Hey Batter Batter Batter

From about April until mid October I am consumed by one thing. Softball. I love playing and if you ask Rafe he'll probably tell you I love it a little to much, this year I got to play with four teams and I had a blast. I made some really great friends and I cannot wait until next season. I consider myself a pretty good player, and I can hold my own. If you look at some of the pictures below you might think otherwise.

Thanks to the teams that allowed me to play with them this year. Thanks Business Time, Thundercats I and II and Team Buster. We experienced wins, losses, crazy umpires, championships, and of course played teams that didn't belong in the same league. I'm talking to you Copper Mountain.

Go Thundercats! BYU Champs

Trying to dive for a ball....didn't turn out to well. Just some of the injuries sustained this year.

Going to the Chapel

So many of you know Rafe and I have been dating for a little over 10 months and its been a great 10 months with him, so its finally official; we are engaged. YAY for us! We are both really excited about spending our lives together and building our family.

We met right after I moved to Salt Lake two years ago, I was sitting in Sacrament and he was on the stand counting the attendance that day (he is the ward clerk) and he had caught my eye, in fact I think he caught me looking at him a few times during the meeting. We had only talked briefly a few time to discuss business like my membership records and tithing and such. He and I didn't have much interaction beyond that and shortly after I started attending a different ward. Almost a year later I finally transferred my records to the ward I had been attending and received an email from Rafe. He said he was sorry I wasn't in the ward anymore but maybe we could get together some time. I quickly replied back to him that I would love to do something sometime, and gave him my phone number. In the age of digital everything I was so impressed that he ACTUALLY called me to ask me out and not message me on facebook or text to ask for a date, he won major points right off the bat for that one.

Our first date was great, we had dinner and laughed so much, we knew we would be fast friends because we both had snarky remarks to make about the awkward Jazz fan who asked for a picture of Andrei Kirilenko while he was eating with his family. After dinner we went back to his house and played a couple rounds of ping pong, I thought I held my own but he still beat me. Come to find out just a couple weeks ago when we were playing ping pong he brought up the fact that on our first date I was serving incorrectly but he didn't want to let me know because he liked me (what a gentleman).

I was definitely excited to have made at least at that moment a new friend, but luck was on my side and he asked me out for another date and we've been together since.

Rafe is so great in many ways, he has the kindest heart and is never one to turn his nose up at serving anyone in his ward. Since I've known him he has moved probably seven or eight people, made countless runs to the airport to drop off or pick someone up, and many other selfless acts. I'm not surprised at the number of friends he has, he is so willing to help out a friend at any time. He has a great sense of humor and you can always count on him for a quickwitted comeback.

We always have a great time together and I always laugh when I'm with him, he thinks I'm pretty funny too which I can't argue with. I've become a Ute fan, Brewers, and Jazz fan all because of Rafe. I have come to appreciate tv shows like Top Gear and he has even got me to watch one of his favorite movies Hot Rod; although I still can't get on board with Burn Notice. He has learned to tolerate watching Project Runway with me, but won't budge and give Glee a chance.

He lets it slide when I make noise when tasting my food or smelling it before I eat it and perhaps finds it a little endearing when my body temp ranges from extreme hypothermia to heat stroke at any given moment. He patiently waits for me to finish laughing before I can tell a story or joke because I think its so funny I can't stop laughing long enough to deliver the punch line. He is a wonderful person and I am lucky to have found him. He was so supportive and patient with me when my mom suddenly passed away and gives me comfort when I'm feeling sad and missing her. He made the trek in blizzard conditions up to Idaho to spend Easter with me and my family and survived meeting all of the extended family. He spent the weekend camping with my family and happily set up and took down mine and Laura's tent, played horseshoes, indulged me and played games with us and sat around smokey campfires. We made road trips together to San Diego and Phoenix and still wanted to date after we got back home.

I am very grateful that we have been able to come together as a couple and now make the transition to husband and wife. It will be an exciting journey.

At least I'd get a purple heart

Our friend Erin decided that for her birthday she wanted to get a group together and go paintballing, and we were all on board. We arrived and were escorted to the waiting area to receive our guns and masks, then given instructions how the game will be played. I felt unsure of what to expect at this point so our group decided to walk around to the side of the arena where you could see inside to the game being played. The referee inside signaled to start the game and then all you could hear is continuous shooting from the paintball guns and the loud bam as it hits the walls and barricades and see this large group of boys running for cover and trying to shoot their opponent. Now I'm nervous. I stand there in awe and I think how in the world am I going to get out of this.

Well our group is called and we enter into the arena, we are split into two teams and sent to opposite sides of the playing field. I tried to figure out a place to run and hide as soon as the game starts and plan some sort of strategy and before I know it the ref yells go and we scramble to find a place to hide while rapidly shooting. It was funny how in my brain a switch flipped and all the sudden it was kill or be killed. And of course I was killed, I don't think I even got 5 or 10 shots off before I was blasted by paintballs. I wasn't sure what it was going to feel like to be shot but when I did I knew that I didn't like it. I raised my hands to signal my death and quickly retreated to the far side behind the net, not before I was pelted in the head with a paintball. This went on for a while until either everyone was dead or no one was shooting anymore. We did a couple more rounds and I did not get any better as the games went on, I was shot in the head again, in the palm as I surrendered because my gun ran out of air, in the back, arm, ribs and then right in the face. When I was hit in the face the paint went through the vents and into my mouth on on my face. It tasted discusting! I was really glad when we all decided we were done for the day.

We went back to Erin's and had pizza and retold stories of battle, I would not be a good soilder; don't put me on the front lines. It felt like I was in the movie Saving Private Ryan and I was one of the soilders who didn't even make it off the boat to the shore.

Rafe and I preparing for Battle

Lacey demonstrating what will happen to me, and she was pretty much right. Erin the birthday girl is in the middle, we all blame her for the great time we had.

Check out the paint splatter on my face, I took it like a champ

Because I'm so gansta?

Retelling stories of battle

One of the battle wounds I can actually show and post online. OUCH!!