Summer Niiiigghhtttss

Well medical school has come back into our lives with a vengeance. Ben started his second year on the 17th of July. Our summer was short, but very, very sweet. I definitely miss our nights full of board games, movies, and relaxing. From my perspective second year is going to be way more intense than first year (which I hoped wasn't even possible). Ben's already taken two tests in his first month and both were proceeded by some intense studies and all nighters. The goal is obviously to get to sleep the night before a test, but with the amount of material he has to cover it's proving to be difficult. Anyways, the purpose of this post is not to bemoan our present situation, but to show the fun times we had during our awesome, albeit short, summer!

His last day of class was June 2nd...perfect timing! We had a fabulous weekend celebrating our anniversary! We went to the temple in the morning (although we didn't actually go in in because Ben forgot his recommend, but we had some companion study in the lobby). We had a yummy dinner (with Martinelli's of course) and just had a chill night at home. My favorite way to spend an evening with Ben.

For any of you that think it's lame that we spent our anniversary at home watching Fantastic Beasts we did actually end up doing something a little more exciting a few weeks later. Ben sent me a deal he heard about on Groupon with some tickets on sale for Something Rotten (a musical Matt introduced me to). It was a pretty good deal and we really hadn't gone anywhere fun together in a while so we decided to go for it! I was so proud of us for spending money to do something fun together...for like a second. Soon after we bought the tickets we got the bill from Ben's school for my health insurance. I wanted to cry. I may actually have cried...I've blocked it out. I immediately regretted our purchase. What were we thinking?! Eventually I made peace with it and decided I wouldn't let the money keep me from enjoying the show. We headed to the theater pretty early so I wouldn't stress about getting there on time. Other than the temple we hadn't spent time in Dallas so we had to take some pics.

Our best attempt at a cute picture....it wasn't a good picture day for me

Another attempt at a cute picture...another fail

By this time Ben had given up trying...

The play was SO fun! We were cracking up through most of it, there were a few inappropriate moments that I refused to laugh at out of principle, but most of the show was very enjoyable. The lead was AMAZING and Shakespeare was played by Adam Pascal! We're fans of Adams from other broadway shows he's done. It was crazy to actually see a famous name I know on stage! 

A few weeks later it was fourth of July weekend! We were tentatively thinking of inviting some friends over, but then we got invited to a get together so we figured that was even better! We were asked to bring a pasta salad. Boo. I'm NOT a fan of pasta salads and neither is Ben. As I was surfing Pinterest for an idea I saw the broccoli salad recipe that mom has made in the past. I LOVE that recipe, so I decided I'd be a little adventurous. I made the broccoli salad as normal, but just added a cup or so of pasta and then added a little more of the dressing. It was SUPER yummy. Although not everyone thought that apparently because we came home with basically the whole salad! Ben doesn't like onions so I had a yummy lunch the rest of the week. :)

We realized we didn't have any pictures of us and we were looking cute so here's our last chance photo.

We are big fans of staying at home so we love finding new two player games. After playing a few rounds of speed Ben suggested a game of poker (with Pinto and Black beans as our chips.) Ben was serious about this game so he insured I wouldn't read his poker face:

Then he got warm so he asked if I had something a little lighter:

Best pic of the summer if you ask me...

We are still going strong with our Nursery calling. Well Ben is...I'm praying that I don't have to actually learn to love the calling before we are released....

 The child whisperer

Suffice it to say we were sad to see summer go. We still find some time to have quality Ben and Em time, but we sure do miss those summer days.

On our way to watch War of the Planet of the Apes the last Saturday of summer. (It was bomb!!)

To avoid ending on sort of a sad note here are some random pics for you:

Sometimes it's hard to get out of bed...

Doctor jokes: