Our week in three words:

This past week was our 8 year anniversary. I can hardly believe it. I really don’t know where the time has gone.

I met Dan in June of 1999. It seems like yesterday, but was over 9 years ago now! So hard to believe. He came to work at the church where I had been working for 4 years. I was so excited to have another young person on staff. I was 21 at the time and Dan was just about to have his 25^th birthday. I can vividly remember him walking by my office when he first started to work.

A group from our church was going on a canoe trip and a friend of mine invited me to go along. I ended up in the canoe with Dan and had an absolute blast. It was so far out of my comfort zone to go on a canoe trip with a bunch of people that I didn’t know, but I got to know such a wonderful man by doing so. Dan was so hyperactive! Oh my goodness, he had energy and confidence galore. He sang songs any and everywhere, he enjoyed life thoroughly.

A small group of us from the canoe trip went to Dan’s apartment that night for dinner. I don’t remember what we ate, but I do remember it involved black eyed peas, sweet tea and country music. What a good southern boy.

Dan and I spent most of our free time together after that point. We didn’t actually start dating until mid-September. After we did started dating, things moved a bit fast. I just knew that Dan was the one. I had no doubts. Whenever he would talk about things in the future, I pictured myself there with him. We both said “I love you” pretty early on as well. The fact that we started talking about marriage early on made Dan a little nervous. Neither one of us thought such a fast courtship would happen to us, but it had! I just truly believe that if you know, you know. He wanted us to be together at least a year before we got married.

So, in May of 2000 Dan took me to dinner at Copeland’s, one of our favorite restaurants at the time. He was all nervous during dinner, so I knew what was coming! After dinner we went to the beach and it was so cold and windy that we ran back to the car and Dan took me to the bay. There, he proposed and I of course said ‘yes!’

Here we are looking extremely young and newly engaged.

We decided we wanted to go on a cruise for our honeymoon, so we began searching and chose the perfect one. After we found our honeymoon, we set the wedding date. Nothing like setting your wedding date around what cruise you want to take!

We were engaged for 4 months and that was plenty of time for me to plan our wedding. Our wedding was very simple and beautiful and we loved every minute of it.

We got married on September 16, 2000.

I had to scan all of our pictures, because no one really had digital cameras then. How old does that make me feel?

Eight years, four moves, two kids, some job changes, some heartache, and lots of love later we are still going strong. We make it a point to remember how our little family began. We try to keep our love for each as the center for our family and a very high priority in our lives. I could not have chosen a better man to share my life with.

Happy Anniversary, Dan!