiss story for any other one. I'm getting all gushy just thinking about it.

4. Zoo
I loved our trip to the zoo. One day when we were off of school and work, we both dressed up as zoobies and ventured into the heat of the Utah summer to see the beasts the local zoo had to offer. I will spare you the details but it was so much fun being a kid again with the gal I love and adore like none other. We saw things from elephants and giraffes to even my ancestors, monkeys (yeah, I am hairy). I think we were the only adults there without kids but we didn't care, we just had A LOT of fun.

Zoobies for life!

We're T-Rexs, just in case you couldn't tell.

5. Four Wheeler
This past fall, we visited Anna's grandparents quite a few times for Sunday dinners. Some good home cooking food in that home. Her grandma makes THE BEST banana milkshakes. One of the times we found ourselves up there Anna and her grandpa thought it would be fun to pull the old 4-wheeler out. We both hopped on with Anna driving. I was thoroughly impressed with Anna's abilities to maneuver that thing. She was cruising! I also must say that it was pretty dang hot seeing Anna hauling in complete control of the four wheeler and with her hair whipping in the wind. Somewhere down the road we may need to purchase an all terrain vehicle.


6. Temple
I will not say much about this one, but I loved attending the Provo LDS temple with Anna. To see her in white and doing such eternally significant things for others was amazing. I find it so attractive to see and be with such a spiritually well rooted gal. A gal that knows who she come from, where she came from, why she is here on earth, what she needs to do here, and where she will be going after death. I am grateful for her parents, Dirk and Laura, for setting her on the right path and I am so grateful and humbled for Anna's commitment to continually become spiritually stronger.


7. Proposal
Bananas and I spoke about marriage early Fall. We both concluded to jump into this relationship head first. Although after this decision we weren't officially engaged because she wasn't wearing a ring yet but it pretty much definitive. Anna was not aware that she was dating the king of surprises and catching people off guard; you would have think she would have known due to the fact that my birthday is on Halloween (I'm not sure how that has anything to do with it....) ANYWAYS, I thought it would be fun to surprise her in two different ways: her ring and when/how I was going to propose with it.

Her mother graciously offered us a very generous gift of her wedding ring. Anna had no idea. That was surprise number one. Surprise number two came on the first game of the BYU football season where we beat Ole Miss. Leading up to the game I had her mother call her and invite us up to Salt Lake City for dinner later that evening. I had this "brilliant" idea of going up about an hour before the dinner and "wander" around temple square together. Anna totally bought it as just another fun date with Cam Cam rather than a proposal. Little did she know, I had a photographer in a disguise taking pictures of us (see below) the entire time as well as her mother hiding in the bushes close by watching us.

As we were wandering around I just spontaneously knelt down and gave her a romantic shpeel about how incredible she was then asked her to marry me. She sadly didn't hear any of these sweet nothings because she was telling me to "shut up", to "stop it", explaining like this "isn't real," and covering her mouth. It was so cute. She said yes.... thank goodness, and I slipped her mother's beautiful ring on her finger. Then to top off the night her, myself, and her mother all went out to eat together afterward. This is one of my fondest memories with Anna thus far.

Keep in mind all these photos are in the moment with our disguised photographer, not staged. Thanks Shane!

Anna is going to kill me for putting this kissy one up.... but it's pretty dang cute huh?

8. BYU football Games
Yes, Anna and I are big zoobies. We bleed blue like no one else and thus attended all of the home football games. Although we had some tough losses and some cold weather, we loved every minute of it. I think my favorite part about the games is having my adorable fiance clinging to me trying to keep her tiny little body warm. We look forward to waking our kids up with the fight song and completely smothering them in BYU apparel. 

9. Haunted Forest
This past Halloween Anna and I thought it would be a great idea to go to a local haunted attraction on a double date with her brother Luke. This turned out to be a fantastic decision. We had a blast. It was so much fun being the manly man for my fiance to cling to when creepy things crept out from the trees along this haunted trail. Little did she know, I was just as terrified as her. GREAT memory. You can read more about this one on an earlier post by Anna.

10. Birthday Dinner
Anna was so cute with my birthday dinner this past Halloween. She asked me what I wanted for my birthday and I told her a nice dinner cooked by HER and a movie. This I guess turned into one of THE most stressful times of her life. First off, she couldn't decide what she wanted to cook and then when she finally did she lost the recipe or something. Long story short, it was hectic for her. Thankfully, she had a wonderful roommate that came to the rescue to assist in cooking a lovely sweet and sour chicken dinner with delicious peanut butter cookies. Everything turned out great but Anna was just a little maxed out, cute, but maxed out.


11. Honey Bunches of Oats
For the morning of our last day in Utah together Anna thought it would be a really nice gesture and romantic to wake up SUPER early and make me breakfast before I left that day on the long road trip to Texas. For those that don't know me that well, I love food and thus I find these types of gestures EXTREMELY romantic. The night before, she bought all of  the things she needed to make me some breakfast tacos. The morning came and we'll just say that sleep got the best of my Anna and pushed her to run late. She sadly didn't have enough time to make me the breakfast she intended BUT she did pour me a huge bowl of Honey Bunches of Oats and ate it with me. I fell in love with her all over again that morning.

CONCLUSION!
In short, I love Anna to pieces and I am so grateful for all of the big and little memories that we've shared together. Those "little moments" as Brad Paisley put it (see below), that makes me fall in love with her all over again without her even knowing it. I look forward to making even more memories with Bananas as we venture together as husband, wife, and best friends. Till next time!