Monday, August 17, 2009

Happy Anniversary

8 years ago today Joe and I got married.


We met in high school and started dating when we were 16. I know we are holding up 17 fingers for my 17th birthday, but we had been dating nearly a year by this point.

Prom was our first official date.

We dated for exactly 5 years and one day and got engaged at the Grand Canyon. He asked a girl to take our picture so there are actual photos of him proposing. See him holding the ring? Even though I lived in Arizona my whole life my first trip to the Grand Canyon was with Joe when he proposed. Our anniversary is April 13th and on our 5 year anniversary it landed on Friday. Joe didn't want to get engaged on Friday the 13th so he waited an extra day. We got married nearly 5 months later. It rained every day of the week leading up to our wedding, but didn't rain until the reception was over which was amazing since the party was held outside. We went on a cruise to the Caribbean for 2 weeks for our honeymoon.


Every year we've been married we have taken a trip outside the country to celebrate. When I asked Joe how many countries we've been to he responded, "A lot." We set up a bank account that we put money into all year called "travel". When I do the laundry and empty out the change from his pockets, it goes into a huge water cooler jug. We take that money and put it into our travel account. One year that jug of coins paid for our plane tickets. Traveling is amazing, but I have always said that my favorite part about it was getting Joe all to myself while we are gone.

We are only 5 months apart in age. When ever he has a birthday (making him officially OLDER than me) I always call him "the old man". It's amazing that in 1 year I can say that I have known Joe half of my life. This is from our first Christmas together. He gave me a music box and a silver ring with "1-4-3" engraved on the inside which means I love you. 1 letter for I, 4 letters for love and 3 letters for you.

On date nights we try to go to a yoga class together and then out to dinner. We also like to stay home, fold out the couch, pile on blankets and pillows and rent a movie. This photo was when we were 18 and I surprised him by showing up in South Carolina to meet him when he was in the Army and graduated from AIT. We hadn't seen each other in months.

7 years after we got married we had Devon. Now our love has taken on the form of a 10 month old in diapers crawling around the house saying, "Mmmmmmmama! Dadadadadadada!"

Life truly is about love.

3 comments:

Kate said...

awe! I was hoping to see this post today...i've been looking for it all morning. 1-4-3...so cute!

Kim said...

How fun to read! I can't believe you've been married that long! Congrats and happy anniversary.

Elizabeth Larson said...

AWWWWWWWWWWWWWw!!! Sooo cute!! It's weird to think back to those days when we were young and I can't believe you met your husband when you were so young! Thats just an awesome story. ;)