Forever with my best friend...Sounds good to me!

When I left school at the beginning of June this year I had every intention to spend time with my friends every day, read a pile of books, spend time with my family, relax, and then get ready to go back to school at Hawthorne in August. I laugh now to think I really thought that! What a turn my life has taken in the past two months...and I love it!

 So many little miracles have occurred in the past two months...if you ever want a good story I'll tell you them all! But some of them include:

Simply meeting Ian Falkner. My parents are in a bishopric at BYU-Idaho. They had tried to get me to go the FHE's at their house for months but after going once I didn't really want to go back. I just felt weird going to spend time with college students again. But in June after going to my own singles branch FHE, one of my best friends Christina encouraged me to go....actually basically told me, "Let's go. I want to meet these people!" We went and were there for maybe ten minutes, but within those ten minutes I met Ian. 

Ian and I only really talked about one thing that night, my Aunt Ronda, who he knew from living in Sandy. Just minutes after meeting Ian I remembered a conversation I'd had with my Aunt several years before where she simply mentioned she had a boy she wanted me to meet after his mission. I didn't really think it was Ian...but I wondered if it could by chance be him. So i was definitely shocked the next morning when Ronda gave me a call and said Ian had asked her for my number and she wanted to see if I remembered a conversation we'd had years before about a boy she wanted me to meet after his mission? Because that was Ian! I honestly couldn't believe it. But Ian had my number and just a couple of days later we went on our first date!

 

 We knew extremely fast that our relationship was going somewhere. He was graduating with his associates at BYU-Idaho and had a good job lined up in Utah, I had a contract job with District 91 in Idaho Falls, so we had every intention to continue dating and being happy and just seeing where it led....that didn't last long! I knew when he told me he loved me just a little over a week after our first date, and when I honestly could say it back, that we were in trouble!

 I always said I would date someone for a really long time before deciding to marry them. After being through this experience I have learned you can never change God's plans for you, and that you can also never judge another persons decisions! Because just a little over a month after dating Ian we began talking marriage. This is when simply seeing how it would work out long distance changed to can I get out of my teaching contract? Can Ian move to Idaho? What can we do? I honestly couldn't even tell you how that conversation went, but at the end of it we both felt like I should start applying for jobs in Utah and see what happens. I cried as I emailed my principal to even just tell him I was considering leaving. That was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. I loved Hawthorne. But long story short I had an interview at a school in Utah and had been offered a job...but I couldn't accept until they'd hired someone in Idaho to replace me. On Friday my Idaho Principal said there's no one in the system to even consider hiring but I'll check again on Monday. By Sunday I was crying in Utah, not about Ian, but considering leaving my family and everything I know and love. I prayed and bargained with God (maybe not the best way to go about it! But at that moment it's what I needed!) I told him that if he wanted me in Utah he had to get someone hired in Idaho by Wednesday or I'd move back and just figure things out somehow else. If he hired someone though I would move without hesitations and be just happy to be there every second I could! Well...Monday I received a call that two people had applied over the weekend and were being interviewed that day. And by Tuesday my principal called to tell me someone had been hired. I cried, a lot, but knew that now I will move and know this is where Ian and I are supposed to be right now and will have so many adventures together here!
 

There are still so many things to figure out, and so many things I could worry about, but I know Ian's going to be right there with me to comfort me, help me, and continue life's adventures with! By this point in our relationship we knew we were getting married, we'd looked at rings, he'd talked to my Dad, and I'd all but moved to Utah. I knew it was going to happen...I just didn't know when. On Thursday night we drove up to Trial Lake in Utah to be with his family. I was not a happy camper right as we began. It had been a stressful day for me in my new classroom and I was feeling completely overwhelmed. But I could have cried when just twenty minutes later Ian had me laughing and forgetting all of my worries! He's my best friend! After getting to the lake he asked if I wanted to walk from the campsite down to the water. Some of his family was going too. I kind of wondered what was happening when he grabbed his backpack from his car and said he was going to bring some waters. The lake was less then a quarter of a mile away...I didn't understand why we needed waters! But I didn't say anything. When we got there his Uncle had a canoe. Ian did not want to go for a ride on it. (This is why I was not expecting what happened next!) But I got him to go. We set off and I was being my dorky self singing and laughing. He just kept asking me to relax and calm down. Mind you my back was to Ian, I was sitting in front of him on the canoe. Finally I did as he asked and just sat there. He asked me to turn around and on his paddle he had rested a letter and asked me to read it. Such kind words had never been written to or about me. I cried as I read his words. But still, I didn't think he was proposing! When I finished he asked me to slowly turn around again and sitting on his paddle was the ring. Half of me wanted to scream for joy and half scream "don't fall in the water!" Ian simply said, "Melissa, will you marry me?" Somewhere in there I took the ring, said yes, cried, and then yelled at him to row back to shore so I could hug him! We were both laughing and couldn't stop smiling. When we got to the bank I realized most of his family had been watching (I had been completely oblivious!) and his Aunt had recorded the whole thing. I have never felt happier then I did that night. I love Ian Falkner!

 Ian and I have many adventures ahead. I smile when I think that I get to be with him forever! Sometimes you hear people say the love of their lives is the half that made them whole, but for Ian and I it's a little different. I feel like we were both two very whole people. Set in our life, and who we are, and happy with the life we were leading. But together we build upon each other and are two wholes that will never be separated! We are learning how to balance both of our families (so fun to have my parents come down this weekend!) our jobs, our dating life, laughter, seriousness, the gospel, and just being together. It is the greatest thing that ever happened to me, a girl who had accepted being single and honestly saw it for me for a long time, and I know Ian felt the same way about himself. So October 19 we will officially continue this journey together and I can't wait to be with him forever!