That one time I got a random makeover at Kohls

So, earlier today I was shopping at Kohl's.

As I perused the make-up section, I found a small clearance area. Some of the prices were really good, so I started to open boxes and see if they had my color in anything. A middle aged Hispanic woman was looking through boxes next to me. She gave me some helpful advice in finding the number on the box so that I could just look at it in the samples rather than having to open each box. I thanked her and, finding a couple of things, I moved on to the jewelry.

I was smirking at some ridiculously loud necklaces when the woman came back over to me. In broken English, she explained that she does make up and asked me if I'd like mine done. Not one to turn down cosmetics related offers, I gleefully accepted.

I followed her back to the make up samples, and she started covering my face in concealer. She explained to me that concealer is good for "covering... things". I'm certain she believes I was completely unaware of this fact, because I was feeling really lazy this morning and hardly did anything with my make-up.

As she continued painting, I tried to get to know my impromptu make up artist better . Her name is Fatima and she grew up in Chihuahua, Mexico. She has 6 children between the ages of 11 and 17, with just the oldest being a girl and the rest are boys. She does make up for friends and family for a hobby. Fatima learned all that she knows about the art from watching Mexican novellas (soap operas).

As she was getting close to finishing up, I began to think that she might do this in hopes of making some money. She had mentioned that she loved shopping. I was prepared to reach into my purse for a few dollars, because she was just being so sweet. When she said she was finished she turned me to look in a mirror and waited just long enough for me to exclaim, "Oh! It's lovely! Thank you!" Then she just smiled, put a hand on my arm said, "You are very pretty," and thanked me in return.  Immediately she turned around and walked away before I could give her any money.

I had to go pick Ben up from school right after. As he flung open the car door he cried out, "WHOA! Well, hello my little Mexican wife!"

Rightfully so. Because this is what he was greeted with.

It's not bad at all, just not at all me. In Ben's words, "It's like biting into what you think is a chicken sandwich and getting a banana instead. Not bad, just very different."

Actually, I kind of like parts of it. But, most of all, I loved the experience. It's hard not to be happy when someone just did something nice for you for no other reason than that they wanted to.

So, wherever you are, Fatima, thank you for one of the most happy, random experiences of my life.

You're a beautiful person.

One Ring to Rule Them All.

Disclaimer: If you are the type to gag at true love stories, walk away now. You've been warned.

So, you remember that one guy from my post about trek? You know, the one who crammed his long legs into the back seat of the car for part of the trip, so that I didn't have to?

Well, it turns out that I love him. He's going to marry me.

What? You want to know how we got here? Well, dear reader, I will be delighted to expound.

Since you all know me already, I will start by letting Benjamin introduce himself. You'll know it's him because it will be in a different font. Also, it will not sound like me.

My name is Ben. I got engaged to Stephanie on Friday. I like marshmallow mateys. I like to hang out with Stephanie. I like to run, but not from Stephanie. Actually, I don't hang out with Stephanie, we go on dates. It's hard to think of clever things to say when you're soooo.....sleeeepy..... But that's not a problem for me because I never get tired! I like to consider myself a connoisseur of beauty, which is why I keep Stephanie around. She makes me say cheesy things and brings out the bad grammar in I.

Thank you, my dearest Benjamin. We'll be hearing more from him as the post goes on. He'll be inserting commentary to my side of our story. 

Many of you noticed that I fell off the face of the earth back in late June. Part of this is because my blog is primarily a weight loss blog, and with my knees deciding to fail me, I had lost a lot of my zest. I had also rediscovered how great food tastes, and was having a hard time talking myself back into dieting.

Then came Ben.

Even after a long day when I look like that, he still looks at
me like this. Fo' reals, people.

With him, my resolve to blog was completely shot. Gradually, he became a huge part of my life. I began to have an increasingly difficult time thinking of anything worthwhile to talk about that didn't tie back to him in some way or another. I also did not want to blog about my dating life. This meant that my blog just kind of... faded away.

Over the past few months I have received increasingly hostile demands for details about my life from former fans of this blog. So, now that things are rock solid with this fella, I figured that I would let you all in on the happiest part of my life, thus far.

I first met Ben in a teacher development class at church. I knew him as the incredibly handsome and intelligent one who was obviously way out of my league. Then we were divided into families for trek. I tried not to seem overly enthused at the discovery that we were in the same group.

But first, let me insert a comment about that class! There was this girl in that class that I was interested in dating, but even though she was nice, she would never sit by me. So I was pleased to discover she would be trapped in a motor vehicle with me for 12 hours.

I've never been more happy to be "trapped" in my life. On trek, we got to know each other better, even through the mysterious sound divide of the two rows of seats. (See the helicopter story.)

All during the drive, I found out that Stephanie was a fascinating person and I had all sorts of questions to ask her. I was disappointed that she still wouldn't sit by me; she kept sitting on a different row.

Upon returning to normal society, I made certain to end up next to him at every possible ward event for the next week. He caught the hint, apparently, and asked me out on a date. Then we went on another date. And another. Soon we were seeing each other a few times a week and I was unknowingly using up every last minute on his cell phone plan.

I discovered that he was not only intelligent and handsome, but he also had the same sense of humor as me. Most importantly, he has the kindest, most genuine personality of any person I have ever encountered.

With all of these amazing qualities, naturally, I was just waiting for him to figure out who he was dating and run in the opposite direction as quickly as his cross-country runner legs would carry him. I was thrilled and amazed when he not only chose to stick around, but really seemed to be genuinely falling in love with me in return. Warts and all.

All of my time was spent going on bike rides, hiking, and dancing in the star-light. I found that he was my best friend. I never feel self-conscious around him. The best way I've found to describe his effect on me is that he brings out the very best of me, makes me want to be so much better than I am, while somehow making me feel like I am perfect the way that I am. I have never felt more beautiful.

What is so awesome is that our feelings were completely congruent. I felt everything she felt, only I felt the same way about her that she felt about me, not about me the way she felt about me. And I don't feel beautiful, but that's okay because I'm a boy and I don't care.

This all sounds like the perfect story to add up to me regaining all of the weight that I lost. However, that is not at all what has happened. I have stayed within 5 pounds of my total 50 pounds lost the entire summer. Considering that I've been trying (and failing) to fatten Ben up, this is even more impressive.

Finally, a couple of weeks ago, after much hinting, we came to the solid conclusion that there would never be anything that would make either of us happier than being married to each other forever. So, we began to make plans and went ring shopping. He then informed me that, sadly, my ring would take a few weeks to come in. Then, this past Friday, he planned a very special date. We went on a romantic candle-lit picnic up the canyon, at a place where we had one of our most memorable dates early on in our relationship. He brought a fresh bouquet of flowers from his parents' garden and some of my favorite foods.  Then he asked me to go on a short walk, and then proceeded to lead me up the steepest part of the Crimson Trail. At this point I inquired as to just how "short" of a walk we were going on. He promised me that it wouldn't be too far, and true to his word, we soon reached the spot. It was a place where the trail split and we could see all the way down Logan Canyon. There was also a rock that was the perfect spot to sit. We talked for a few minutes and then sat quietly before he jumped down from the rock and got down on one knee. The next thing I knew, he was opening a ring box he had made out of some shiny origami paper from one of our dates and saying, "Stephanie, will you marry me?"

In my mind, I thought that I was saying a clear, "Yes" and then calmly picking up the ring. Apparently, I actually did some unintelligible squealing, grabbed the ring with lightning fast reflexes and put it on my own finger. In hindsight, perhaps I should have let him do that. I was just  soooooo excited! I mean, seriously. I get to keep my best friend with me for the rest of eternity. And he's the one asking me to do so! That is the coolest feeling ever!

I'm pretty sure I heard a clear, happy, yes, like the chime of a bell. I thought the whole candelit dinner with all the artifacts from our previous date at Guenevah campground would give my plan away, but fortunately, it did not. It was raining everywhere but where we were. Literally.


Now, I'm sitting here with him. Finally typing up our story. The dress is bought. The appointment is set at the temple. The ring is on my finger. His secret plans for where we're going on our honeymoon are underway. There is still a great deal to do to plan for the reception and such, but things are rolling along quite nicely,

I can say with complete honesty that I have never been as happy as I am right at this moment. Every day is better than the one before. I'm always discovering new reasons that I could never imagine a better person to be stuck with.

Now there's only one problem.

Eternity is not nearly long enough.

Day 159

Busy week! I just got home from my first full rodeo. Lauren and I went together and had a marvelous time.

The announcer and rodeo clown could use some help, though. The clown kept on yelling jokes up to the announcer in the booth who would kind of pass them on to us through the mic. Unfortunately, they didn't seem to realize that this had the effect of listening to one half of a phone conversation for three hours. Fortunately, the parts that I did get sounded like they were all racist or misogynistic jokes, so I don't feel like I missed out on much.

"Uh-huh. . . . . . . . . . . . . . Oh, yeah . . . . . . . . . . . . . So, how can you tell it's married?. . . . . . . . . Oh! laughter I don't think I can repeat that to them." 

For three hours.

That being said, the rodeo itself was a whole lot of fun to watch. There are some unbelievably tough men in the rodeo business. My favorite part by far was the mini-bull riding. It's just like the big bull riding, only with little kids and little bulls. 

I was very impressed.

In news that is relevant to my goal, my knees aren't hurting, and the swelling in my foot seems to be going down, so I'm planning on running again this week. I've had it recommended to me, from a fellow runner with knee issues, that I run barefoot on the grass as part of my training. Apparently, that helps your body to just naturally fall on the balls of your feet, rather than the heels, which eliminates a lot of the stress on your knees. 

Come Monday you can fully expect to see me frolicking barefoot through my backyard for around a half hour. I also have a hunch that I will be singing a certain song.

Oh yes, I am looking forward to it.

Day 158

My right foot is pretty swollen. No idea why, but it has been for a few days now. It is also kind of sore.

It doesn't really hurt when I poke it, so I'm hesitant to get it checked out. Because, you know, everything that needs to be inspected by a physician hurts when you poke at it. So, while it still passes the poke test, I'm just going to proceed to ice and elevate it.

Today rocked. Kelsey and Natalie came over and watched a movie this morning. We watched a movie called Fireproof.




It is super corny and predictable, but I love the message that it has.

Then I had a date with Tressa tonight. We wandered around the Summerfest festival downtown, where I ran into my friend Tina, as well as my and Tres' old friend Scott and his beautiful wife, Leslie, who is expecting their first child.Then we went to Tesha's graduation from Dental Hygienist training.

We're pretty darn proud of that girl.

Then Tressa and I continued our date by going to get an ice cream cone at Charlie's Ice Cream, where my other friend, Lindsay, was working. Then our other old friend, Derek, walked in.

I can't tell you how much I love unexpectedly running into friends. My life is stellar.

The song that I am in love with at the moment is Little Romance by Ingrid Michaelson. I can't seem to stop humming it and smiling.

Day 157

I ran 3.5 miles today. This was the first time in a couple of weeks, since my knees have been giving me problems.

My right knee didn't hurt at all during or after the run, but my left was just a bit achy during the run. I didn't time myself, but I figure that I just kept an easy pace, probably around 12 min/ mile.

Knee wise, I consider today to be a success. However, I have had an awful time after my run today, and I think that it is due to a few mistakes that I made.

1. I started my run a bit after noon, when it was bordering hot outside. 
2. I haven't been drinking enough water lately, and today was no exception.
3. I slept in and just had a granola bar for breakfast, with nothing else before my run. This was after I accidentally skipped dinner last night. I also have not been eating very healthy foods for a few weeks now.

All of this added up to a migraine off and on through-out the afternoon, and I haven't been able to keep any food down all day, either. Also, I am very tired, even after sleeping half of the afternoon.

The great news with all of this, is that those 3 things are all choices that I can change for future runs. If my knees are back in the game, then so am I.

Boo-ya, baby.

Day 156

Trek was awesome.

It was also quite eventful. I am still discovering scrapes, bumps, bruises and the odd sore muscle. I'm also still recovering in the sleep department, so this is likely to be a highly revised post as I come back and re-read it.

We kicked things off with a 7 hour or so car ride through Wyoming's vast array of sagebrush and nothingness. Fortunately, I was in a vehicle with 6 people that I now know are rockstars. There were Nate and Kristen and their 8 3/4 year old son, Hyrum. My fellow young single adults were Ben, Katie, and Julie. Since I have the leg length of your average Dachshund, I volunteered to sit in the very back with Hyrum. This was also a great arrangement because I've missed in depth discussions about Legos, Skippy Jon Jones, and various ways to play dodge ball. However, my the seating arrangement made things interesting due to the fact that I still very much wanted to get to know everyone else in the car, and apparently I am an elderly woman who is experiencing hearing loss. Somebody would say something up front, and I would hear something completely different in the back, if I heard anything at all. This would lead to conversations that went something like this 

(Actual excerpt):

I heard something about a helicopter

Me: Well, it would sure have its pick of where to land out here. It's wide open. (Chuckle)

Rest of car: Silence

Ben: What's landing, Stephanie?

Me: The helicopter. (Awkward chuckling as I wait for everyone to catch on)

Katie: None of us said anything about a helicopter . . . 

Me: Oh . . .

Eventually, we made it to Martin's Cove.  We only had a short 2 mile hike into the cove. 

It was relatively flat and a well paved trail. Everything went according to plan, except for the weather. The wind was strong enough that I could spread my arms and lean most of my weight into the wind and it would support me. I took a video that doesn't completely do it justice. Fair warning: Turn down your volume before watching.

After a very thought provoking trip through Martin's Cove, we hopped back into the cars for the hour trip to where we would set up camp. Ben was kind enough to cram himself into the back seat for this leg of the journey. I stretched out my legs in the next seat up, enjoyed the scenery out of the window, and felt slightly vindicated as this conversation took place:

Me: That is one of the most beautiful horizons I've ever seen in my life.

Ben: What dress?

Me: Huh?

Ben: The pretty dress you just talked about . . .

Me: HA! It's not my ears! It's the back seat! The words change between here and there! HA!

After nearly flying away while setting up the tent in the ridiculous wind, the weather began to calm a bit as we ate dinner and then were taught some square dances by the resident senior missionaries.

Then we unwound even more by playing jump rope with an enormous rope. We then played tug-of-war, stick-pull, and leg-wrestling. After spending a bit of time around the campfire, I hopped in my bed a bit early, with the hopes of being well rested for the next day's 10-mile hike.

Around 11:30 camp quieted down enough for me to drift off.

Around 12:15 I was awoken by a couple of the guys talking. I was beginning to be slightly annoyed, when my mind registered that they were talking about their tent being flooded with at least 4 inches of water.

My semi-coherent mind threw out the thought, "At least I'm sleeping on an inflatable pool float. I'll be fine."

Then the thought of a flooded tent fully sunk in and my eyes flew open in unison with my hand struggling its way out of my mummy bag to feel the ground around me.

Dry.

The floor was dry.

I started to breathe again. My tent with 5 girls had lucked out. Several other tents weren't so fortunate and had to wade with their stuff over to the trailer we used to haul stuff around in, which became a make-shift shelter. It was decided that we should move our tent a bit further away from our new shoreline property, just to be on the safe side. So, we all stumbled around in the dark to unstake our tent and maneuver it to a place that we deemed safer. 

I loved all the people who were on Trek. Seriously, these people are amazing. Even after all of this, I heard very little complaining. I fell back asleep to the sounds of the flood victims all laughing and joking from the trailer.

We woke up early to a gorgeous day and hit the trail.

 I found out later that there were conflicting reports floating around about the trail condition, but all that I heard was that we would encounter some water in our first 1/2 mile, and then we would be okay until the official river crossing, much later. In actuality, the trail-head was underwater. We were in and out of thigh-deep water for our first 3 1/2 miles. Nobody knew when the next flooded part was, so we spent a great deal of time drying our feet and changing in and out of our hiking shoes.

It was a really cool experience. Everyone was so quick to help each other in whichever way they could. It seemed like every time that I started into the water, someone was offering me a hand, or shouting out from ahead to tell me when I was approaching a hole under the murky water. Some of the smaller girls, and those with injuries, were carried across. 

I watched as men waded back and forth, sometimes in water up to their hips, to make sure that every girl made it across safely. These are some incredible people.

Would we laugh when somebody face planted and came up covered in mud? Oh, yeah. But, it would always be as several people were running forward with their hands outstretched to help them back up.

After lunch it was decided that we would take the fork ahead for the 6-mile loop, rather than our original 10-mile. The original purpose of going the whole 10 miles was to experience a river crossing, but, well, we were as water-logged as we cared to get from the unexpectedly flooded trail. I must confess that I was pretty bummed about not doing the entire 10 miles. I knew that I was becoming completely exhausted, but I was enjoying myself immensely. There were so many experiences on that trail that strengthened my faith and brought me closer to all of those around me. 

A little over half-way, I noticed that the most significant thing that was occurring, was something that was not hurting. I had been very nervous about my knees. Even with Aleve and my braces, they were feeling achy the previous day. I can only think that it must be a tender mercy that I did not feel one bit of pain in my knees during the 6-mile trek, up and down some steep hills and rough terrain. Near the end, I managed to trip and fall on my way out of a water-crossing. I went down hard, landing right with my knees on some rocks. This was when the tubing in my braces saved me from anything worse than some slight bruising and a few scrapes.

I am a very blessed girl.

After we made it back to camp I sat down, and never wanted to get back up. At that moment, I thought the patch of shaded grass where I had planted myself with my feet in the sun was the absolute best place in the entire world. Pulling a handcart requires muscles that I just don't use in everyday life. Every move that I made awoke soreness in parts of my body that I'm not certain have ever been sore before. 

So, of course, we did more square dancing. We all stumbled and staggered our way, laughing through the whole thing. Then one of the girls from the ward lead us all in yoga. I didn't get pictures of it, however I know that somebody else did. If I ever get my hands on them I will post them on here. There's just something about watching a bunch of pioneers doing Downward Dog that I find hilarious.

After a powerful fireside devotional, we spent a couple of hours cooking s'mores and talking around the fire.

Didn't turn out how I was imagining.
If you look closely you can see some pioneer silhouettes, though.

At some point I went to bed.

Saturday morning we woke up, cleaned up the camp grounds and broke camp. On our way home we stopped at a site called Rock Creek Hollow, where 13 members of a handcart company died in one night and were buried. There was still an impressive amount of snow there.

The panorama feature on my camera decided the scene needed some pink.
Thanks, camera.

 After that, our long journey home was only broken by a stop to split a few big pizzas at Bear Lake.

While I was super excited to take a long, long hot shower and sleep on a bed, I was really sorry to see Trek end. It was an amazing adventure with some of the most magnificently stupendous people I have ever gotten to know in my life. I'd go just about anywhere with this group.

Day 155

I leave for Trek at 6:30 in the morning, which is just less than 8 hours from right now.

Don't think I've quit or died or anything, but I'll be gone for 3 days.

The last time I went on Trek, there was a strict weight limit for what I could bring with me. That was not the case this time. So, what do I bring to get my pioneer on and hike across the barren Wyoming nothingness?

This is what:

The sweats are for sleeping in. The Chacos are for the river crossing. The rest of the time I will be in my pioneer garb.
Those baby wipes are my bath for the next 3 days, so things are about to get pretty ripe up in here.

And then I crammed it all into a large backpack and a smaller backpack, while the bedding went into a trash bag.

And now I bid thee all a fond farewell, until we meet again.