6 Years

Can't believe six years ago we got married! Really, in the grand scheme of things six years doesn't seem very long to me. But looking at all we've done, it's been a jammed packed six years!

I was thinking about how we met and dated the other day and realized I've never written anything about it down. Since this is pretty much my journal now, figured it would be good to get our story on "paper" for my benefit. It's long, so don't feel obligated to read it. :)

It actually starts back my senior year of high school. We were all getting ready to graduate and move on with life. I'd already decided to attend Utah State, had a place to live, classes set, with scholarship in hand. I had always been able to picture my life up to that point, and I could picture how college would be; I had this mental image in my mind about what would happen, how things would play out and what it would be like. Until January, when my first semester would be over. For some reason there was always this block, or fog, for lack of another word, that stopped me from feeling what my life would be like past January. It was really weird. I knew something was going to happen around then. I didn't know what, so I called it my "January Event."

Anyway, fast forward past graduation, summer jobs and the first month of college. I was casually dating two guys, my interest was piqued in both of them but didn't really see anything serious happening. I had become really good friends with two sisters who lived downstairs from me. One day after lamenting to them about boy troubles, one of them practically shouted, "Chase! His mom would love you!" They told me about this awesome guy from their home ward in Idaho Falls. They proceeded to call him and left a message on his phone telling him they'd found his "future wife" all in good fun, saying we should hook up sometime.

Some time went by and they kept the idea going, but I didn't really think anything would happen. I'm told we first met at a hockey game. But I barely have a recollection of being quickly introduced as he passed us to sit farther down the isle. Later he told me he actually thought my roommate was cute. :)

A few weeks went by and these sisters arranged a Sunday dinner where we could officially "meet." At this point I was passive about the whole thing since one of the guys I'd been seeing had started talking more seriously about our relationship. Chase came with his best friend, Ben, and honestly I thought they were both crazy. (Those two really get going when they're together.) I didn't say two words the whole night. The only thing Chase said to me was, "So I guess maybe I'll ask you out sometime." And I thought, jerk! And I thought that was the end of that.

Nothing happened the next little while. Kelly and Alli kept bringing Chase up in conversation and what-not. They got tickets to the First Presidency Christmas Devotional and I was really excited to go. Later it was turned into a group date, so I needed to find someone to ask. I thought I would ask one of the guys I'd been seeing, but wasn't feeling anything towards either one of them so I didn't want to lead them on anymore. Alli and Kelly convinced me to ask Chase after much persuasion.

He actually called me the week before the devotional and asked me out since he thought it was lame for me to ask for the first date. We went to the institute and played pool and ping pong and just talked for awhile. I went home thinking he was nice but nothing particularly special. The devotional came and Alli and Kelly got me all hyped up and excited for our date. Come to find out they'd been hyping Chase up too. :)

And on that date I fell head over heels for him. He was so easy and fun to talk to. It was a great night. A week after he asked me out again. He surprised me by showing up to my choir concert, we made cookies and went to Adam's park, where we sat on the gym for three hours and talked about everything and anything. It was that night that I knew he was special. A few days later he called again. He came to pick me up wearing a canvas work coat with a blue striped polo. I walked into my room to get my coat, and it hit me, "He is my January Event."

After that, we were pretty much inseparable. I went to Idaho to meet his family, which scared me to death but cemented my answer further to marry him. We got engaged a few weeks later on February 15th. (Valentine's day was just too cliche.) Originally we set the date for August since he was leaving for the summer to work. My Bishop encouraged us to get married as soon as we could and I would go with him. That left us five weeks of engagement before getting married the last day of finals and then moving to California.

May 4th was a cloudy, rainy, crazy day. But it was perfect. :)

From there we moved to California, Arizona, back to Logan in three different apartments, found 5 different jobs, graduated, had Lauren, Chase graduated, bought a house, and another baby on the way.

It's been a great 6 years!