Its begining to look a lot like Christmas...

Merry Christmas from two very embarrassed dogs,

Burl Benson and Boomer Delamarter.

Burl ( in green): What is happening?

Boomer( in red): You used to just take pictures of me!

Burl: Oh no. She put me in a freakin bow.

Boomer: Do I look ok?

Burl: Why would he want to marry someone like this?

Boomer: Merry Christmas.

Burl: I knew I hated the holidays.

Our One and Only "Unofficial" Christmas

Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree, how lovely are your branches.

Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree, that's all I know of this song...dadada, dadadada....and so I sang as we headed out to Daren's truck in search of our first Christmas tree.

I have a tendency to be a touch Hyper-Festive around the Holidays. I know this about myself and rather enjoy it, but for someone who hasn't been through the holiday season with me this comes as a bit of a surprise. I tried to warn him ahead of time. He did his best to heed the warning and showed up in a red shirt and green hat for Christmas Tree Day. ( God bless him). We searched high and low, in NE and NW and nothing...no perfect tree to be found. Finally, Daren rolled down his window and asked two very nice people out walking where in the world are there good trees around here!? The nice walker pointed us up Burnside even further.

Twenty more minutes of Christmas Carols later we arrived. The trees were beautiful! Healthy, green and tall. And this is where we found her! Dolly the delightful Christmas tree and here she is!Yes I name my Christmas trees. This year it was between Henry and Dolly and Daren decided that the tree was a she, so Dolly it is! ( Again, God Bless Him)

Now I don't just make him listen to Christmas Carols for 6 solid hours and say "Hi" to the ornaments with no rewards. No, I love this man....so I spiked his Eggnog.

Cheers! To our one and only "unofficial" Christmas. For all of our Christmas' to come we will officially be, The Bensons.
And here she is all dressed up! Hey Doll!

The Green Room

Daren loves me, he really loves me. How do I know this? What great act of love did he do to show me this and allow me to speak with such confidence about his love and commitment?

DAREN SANG KARAOKE!

Its true, Daren sang karaoke for the first time in his entire life. We were out at the Green Room ( best Sunday night karaoke in town) with a group of my friends for Brian's birthday. Note that these are my oldest friends, the friends I grew up with, the friends that have known me since before my first boyfriend and are now loyally standing by me as I get married. Brian, the birthday boy, decided that since it was his birthday he was going to pick what and when everyone sang. So you would be just sitting at the table laughing and telling stories when Captain, the DJ, would call you onto stage and let you know what song you were about to sing. I sang my karaoke staple, Black Velvet. Matt performed his best Neil Diamond ( several times as a matter of fact, even though Brian only put his name in once). Jessica and I sang a rousing rendition of "Earls gotta die" by the Dixie Chicks and joked about how many times we have sang this song together at the top of our lungs with no one but my dog and her cat to listen. Then is happened....

"Let's hear it for Daren!" shouted Captain into the microphone. With that the whole table started clapping and shouting for Daren to go up on stage. He downed his beer, grabbed mine and polished it of too as he slowly raised himself from the dark wooden bench we were seated in the back left corner of the bar. Knowing the whole time that these old and loyal friends are also protective of me and want what and who is best for me. So he did it! Daren walked onto that stage grabbed a microphone and waited as Jimmy Buffet's, Margaritaville, began to play. With that one of our crew, Arbo, jumped up from his seat and darted up onto the stage, grabbed the other microphone and offered up his vocal support to Daren, Sarah's fiance who has just proven himself to us.

While Daren and Arbo were blowing out flip flops and stepping on pop tops birthday boy Brian leaned over with a huge smile on his face and said, "He must really love you."

We have flowergirls!

Between the two of us Daren and I have eight, yes that's 8, nephews and not a single niece. Leaving us with an abundance of ring bearers but no flower girls. Lucky for us we each have one little girl in our lives that we are especially close to and love. Daren has Ella, the 7 year old spitfire who already possesses a natural grace and elegance and who likes me better than his ex girlfriend ( when Ella told me "I like you better" on the first day I met her she instantly endeared herself to me for the rest of her life! Hahaha!). And I have Emma, the 5 years old firecracker with the most magical imagination I have ever been blessed enough to be a part of.

Daren and I went to "Build-a-Bear" and built bride bears for each of the girls. We individualized each one with a sound chip that said "Ella will you be our flower girl" and of course Emma's said Emma.

When Ella got hers she acted like she was in shock. Then in a very nonchalant grown up at 7 years old way, said yes. She then ran upstairs with her bear and turned to her mom with great excitement and said "Can you believe it!!"

When I asked Emma I almost cried. She played the voice recording about 5 times in a row and then I said "Does this make sense? Will you be in my wedding?" She smiled, nodded and then threw herself into my arms for a great big 5 year old bear hug.

I am so excited to have these two girls in my wedding. We are going to have the cutest, feistiest pair of flower girls this town has ever seen!

A dream and a dress

A girl spends a good amount of time as a child pretending. Pretending to be a teacher, pretending know how to write in cursive, pretending she is a bride. Each bought of pretending is filled with the most remarkable details in her mind including what her hair looks like, what she is wearing, how tall she is and who is there with her. Any any given moment of imagination a child pretending can relay to you where they are, who they are, what they like and don't like, and where they plan to go.

As a girl I was one of "those". Not only did I pretend that I could write in cursive while playing teacher but I have been pretending and dreaming about being a bride for as long as I can remember. I have been dreaming about my wedding dress for even longer. And in great detail. That dream has come true. That little girl pretending to be a beautiful bride in the most amazing dress she has ever worn has come true. I have found my wedding dress!

The ladies of my life gathered round at my condo for a "Ladies Lunch". Everyone arrived dressed to the nines and ready to enjoy day of champagne, bubbling over with laughter and supporting that dream of finding the perfect dress.

The dress was found! Believe it or not it was the very first dress I tired on. It was also the only dress that made my best friend who rarely cries cry. When she came around the curtain of the dressing room with tears in her eyes and hugged me that was it. The deal of the dress was sealed in tears between two lifelong friends who have spent many years dreaming and pretending together.

The day was a dream and the dress is a dream come true. I have plenty of pictures but everyone who was there that day is under a strict gag order about the dress...so no peeking. You can see it in April.

Daren and Sarah's First Halloween

Halloween went a little something like this...

"What are you going to be for Halloween Daren?"

"Sarah, what does your Dad dress us as for Halloween?"

"Nothing. I've never seen him dress up."

"That's because he is a good man."

I went as Rocky Balboa and Daren....went as an x-ray tech. :)

Family

Family. We are about to be a family. Just he and I, a little pod that will someday sprout up into a whole family tree. Amazing.

My parents hosted a Family to Family Engagement Brunch at their house on Sunday. It was wonderful. Full of great food- strawberries, honey roasted ham, cream puffs, salads, chocolate eclairs, and my mothers trademark chocolate fountain and sugar cookies shaped in a D and an S frosted with our wedding colors. There was wine, oh was there ever wine! Coffee and cream, tea, sodas,beer, mimosas...It was a feast. Our first official family feast.

Come April 26th we will be family. I find this truly amazing and moving and so very exciting. And all of these people that came to join us and celebrate with us on Sunday will be our family too. It was such a memorable and powerful moment when this hit me. All of the sudden it really hit me that I am getting married and the true depth of that. His family is my family. My family is his family and Daren and I will go on to have a family of our own. What a wonderful concept.

And...we all got along. What an even more wonderful concept.

Love and Laundry

Laundry = Romance. Is this a sign of things to come in my life as a future wife and mother or was it just one of those spontaneous moments that I will always remember as special. I chose to believe the latter. Never before has folding laundry been a romantic experience for me. Most of the time the folding of my laundry is an afterthought and is only done when guests come over to clear a space on the couch! This time, this one time, it was different.

Daren was over at my place and I had been puttering around like I usually do in the evenings. We had cooked dinner together and I was catching up on those mundane chores you don't think to do when you are busy being in love and planning your dream wedding. Hence the laundry.... the only thing left to do was fold the towels and the sheets that where heaped on the edge of the couch, already dotted with dog hair. I walked into the other room to put away a new stock of clean socks and when I came back into the living room Daren was folding my laundry! This in and of itself was wonderful and thoughtful. He picked up the red sheets and began to fold the big queen sized top sheet and it was clear that it can be folded best with four hands. So I walked over and took the opposite side of the big red sheet. We folded it long ways and as I walked closer to him to fold it in half the sultry sounds of Elvis's voice fills the room and we hear " Wise man say, only fools rush in...." That's our song! It became our song on the beach in Hawaii when we heard it playing distantly from one of the beach bar bands and it is our story word for word. As I reached him with my side of the big red sheet he stepped even closer to me and we began to dance. Right there in my living room with the big red sheet still in our hands we danced. Danced to our song that is quickly becoming part of our history and is sure to be a part of our future. Then he kissed me....and he smelled like peanut butter.

The Great Back Hair Debate of 2007

Throughout history there have been various major significant events that go on to shape the future of the world. War is often a part of these defining moments. The Great Depression. The Holocaust. The Great Potato Shortage in Ireland. These events created an atmosphere of strife and of determination in those who lived through them. Those people became resilient, hopefully, confidant and wise. Through great strife arose a spirit of appreciation, thankfulness, and steadfastness. In the world of Daren and Sarah we have just experienced one such major event "The Great Back Hair Debate".

We began our weekend as we often do, with a workout class on Saturday morning. This particular morning we chose Spinning class at our local gym. This class was ridiculously hard and caused us both to go into a state of low blood sugar which may or may not have attributed to the following sequence of events.

There was already an air of tension filling the room that should have been recognized before the next sentence was ever muttered from this bride-to-be's mouth. " Hey, we should wax your back" Now please understand that the hair I was offering to wax is about 3-5 stray strands of hair. No sweaters here! The offer was much more for my own enjoyment than anything else. The answer, of course, was an immediate "No." I, not always taking the no means no philosophy to heart, kept at it and asked a good four more times in various ways and offering up different hair removal options. This time the answer was a much more adamant "No" Following by a fervent "I don't want to change anything about you!" ......Oooops.

The battle then lasted us a full three days and grew in size to cover a remarkable number of topics ranging from plastic surgery opinions to money matters to the need to recycle and even on to how I could call a child Olive but that I don't actually like to eat olives. In the end we both agreed that there is a certain amount of pressure that comes along with being engaged and planning to spend your lives together for the rest of your life that makes such trivial matters feel of utmost importance.

I love being engaged and I love the man I am engaged to. This weekend of conflict was full of frustration, tears, raised voices...sure. But it was also full of deep, passionate communication that allowed us to walk away with a deeper understanding of each other and of where we want to take our future marriage. I think that people spend way too much time keeping their real feelings about life experiences quite. Getting married is very exciting but it is also a lot of change and that causes stress, anxiety and even fear and no one really talks about that. In no way does admitting to these feelings mean that I do not want to marry Daren, nor does it mean that we won't have a happy marriage.

Being engaged is an incredibly exciting season of life. But remember that each seasons climate causes harsh spots. The Great Back Hair Debate of 2007 will go down in our history books as a big battle that helped us move closer to each other, revealed even more of our authentic selves and will give us plenty of fodder to laugh about over the years.

Dating a Doctor

For those of you who don't know, My Daren is a doctor A Podiatrist, Dr. Daren Benson, to be exact. Two days ago at dinner Daren says to me " I got to tell a girl that there was nothing wrong with her today." I smiled and said 'Thats good, right?" He smiled his smirky smile and then tells the truth. :)



A girl came in today in her early 30s and was all dressed and dolled up. She came to see Dr. Benson complaining of toe pain in her 4th toe. The thing is she has nothing wrong with her feet.....but her mother did sit next to Daren on an airplane a few months ago.....Ha! This girl came in to try and date my doctor. He said "And then I got to tell her I'm engaged! It was awesome." Of course the appointment then became much less exciting and ended shortly there after.



I can't wait to get a ring on that man! :)

sidewalk chalk

We Met, We Fell in Love, We got engaged

We met at the Brazen Bean on Wednesday May 9th 2007 on a blind date. We agreed to meet for just one drink and ended up staying for 5 hours! Our second date lasted 12 hours and included 3 resturants, 1 wine bar, a donut shop, and the ice cream shop. It was so much fun amd we have been pretty much insperarable since.

Four months after our first date on Wednesday September 5th 2007 Daren took me back to the Brazen Bean for a drink. We hadn't been back there together since our first date. ( With this in mind I was very suspicious about the evening. So, I got all dolled up, charged my phone battery, charged my camera battery...you know...just in case. :) ) At one point during our nervous drinking of the infamous Brazen Bean martini I did spot what could possibly be a ring box in his coat pocket! It was either that or a pack of gum but thats when I started to get really really nervous/excited and sent a text to m y best friend saying "This is so much fun". He said it was time to go so that we could get to our reservations but he would not tell me where we were going to dinner so we just start walking down the sidewalk. I couldn't think of a single place to eat in the direction we were walking but I get lost a lot so I thought maybe I was wrong. About tow blocks down the street Daren slowed down a little and I thought to myself "Here? Right next to this empty building?" But then we walked a little farther and three blocks later Daren slows to a stop and I look down and see " I heart SD" written in pink sidewalk chalk. I look at it, then looked at him and just started to cry. (So did he but I'm not supossed to tell you that)Daren then went on to talk about how he had seen me walking to the Bean the night we met and this was the spot that he first saw me and where he first fell in love with me. He then got down on one knee....at this point I start hopping up and down, literally toss my purse to the side somewhere and have the biggest smile I have ever had on my tear streaked face. He then looks me directly in my eyes and says "Will you marry me?" It took me a few seconds to actually be able to speak then I let out a "Yes!" Daren jumped up and hugged me and opened the ring box to reveal a perfect perfect perfect engagment ring. We both just stood and stared at it for a minute until he finally said "Take it". He put the ring on my finger and I have never felt more bliss in my life! He then took me to the Ringside Steakhouse for dinner...which was perfect. :) I told him that I had remembered everything that night except for my waterproof mascara! HA! It was a beautiful, perfect engagment that is everything I have ever dreamt it could be.