The day after we got engaged, Dallin picked me up from school to head to the SLC airport on our way to Saskatoon, Canada.  To everyone's shock, baby Maverick was not allowed to fly without a passport, even though the family had called three different times in the past few weeks to confirm that he needed only a birth certificate.  Apparently there was a new law, which meant that Matt stayed home with Maverick and Danielle flew with Dallin and I. Thank goodness for nice people who let us switch seats so we could all sit together.  

     As we waited in line, a man overheard me telling Dallin that I had only gotten three or four hours of sleep the night before and sighed back, "Yeah, I'm sleep-deprived because I have to stay up writing emails." 

     Feeling silly for sounding like I was complaining, I explained, "I couldn't sleep because we got engaged last night, and I was really excited." 

     The man, who was in his fifties, was absolutely shook. The line around us went quiet before someone random finally congratulated us, and I stood blushing. He looked us up and down and asked, "When are you getting married?" 

     "Sometime after school gets out."

     "You're students?!" 

     "Yeah," I said, and then, by the mortified look on his face, wanting to make sure he knew I meant college and not high school, I clarified, "I go to BYU.  He goes to UVU." That didn't make him any less surprised.

     "Well you're at least waiting till after graduation I assume?! When do you graduate?!"

     "In a yea--"

     "We're still figuring it all out." Dallin took over the reigns of the poorly-steered conversation.  "I'm a little behind in school."

     "Well you sure jumped the gun with marriage, that's for sure!"

     We chuckled awkwardly. The first time Dallin and I were asked if we planned on getting engaged was when we were still 18 {the week he left on his mission}, and over the past year especially we have been asked by pretty much every single person we know why we weren't married already, as if there was something wrong.  So it was funny to be given a little dose of non-Utah/Arizona perspective on romantic relationships from this dude at the airport.  

    During our layover, I practiced not flitting my eyes over at the strangers around us which Danielle and Dallin cracked dirty jokes aloud. We finally arrived late that night and found our hotel doors decked out with handwritten hearts from Dallin's sisters.  I stayed in a room with Livy and Gracie.  The next morning, we met a lot of Dallin's cousins, who had flown up from various parts of the western U.S.  We bundled up and still weren't prepared for the bitter cold when we all decided to take a walk to a hippie coffee shop selling concoctions for the soul.  -12 with a -28 windchill was no enjoyable sensation; I could only feel sympathy for my brother and his next two years in Mongolia. 

     The funeral was beautiful.  It was held in a Lutheran church with green decor to honor his ten years as a football player for the Saskatchewan Roughriders.  The old priest, who had been an avid fan since childhood, made analogies about the resurrection being possible because Jesus had scored the winning touchdown, and now Ted could take the victory shower.  Over the pulpit, the cousins told lovely stories and argued over how to pronounce Urness.  Dallin's dad  trumped them all by explaining the origin of the name: the Norwegian ancestors were Petersons who changed their last name to the name of their village, Urnes, when they immigrated, because Peterson was too common.  As he transitioned to stories about his father, the Spirit was tangible with his emotion.  He reminded us that "we are not mortal beings having a spiritual experience, but spiritual beings have a mortal experience." His children took turns singing.  

     After the funeral was a slideshow and luncheon.  I enjoyed meeting many of the relatives, and I met even more at the formal buffet afterwards in the banquet hall.  After a few hours, the girls and I attempted to hot tub.  Of course, we had no swim suits, so we improvised swimsuits out of leggings, significant others' basketball shorts, and T-shirts, but alas, so many kids were splashing around in the jacuzzi that we decided against it.  Instead, Danielle hit every button of the hotel elevator and jumped out at every floor. 

     The next morning was the graveside service.  After the priest's prayer, Dallin's dad dedicated the graves of his father and grandparents in the snowy cemetery.   We placed roses in the ground.

     We attended a church meeting  at the ward building where Dallin's dad first felt something good as a nine-year-old, before he and his mother decided to get baptized.  Everyone joined up for brunch, where Dallin's immediate family stayed even longer for a game of Scrabble on a giant board. At the hotel, we did Come Follow Me together before Gracie started doing gymnastics on the mattress, and then we took a walk along the riverside.  Dallin and the girls tried to slip around on the ice of a gutter. Of course, even better was actual ice skating at the free rink, where we all linked arms and pulled each other along.  

     The next morning, we met one of Ted Urness' friends from the care home, a 104-year-old woman who was a total spitfire. She told us that, when she had her baby, she was living in a tent.  

     I am seriously so grateful to Dallin's family for inviting me to join them in Canada for the funeral.  Even though I never knew Grandpa Ted, I loved listening to stories of his life, especially knowing that it's his name that I will pass on to me and Dallin's babies! 

     I was a happily surprised when Dallin's parents invited me to join the family in Canada over the next weekend.  Although I've been around for quite a while, I still felt a little unofficial to be joining in as Dallin's girlfriend, especially for something so important as a funeral.  Still, I agreed to come.  That night, still a few days before the trip, Dallin called me and asked me out to dinner.  

    "We haven't had a nice sit-down dinner in a while," he said. "Would you like to go Carrabba's tomorrow at 5? How bout let's dress up." 

     And so I dolled myself up in my favorite blue floral dress. When Dallin knocked on the door, his brows pinched together as he stared at me like I was the most beautiful woman on the planet.  He kissed me even sweeter than normal. 

     "Wow, you are so gorgeous," he murmured. 

     Rain poured hard we enjoyed an Italian dinner with a friendly waitress.  Afterwards, he said, "My friend Jason showed me this cool spot over by the amphitheater.  Do you wanna check it out?" 

     So we drove the Bricklin up the side base of the small mountain, rolling down our windows to increase visibility and flashing our headlights at wide-eyed deer in the grass.  At last we pulled the car off the side of the road, and he pulled out his mission journal. 

     "I'd totally forgotten about this until the other day, but I found an entry that I wrote after our first time seeing each other after our missions."   After dating our senior year of high school, Dallin and I had spent two years apart, and then both returned within two weeks of each other in August, 2017.  The entry described that oddly-normal moment when I came down the stairs to see him, our nervous awkwardness in the car, our dinner date, and then the process of us becoming more relaxed as we lay next to each other in the grass of a random park.  We caught each other up on 24-months worth of experiences on different continents and established our mutual hope to simply test the waters between us before making any big decisions. Although in high school I had been so timid and he had always had to make the first move, Dallin wrote about how I slowly moved closer and closer to him...first reaching my hand for his...then snuggling my head on his shoulder...then eventually planting that second first kiss. The story continued until the entry ended with, "I think I love her."

   Now, as I heard the words in the passenger seat of the Bricklin, I couldn't stop smiling.  Dallin had been so reserved for so long after our missions, I'd had no idea the feelings he had for me the day we were reunited.  

     "Do you want to go outside for a little?" he asked.  I nodded.

     The rain had trickled out to nothing more than a mist as he stepped out to see the glittering view of Provo.  Almost immediately he exclaimed, "Well, there's no time like the present!" He dropped down onto his knee right there in the brush and asked, "Will you marry me?" 

     "YES!" I shouted emphatically. I squealed and laughed and gasped, "Oh my gosh!" about a hundred times, hugging and kissing him after slipping the beautiful ring onto my finger.  It was stunning-- my dream ring.  

     Eventually our friends Parley and Riley stepped out of the bushes to take our pictures.  Our feet stuck in the mud and even the car wheels were beginning to sink a little, and all I could do was stare at the ring in shock, happier than I could possibly describe.  "We're getting married!"

    The four of us went out to ice cream and I tried to contact all my close family and friends to announce our wonderful news.  That night, Dallin and I lay together for hours discussing the possibilities of our future together.  If only we could get married next week! 

     Oh how I love him. 

On Christmas, I was at Dallin's family's house when suddenly my mom called. "You need to come home right now.  Grandpa has taken a turn for the worst." My dad had already left to drive over to the hospital, but even though Grandma and Aunt Susan had been there not long before, no one in the family was there when he passed away.  The entire extended family met in the hospital room where Grandpa lay, still.  Many tears were shed.  It was strange to see our grandfather like that.  Yet my uncles and aunt began sharing stories and offering homage to their father and the wonderful life he had led. My grandma, calmer than all the rest, comforted us in saying that he didn't have to be deaf anymore.  He could be back with his parents and other family members on the other side.   

Some people say it's sad that it happened on Christmas.  But truly, it brought a deeper meaning to Christmas than any before, as we pondered the birth of Christ and His subsequent Atonement, death and Resurrection celebrated at Easter.  We felt so at peace.  I've never been one to have a doubtless testimony, and yet in that time I KNEW that we would see Grandpa again one day. There was no doubt about it. 

On January 1st, the family caravanned up to Utah to attend the funeral. Grandpa was honored with dozens of relatives and old friends from his childhood in Monroe. I learned stories at the service that I had never heard that made me smile.  Grandpa was buried in the Hamel section of the SLC Cemetery, beside many of Grandma's forbearers.  He was honored with the presence of the Air Force, who demonstrated Grandpa-like precision by refolding the flag when a glimpse of red was visible the first time.  

Grandpa suffered from dementia in the last three or so weeks of his life.  I don't wish to dwell on such stories, except for that in which he insisted my dad take him to the Mercede's dealership to make a spare key because Grandma took his keys away.  My mom called the dealership as they headed out the door to warn the salesman not to let my Grandpa have keys under any circumstances. In spite of such stories, I believe it is more important to write about the amazing legacy he left behind. 

     My Grandpa Burns was born in the early years of the Great Depression.  His parents were born at the end of the nineteenth century, and his grandparents were Danish pioneers who settled in Monroe, Utah after finding the gospel. Grandpa grew up on a farm where he would often be up from sun-up to sundown thinning sugar beats.  

     Not content with such a life, he decided to become a pilot, and during the same time as the Korean War, he was sent to Europe.  He couldn't have been more ecstatic for my mission call to Southern Germany and Austria because of his time there.  I once met a Bavarian woman who praised American soldiers such as my grandpa, without whom, as she said, they would have starved. One of the bravest stories told at the funeral was that in which a top-secret message needed to be sent across the continent, and though a storm was raging so bad that every flight in Europe was cancelled, Grandpa was sent as the sole plane in the sky to deliver the message.  His plane began to freeze and the dark was so all-consuming that he had to rely entirely on his instruments to land.  

     After the war ended, he met a stewardess named Marilyn and almost didn't take her out again when she fell asleep watching the movie {neither realized at that point that she had sleep apnea}.  When they got engaged, he helped his dad slaughter a pig, startling my grandma so bad that she gave him the ring back.  Although her intention was for him to console her, he slipped the ring back in his pocket and agreed to take her home.  On the drive, she pointed to a pretty pheasant, at which point he freaked her out even worse by slamming the breaks, shooting it, and swinging the car around to take it to his father.  Luckily, it worked out for all of us and they were married in the SLC Temple by an apostle.  

     His farming experience came in handy when my grandma's labor with their forth child {my dad} occurred so quickly that she delivered him on the bathroom tile. My grandpa raised his kids on strong gospel principles, resilience, and hard work, and he used to shout "BOUNCE" and jump onto their beds on Saturday mornings if they didn't wake up.  He made up wild nicknames and songs for the kids and dogs. When they moved from Ohio to Cali, he wanted my fifteen-year-old dad to get experience driving and so had him drive the moving van.  On day 2, my dad started feeling nauseous.  

     "Dad, we need to pull over."

     "No son, we don't have time to pull over."

     "I think I'm gonna throw up!"

     "If you're sick, then just roll down the window and I'll take the wheel. I'm sure you'll feel much better."

     And so it happened. Later on in the trip, as they approached the California border, my dad panicked and wanted to switch before anyone could see him.  "You'll be just fine," my grandpa insisted.  And so it was.

     There are many stories of my grandpa.  He was a farmer, a pilot, a jeweler, a family man, a missionary, a record-breaking indexer for the Church, and many other things.  He always gave us bear hugs and big kisses.  He had a stronger testimony than any person I have ever met.

     When he passed away, the nurse told us emotionally that he had passed with grace, and that she hopes she can go just like he did.  We will miss him of course, because we love him, but that's why we sing the song "Families Can Be Together Forever." 

Today was the first day of school.  My classes are as follows:

I'll admit, I was not ready to say bye to the family and head back to classes! 

We celebrated Rachel's birthday by ordering lots of appetizers at Flo's, a long-time tradition. Cousins Becca and Taylor came in town for a few days, and I don't think baby Sloane got put on the floor once, since everyone wanted to hold her.  The boys were also cute as could be; we had fun getting Spanish churros and visiting the dancing lights all together.  Perhaps most memorable was when Taylor sang part of 12 Days Christmas screamo style.  On Sunday, Adam gave a great farewell talk, and then we held an open house, where all our old theatre friends showed up all grown up.  

On New Years AKA the day I like to argue as our fourth anniversary of dating, Dallin returned from Canada, so we met up at around 9 PM.  You'd think after being separated for two years of missions, that we would be able to handle long distances for a week. Nope--it gets harder every time, so needless to say I was very excited to see him and definitely dolled myself up for the occasion.   We visited briefly with his sweet mom and then chatted with his paternal grandparents, who had served in Germany as well. Since all the firework shows had been cancelled, we instead picked oranges at a local park, sat in the car with the heater until 11:55 and then blasted the stereo for a dance party in the parking lot! 

My family drove up with Rachel and I the very next morning.  Liv picked just the right car to go in-- us three girls played Queen, told stories and listened to Rachel's crime podcasts. That night, we pulled into Provo with just enough time to get Thai ice cream; the next night we all crammed into my bed to watch a scary movie.