When last we left off I had a wedding dress, a date circled on the calendar, and a pretty spectacular boyfriend. I didn't mention it before, but I had a pretty clear vision of what I wanted my wedding dress to look like for months. I had two advertisements torn out of bridal magazines that I carried with me to the bridal shops and I didn't buy anything that looked remotely like either one of them. <Side note: This was all before blogs and Pinterest and I literally had a three ring binder full of tear sheets that I carried around for months. How adorable is that?!> I ended up going back to the very first dress I ever tried on and I couldn't have been happier with it -- how it fit, the style, the details -- everything was perfect. It required no real alterations, so once it was ...
love story
Our Love Story | The In Between
Josh graduated high school that same year and left me behind. Well, he still lived at home in the same house, I just wasn't able to follow him around school all day. Although, it was still pretty early in our relationship, it was pretty clear from the beginning that we weren't planning on going anywhere. Thankfully, we didn't have one of those relationships that fell apart and came back together over and over -- we never broke up and I don't remember ever thinking that it wouldn't work out. We talk now about how rare that kind of relationship is and how different life could have been for us -- we are so thankful that it wasn't. It is amazing to look back on seventeen years and see God's hand in our relationship from the very beginning. The decisions we made that helped keep us on the same ...
Our Love Story | The Prank Call
Weeks before that first basketball game I was home alone when the phone rang. I remember answering and hearing a boy say: My brother is in love with you! Then there was some commotion and the call was disconnected. I never thought much about it or who the caller might be. I always assumed it was a prank call, but I would find out I had assumed wrong. Josh was back at school the Tuesday after our date and our regular routine resumed. We casually flirted at school and talked on the phone after dark. I think we almost always started out on a three way call with Chris, but he would bow out at some point each night. So much of our early relationship was wrapped up in our friendship with Chris -- the three of us were always together and he knew as much about our relationship as I ...
Our Love Story | The First Date
Josh says the first time he remembers seeing me, I was standing against the wall in the lunchroom. I was wearing a v-neck men's undershirt, a red plaid skirt, tube socks, and combat boots. Nothing about his description surprises me -- it was one of my favorite outfits. An outfit my mom later forbid me to wear on our first date! That three way call was the first of many. I spent hours every night talking to both boys when I should have been sleeping. Several weeks later, right before Christmas, the boys came by the house bearing gifts -- a few new fish for my tank, an incense burner, and a candle from Spencer's (does anybody remember that store?!). I recall that when they came upstairs to my room for the first time, Josh couldn't believe how girly it was. Sunny yellow with floral ...
Our Love Story | The Very Beginning
The first time I shared our story was way back in 2014. I'm not sure anybody was even reading then and I left out a few of my favorite parts. I stumbled across these old posts when I was updating the blog last year and I knew immediately that I wanted to share them again. Since we're approaching Valentine's Day (how cliche), I figured now was the perfect time. I've updated the story and added some of my favorite photographs and will be sharing a post every week until we're all caught up. The first time I shared these posts, I stopped with the wedding, but we've been married fifteen years now and our story isn't over yet. I know I've shared bits and pieces of how I wound up married to my husband, but I don't think I've ever told you how it all began. We were laying in bed one night ...
Our Love Story | The Big Day
I've been married for almost twelve years and it's starting to be weird to look back on my wedding day. For some amount of time after your wedding, you look at the photographs and say "I wouldn't change a thing!" And I wouldn't change a thing about how the day went or how I felt or how happy I was then or how happy I am now. But after twelve years, my style has changed SO much and it's weird to think about what a wedding would look like if I were planning it today. The day was perfect. It helped that I had a three ring binder full of tear sheets that I had been saving for years. Not to mention that my mom is pretty much Martha Stewart and she runs a tight ship. I hear girls talk about how stressful wedding planning can be and how overwhelmed they felt and I just didn't. I had no idea ...