Adventures with Ninjas: Our dating story

In April 2010 I started hearing a lot of rumors in the Single's Ward I attended about a guy named "Neal Johnson" who would be returning from his mission in Manchester, England soon. I even had a few people I was talking to at church ask me, "Do you know who Neal Johnson is?" When I replied that I didn't, they chuckled and said, "Oh don't worry. You will." I became very curious and so I found this mysterious guy on Facebook. As I searched through the pictures he had posted on Facebook before his mission, I thought to myself, "Wow...this guy is kind of a dork. Why is there so much hype about him??" Nevertheless, for some reason, I was extremely interested in him, and thinking about meeting him when he came home made me nervous, and even gave me butterflies a few times. I found it very odd. I knew he came home on Friday, April 23rd, so that following Sunday I put on an outfit that I thought made me look good (because for some reason I was trying to impress a man I'd never met, and who didn't even know I existed) and went to church. (Note: I found out later that Neal really REALLY did not like this outfit, and that he thought it made me look 7 years older than I actually was).

This was his profile picture when I stalked him

The following Tuesday our Relief Socitey was having an activity. We were going to our bishop's house to watch movies. I found out that the Elder's Quorum decided to play Ultimate Frisbee during the Relief Socitey's activity. Now, I wasn't a huge fan of the movie the girls decided to watch, and I LOVE Ultimate Frisbee. So, I decided to ditch Relief Society and go play Ultimate Frisbee instead. I found out when I got there that Neal has the same love for the game that I do. We were on opposing teams, and no one was guarding Neal, so I started to guard him. Apparently this impressed him, and so we started talking. After the game, Neal announced to everyone that he wanted to go to Sonic. I, of course, was ecstatic. My friend, Erika, and I rushed back to the bishop's house to get her car, and then rushed to Sonic. When we got there, it was literally 1 minute after 10:00 pm, and Sonic had closed. No one from the frisbee game was there, and I later discovered they had all left already. I was bummed. (Note: Neal swears I never showed up, and that I, in fact, ditched him. Erika - help a sista out, will ya? Tell him I did!!) That night I requested to be Neal's friend on Facebook, and we talked for a while on Facebook about a whole bunch of things. He then told me he was getting a phone the next day, and I gave him my number so he could call me.

The next day Neal texted me and asked if I would like to go get ice cream at Baskin Robbins with him and his family. I, of course, said yes, and rushed up there. He also invited his friend, Troy, and Erika. After we ate our ice cream, Neal asked if we wanted to come back to his house to watch the Nugget's game. We headed to his house and ended up getting in a MASSIVE pillow fight instead of watching the Nugget's game. It was honestly one of the most enjoyable dates I've been on! As I was leaving, Neal gave me a high-five goodbye. Now, before you go making fun of him, this is one of my absolute favorite parts of the first week we knew each other. This was unbelievably endearing to me, and showed me how fresh off his mission he was. I LOVED it! (Another note: I later found out that Neal doesn't like basketball, and that his intent was merely to get us to come over to his house.)

We hung out for the next couple of days, and on Sunday, Neal came down to my parent's house for my birthday party. That night as I was saying goodbye to him, I looked at him and said "Neal, I'm kinda sorta attracted to you." (That's right....say awwwww!) After that he looked at me and said, "Do you kinda sorta wanna be my girlfriend?" I (obviously) said yes :)

Our first picture together at my birthday party....awwww!

We dated for 7 months before we got engaged. We did all kinds of things together: Elitches, celebrated Neal's birthday, went to a few concerts, hiking, wakeboarding, went to dances and other things. We also found one of our favorite places to visit: Estes. We found one of our favorite shows, Bones. Neal taught me how to snowboard after many tears. Here are some pictures of the fun stuff we did while we were dating!