The adventure that started it all

As little girls, we always dream of our wedding day. We stage our barbies or dolls and create fairy tale weddings and lives that follow the fantasy wedding. What we don’t set up as little girls is how we meet “the one” and develop a strong marriage to last a lifetime. While we are living our greatest adventure now, my life with Andy started out as a whirlwind with many bumps in the road. I’m going to share with you five things that helped us through the difficult first year to get us to where we are now along with sharing our biggest adventure!

When Andy and I met in 2003, we were living nearly as far away from each other as possible while still both in the United States. I was in California and he was in Boston for the summer. On a quick whim, I decided to visit a friend in Boston. After a night out with my friend a few others, I knew I had found someone who made my heart jump. We talked all night long until the sunrise (probably the only sunrise we have ever seen together)! The next day I left to go home to California and a few weeks later he left Boston to go to his home in Texas. From the day I left until the day I moved in with him, we talked on the phone every.single.day. We met in July, I moved to Texas, got engaged in December, and started planning our wedding for the upcoming July (a year to the date we met).

Little did we know that we would be married sooner than July! We were so poor – a teacher and a college student. We had zero extra for diamond wedding rings. One day on the radio, I heard they were advertising a wedding giveaway. It was to get married at “the biggest diamond in Houston” – home plate at Minute Maid Park, where the Houston Astros play. Along with the wedding came a rehearsal dinner, wedding reception, AND a diamond wedding ring. I knew we needed to try and win this! To enter, you needed to write a story detailing why you should win. Andy is an incredible writer, so he wrote our story and submitted it. And….we won! It was a Valentine’s Day wedding live on a local radio station! With Valentine’s Day this week, I thought it was a perfect time to share our story! Here is what he wrote for our winning entry:

My fiance, Jenna, and I met this past summer while in Boston, Massachusetts. While this may not seem incredibly unique, read along and you may change your mind. I am a school teacher – originally from Detroit, Michigan -that moved to Houston a year and a half ago. On a whim, I thought that – during my summer off – I should find a summer job in a new and exciting place. Boston was that place for me. Around the same time, halfway across the country in California, the love of my life decided to visit an old friend that had just moved to Boston. We met for the first time in July, where it seemed that fate had brought us to this unique place at the same time. I had met her friend only once before, and Jenna was to spend only 3 days in Boston. However, from the moment I met her, I knew I had met my soulmate. Several months and an engagement later, we have decided to make Houston our “home.” Getting married in Minute Maid Park would be the culmination of our journey, with Boston as first base, Michigan as second base, California as third base, and Houston as home plate. Please make this dream a reality.

The wedding was incredible! We said our vows and had our first dance on home plate. We ran the bases together, had our names on the big screen, and have very special, unique memories to last us a lifetime!

While it was incredibly amazing to win this wedding, consider this: we had only known each other 7 months, and only lived in the same city for 2 months. Yes, while we talked on the phone with every spare minute we had, in retrospect we didn’t know each other well enough to be married. We learned so much the first year we were together. By the grace of God, it brought us closer together when it easily could’ve broken us apart.

These five principles – learned through many trials and tribulations – made us and our marriage stronger:

1. Clear communication is key
2. Give each other the benefit of the doubt
3. Make it your goal to completely understand each other
4. Love is an action, not a feeling
5. Remember why you fell in love to begin with

Clear Communication is key – We could always tell when we were about to have a disagreement. More often than not it was because we hadn’t communicated with each other what our hopes or plans were for a particular day or project. When we both knew how we wanted something to look like, everything went smoother. Even something as simple as discussing weekend plans together before the weekend arrived made a world of difference.

Give each other the benefit of the doubt – Sometimes it is tough to give our closest loved ones the benefit of the doubt. After all, they should know us better than anyone – shouldn’t they know inherently when a choice or harsh sentiment will cut us to our core? Instead of cutting them some slack, we assume they hurt us on purpose, without considering our feelings. Instead of immediately lashing out, we learned to respond with grace first. This helped us to break down barriers in our relationship, allowing us to be more vulnerable and authentic with our feelings.

Make it your goal to completely understand each other – If you buy in to the idea that you must strive to completely understand your significant other, here is the dirty secret I’m obliged to tell you: this journey must continue throughout your lives as a couple. My husband and I are constantly evolving. Just when you think you’ve got things figured out, significant life events change us immeasurably. Perhaps you’ve lost a parent or close friend, added a child (or four) to your family, or lost a job unexpectedly. Through each of these life-altering experiences, you must work to identify your partner’s new “normal” and help them work through the fear of change that we all have as humans. Learn what makes your partner feel loved and try to give them what they need. The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman provided us with insights about each other that made a real difference in our marriage. We began to realize that many of our arguments were because we weren’t speaking each other’s love language. I would highly recommend every couple to take this assessment to learn each other’s love language!

Love is an action, not a feeling – Many arguments during our early years included one of us saying, “maybe we weren’t meant to be together.” It was another way of saying we weren’t “in it for the long haul.” These words still sting years later, even though we have moved past those trying years. Love is an action, not a feeling. When you decide to be with someone forever, don’t make them feel like you’ve got one foot out the door. Choose to persevere. When you start each disagreement with the thought that your marriage will last the test of time, your actions will adjust accordingly. In retrospect, what we were really saying during our fights as a young couple was, “I’m not prepared to compromise, so either you admit defeat, or we’re over.” Once we both recognized that we were truly committed to each other, we were able to work through our issues and thrive as a couple.

Remember why you fell in love to begin with – Every once in a while we look at pictures from our early years as a couple. We think back to what bonded us together in the first place, and how those feelings morphed into deeper understanding, appreciation, and admiration for each other. Taking the time to reflect on your journey as a couple is like building a solid foundation for your home. If the core is strong, you can weather the storms that life may throw at you much more easily.

So as Valentine’s Day is upon us, we like to reminisce about our lives together and how much closer we are. Each year we celebrate our anniversary on the February 13 instead of Valentine’s Day, since our Minute Maid Park wedding happened on Friday, February 13! Thankfully, our lives together have been more about blessings than the curses that most people associate with that date. What are some of the things you do to celebrate Valentine’s Day? How do you stay connected to your spouse? Leave me a comment below!