Today I am celebrating my sixth wedding anniversary with Craig and as part of the celebration of our marriage, I have opted to walk down memory lane and share how Craig and I met.
I am certainly a hopeful romantic by heart. Ever since I was a little girl, I knew God had a man He created especially for me. In high school, I was extremely selective when it came to dating and I knew I needed to be with people who shared my same morals and beliefs. When I was younger, I certainly wanted to be the girl who married her true love in high school and get married super young and have a family right away. This was not the perfect plan God had for me and I could not be more blessed as I have reflected back. I graduated high school and went to college. Of course, I wanted to meet someone, but there are slim pickings for genuine people to date. I am not a bar hopper or one who does things other people in the “world” do- yes, some may call it odd, but I am who I am- conservative to say the least. When you are living through the situation, you of course look at meeting someone in church, but my church is small and similar churches like it, and with those circumstances you can look around and see everyone paired up like Noah’s Ark. It is easy to become discouraged, but I can honestly say, I kept the faith and knew then the time was right I would meet the man God had for me. Did I cry and feel disappointed in times of loneliness? Absolutely! I realized in my early twenties, if I had not met him yet, he just wasn’t ripe yet, but I continued to pray for him and I knew one day we would be together.
As I was approaching my junior year of college, I opted to try and meet new people and did some online dating and tried to broaden my network. There was a guy I started talking to in November of 2005. His name was Craig and I was a little surprised at how genuine he seemed online and on the phone. We opted to meet and there was just something different about him on our first date on December 7, 2005. There was no awkward conversation or awkward pauses and everything seemed to “flow.” Obviously he wasn’t my “perfect” match, after all, I was concerned he was not in church and initially he wasn’t interested in marriage or the idea of children, so I was concerned we really did not share many of the core qualities I was looking for. I remember calling my mom and my sister as I was leaving the restaurant after our first date and telling them about this guy. They both expressed very similar points of view, to “see it through” and “don’t shut the door.” They both encouraged me to just get to know him and if we become nothing more than friends, it was ok, and no one can ever have too many friends. We continued to talk and go out. We shared our first kiss on New Year’s evening 2006, shortly after the clock struck midnight. As we started dating, I did not want to be too pushy about him not attending church, but was hopeful he would eventually start to come with me. The other nice thing about both of us, is we are close in age and neither one of us had been married or had children or any other hurdles right from the start. Craig proposed to me on New Year’s Eve in 2006, and of course I accepted. Craig started coming to church and started to become more involved with my church family. I graduated college in 2007, and we both gradually started separating. We still were dating, but I honestly cannot explain the distance that was growing between us. In the fall of 2007, we ended our engagement.
We would still talk, but things were not the same as they had been, and again, there was not one particular catalyst for this change in our relationship. I was working full time and focusing on seeing where my career could go and he was working a lot too. I wanted to travel and play some, and I had many opportunities and did some neat things, but there was still a piece of my life that was missing. Craig would still come over for dinner and help us with small projects around the house on the weekends.
One day in 2009, things just started to change and I feel as though Craig and I stepped into a new phase in our relationship. It was like a light turned on and we just “knew” this was the time. We started dating again in the late summer. As fall approached Craig decided to take my mom ring shopping for me and they picked out a new, bigger, prettier ring than I could ever have imagined. On October 9, 2009, he proposed to me a second time. I, of course accepted and we opted for a quick engagement and planned a quick elopement over a weekend. Neither one of us wanted a large wedding or any of the “bells and whistles” so we kept it nice and simple, but exactly what we wanted. Our pastors from our church took the drive up to marry us and it was so meaningful to both of us and my parents. On November 6, 2009, we were married in Parker, Colorado. We did not live together before we got married, because I did not believe in premarital activities outside of marriage.
In 2012 we welcomed our perfect baby girl into our lives. We certainly are not the “model couple,” but we love Jesus and put Him first above everything in our marriage and the decisions we make. I have never been with anyone who makes me laugh so hard, make me so angry, but yet so happy. He also puts up with all of my many antics and hair brained ideas and somehow goes through it regardless of what he REALLY wants to do. I am abundantly blessed that God created this man for me to share my life with and continue to grow with in this crazy thing called life.
Wishing you a very Happy Anniversary Honey, I am so blessed to share my life with you and to raise our beautiful little girl together. I love you!
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