5 years

OHMYGOODNESS.  We've been married 5 years.  Time has flown, everybody!

In the tradition of the day, here's what happened in the last year for us:

• Added two (2!) children.  Never thought five years ago that in five years, we'd have two kids.  
• Lost a lot of sleep due to the amount of children we had at one time.  
• Realized having kids is NUTS.  Awesome, but nuts. 

• Basically bummed around our families' houses.  (My in-laws' place, my mom's place, a hotel, then back to the in-laws').
• Lived in a hotel from June through August.  Became buddies with the maids.  
• Made some really good friends in Elko, and then proceeded to miss them every day since we've been back.
• Kept our two dogs.  (Though sometimes I wanted to strangle them, and other times I wanted to smooch them.  So I guess the fact that we kept them is a milestone, eh?)

•  Sold a jeep, bought a truck, went to Vegas to pick it up.  (THAT was an adventure I didn't write about... let's just say:  it was an adventure.  An adventure that maybe shouldn't ever be repeated.)

• Quit a few jobs (two for me, one for my housband)
• Began a few jobs (one for me, kinda!, two for my housband)
• Got a real-life, grown-up job offer! (I guess we're adults now!)

• Went through some really hard things with my family.
• Survived anyway. 

• Jogged lots of miles
• Biked lots of miles
•  Lost almost 40 pounds (one of us... ahem).
• Worked on becoming better human beings

I really think this has been one of the hardest years we've had yet, for a myriad of reasons.  I was reading somewhere recently that someone wrote that after having a baby, she and her husband attended therapy because having children is something like taking a good thing and throwing a bomb in it.  Haha!  I can see what they meant. 

Our girls have completely enriched our lives... they are such a source of joy for us. 

Anyway, this year's been tough.  But, it's also been really, really good.  Here's to the next five years!

4 years

Four years ago, it was a great day to be marriaged.

In the past year, we have:

• Lived (nearly) separately for four months (that was a doozy)
• Had 5 jobs between the two of us
• Rode our bikes miles and miles
• Walked our dogs miles and miles

•  Had 1 car engine blow up on us
• Bought 1 new (to us) car
• Traveled to many (many) soccer games

• Welcomed a new little niece
• Saw my oldest brother get married
• Moved in with parents
• ...And subsequently moved most of our belongings into a playhouse out back

 

  

• Lastly, we readied ourselves to have two new little people join our family... any day now.

It has been a really great year.   Probably our biggest year yet!  And we made it!  Huzzah!

(I've really been hoping the girls don't decide to come today... but I don't think they will.  This is our special day!  They can have any other day!  Ha.  Cross your fingers for me, ok?)

The real story, part 3.

(Do you remember this at all?  It's really delayed, but I want to finish writing it, so here it is.  The story of how my housband and I met, then got together!!  Read part 1 here, and part 2 here.)

I felt weird about him leaving on his mission...  actually, I was quite struck by how sad I was; I had a bunch of guy friends leaving on missions, and though he was the first, I can't really recall feeling that way about any of my other friends when they left.  I sincerely missed him.

I wrote him a few letters over time, and he wrote back funny and interesting letters detailing his life. I missed him a lot. I wrote a couple other friends also on missions, but none were special to me like his. I never really thought much of it, beyond the fact that I enjoyed writing him and getting letters back, though I didn't write much.

Most of his letters were typed up via email, and his mom or someone would print them out and mail them to me.  Once, though, in the fall of 2005, I received a letter from Honduras.  It had his spidery handwriting on the envelope, which I knew so well from having a class with him--I'd never seen such small and distinct handwriting, and I immediately knew it was from him.  I was so elated.  I opened up the envelope and he'd sent me a few pictures describing different places he'd been along with his letter.  He says now that he's not sure why he sent me photos, maybe because he knew I liked photography, but he never sent any to anybody besides maybe family.  They were so special to me.  I showed them to my roommates, so excited to tell them about my friend who was on his mission and how funny he was.  Getting letters from him was so exciting... I still wonder why I didn't write him more often.

Anyway, February 2007, he was scheduled to come home. I remember thinking he'd probably come home Valentine's day, and I was SO excited. I saw his brother working at this pizza place I used to go to and asked him when he would be coming home; I even had a friend call and ask when his homecoming talk in church would be. I was so nervous, I couldn't talk to his family myself.

He was delayed a few days, and in the meantime, I traveled with some of my friends to Colorado for the weekend. I'll never forget sleeping in my friend's little sister's bed, looking out the octagon shaped window at the darkened night sky, and feeling such excitement about him coming home. Everyone asked me if we were more than friends, because I couldn't help but mention him coming home, and the answer was obviously no, but I think, somewhere, I had the hope of maybe someday something happening, even if I wouldn't have admitted it at the time.

But I had no idea what he thought of me.

On the drive home from Colorado, I finally figured that he would be home by then. We stopped in Price, Utah, and after getting back on the road, my phone rang.  I didn't recognize the number, but I answered anyway.  Turns out, it was his best friend Jacob, and my housband was there with him.  A minute later, I talked to him. I was BEYOND excited. It was so fantastic. We agreed that he'd come over to my house later on that night, so as soon as I got home, I called him, then cleaned like a crazy person.

That night, he came over. I asked him if I could hug him in my dark entry way. It was awkward.  We talked, and I felt like I could barely breathe--I was that excited. He told me about eating a turtle, the crazy people he met, what it was like for two years in a foreign country. I enjoyed it so much. I was so excited to have my best friend back.

He came over the next day. I tried to pretend like I didn't care too much or that it didn't matter he chose to spend his time with me; I didn't have a particularly busy semester, so I had a lot of free time. He came over, and we watched music videos. I remember watching Regina Spector's video for "Fidelity" at least once a day--it became a pattern. He came over almost every day until he began working, mostly because it gave him something to do, but soon I think we both realized we liked spending time together.  We had both grown up, neither of us was as mean as we had been (haha!), and it was nice to have a reliable friend.

A couple weeks later, we were dating after we admitted to each other that we liked one another.

After that, we dated for a while, were engaged for a bit, then got married.

IT WAS AWESOME.

So that's how it happened. Not as fantastic as it sounds, yes? But let me tell you: it was. Everything about dating him was so great. Though I worried writing down the experience would make it feel cheap, it was so much more than what I could ever write.  When I think back to how we got together, what it was like when we dated, I just remember it as just the most fantastic thing.  He was my first and only love--and I love it that way.

It has been a dream to be married to him.  He is just the best.

The real story, part 2.

Remember this?  Yep.  Here's part 2... finally.

So, junior year passed, and with the start of my senior year, I had lunch with my best friend. I didn't have lunch with my usual group of lunch friends, so I sat with my best friend and her "weird" (or so I thought) friends that I didn't know so well.

One of whom was my housband.

He joked a lot and had big (BIG) hair. I didn't take him very seriously--I had too many experiences with teenage boys that embittered me, and because I didn't think he could be serious, I was more harsh than I should have been.

I remember very vividly days in the lunchroom, bright yellow lunch trays (which he got in trouble for "stealing" over 100 trays, though they never left school property), talking with him and other friends, laughing and joking about our future plans and college applications, things like that.

We became ok friends; that year, we went to a football game with some friends and I remember feeling a sense of security with him and those friends, like maybe we'd be friends for a while.  I felt good about the idea, and felt comfortable about hanging out with them in public. (Ok, so I was weird in high school.  Who wasn't?)  Later in the year, I wished that I could go with him to senior ball--there was a lot of drama surrounding the dance for me, dumb stuff--he went with his girlfriend at the time--and I boogied with him and his girl that night, and had SO much fun. He was very sweet to his girlfriend, and I admired that.  He held her hand in front of all of us, which is a big deal in teenager-dom, and I distinctly remember feeling a bit of jealousy about their hand-holding.

Eventually, school ended, and his relationship did, too. I saw him one or two times that summer.

That fall, we both went to school at the same University, as kids from our town tend to do since it is a college town. I was pretty overwhelmed with the whole concept of COLLEGE, but when I went to my last new class, there he was. Sitting alone. Looking ornery. I found out his e-mail address and told him via msn messenger we should sit together in Psychology. So we did, and we doodled together, laughed at our professor's weirdness, made jokes, and generally had a good time. He walked with me after every class to the bench where my sister would pick me up after her class. We'd laugh and talk, and he'd make excuses to go the direction I needed to go next.  Once, after a psychology study session, his longboard got ran over and broke in half.  Later, he told me he was thinking about something I said, which caused him to hit a crack and bail on his board... but all I got from his story was wondering what I could have said that would stick with him.  He was thinking about me?  On his own time?  That was interesting.

I kind of liked him, but I didn't want to admit it--like I said, I didn't really trust him, or most boys in general. We did things outside of class, too, like bowling and watching movies on Fridays with friends, and I grew to really enjoy my time with him.

One day, he asked me on a date, mostly because his friend needed someone to double with.  It was extremely awkward. But we ended the night at this certain park, and I doubt I've ever laughed harder.  After the date, we went to my house and he helped himself to apple juice in my fridge--perhaps the first time he ever did that.  I liked the familiarity of the gesture.  We decided that night that we were best friends. Even if we really weren't, we decided it anyway and it sort of became reality after a time. We made it some sort of ritual that we'd go to that park, sit on the lawn in the dark, and talk that fall semester.

After that semester, he prepared to leave on a two-year religious mission for our church. I knew he'd probably be going all along, but what I didn't realize was how much I'd grown attached to him and his friendship, and how much I'd miss him.

The morning he left, I went with my best friend (who is also one of his best friends) to say goodbye to him before he reached the MTC (or, Missionary Training Center) with a care package he could have, but we accidentally slept in due to staying up late the night before getting the package together.

We missed him--he'd already left.  I felt sick to my stomach that I'd missed him, because who knew where I'd be two years from then?

To be continued...

The real story, part 1.

So, I think it is only appropriate that one day after my one year blog-iversary, I'll tell you what you've been waiting for since June: our story.

Like I said then, I met my husband in middle school.

Our school was awkward, like most schools which house kids that age. I remember seeing him every once in a while--he was skinny, gangly, short hair, glasses which lightened or darkened according to how bright it was. I didn't really know him. I passed him in the halls filled with shiny, navy blue lockers and teal-and-cream wall tiles. Still, I didn't know him well, and he was friends with a boy I really liked (which, obviously, didn't work out and didn't last too long).

I remember thinking he was goofy.

Middle school is a blur of awkward experiences, bad haircuts and weird changes. High school came along, and I didn't see much of him. Our high school wasn't that big--but we had two separate lunches according to how our schedule was. I don't know that we ever had the same lunch; either that, or I just didn't notice him. (I mean, yeah, he's good looking, but you don't look at your friends or people you've known for a long time and think that about them most the time...)

So, high school flowed along and my junior year was turning out to be tough because my best friend moved away and my mom was seriously dating my-now-stepdad. I was in the same choir, different class than my husband, and we were scheduled to go on a trip to Disneyland. I almost opted not to go, as my best friend had moved and I didn't have a ton of good friends in choir, but eventually I changed my mind.

I found a random group of people to hang out with, and I had a lot of fun. I remember waiting the 5 or so seconds before California Screamin' took off, looking to my left and noticing one of my friends and my husband standing there on the boardwalk. He was watching me. I didn't think much of it, but for some reason, I've never forgotten that.

To be continued...