20th anniversary

Today is my 20th anniversary!!!!
Wow, its so crazy to think that Dan and I have been married for twenty years! We have actually been TOGETHER for 25 years!!!!!!! That's more than half my life! Such a beautiful thing! I am so happy and have been in such awe of this occasion for the past couple weeks as the day has approached. It is so wonderful , but also so hard to grasp my head around, because it seems sort of surreal. Not unreal that we would last, just unreal that 20 or 25 years has actually passed since our first date that Wednesday night to the JV football game. Wow, all the things we have seen, done, experienced, and grown from together! One week after our wedding we packed up a moving van with all our clothes, hand-me-down furniture, $6000 in our bank account (half of which came as wedding gifts), and a truck with a monthly payment, and moved away from my family and our friends to start our lives and careers in Vegas. Wow, that was such a hard time. Not because we didn't love each other, because truthfully, our love, was the ONLY thing carrying me through that first year. I would cry myself to sleep at night because I missed my friends and family so much, and I was so overwhelmed and scared of messing up at my job. Unfortunately, I didn't know Dan was such a light sleeper and he heard me every night, thus thinking I was miserable in our marriage. Till finally one day in a bit of an argument, he tossed out the fact that he heard me every night! I stopped still in my tracks because I realized all this time that he was listening to me cry he must have thought I was unhappy with him, but that was the farthest thing from the truth! He was the ONLY thing that gave me the strength to push through and carry on! We did clear up that misunderstanding, and I got more comfortable in my job, and I made some new friends, so eventually I didn't cry myself to sleep every night. But what a way to start a marriage lol.  Yet, through communication, we made it through!
I have so many smiling moments when I think of our history together (we have so much of it, since we've been together more than half our lives and we've known each other since we were elementary students!)
I smile when I think of our first jobs, and how my boss, Bob, never saw Dan in anything except basketball shorts, till one day he stopped by our office after an interview while still in his suit, and Bob literally put the person he was talking to on hold for like 20 minutes(!) when he saw Dan walk in because he was so shocked to see him in that realm, that he was blown away by this 'other side' of Dan and he wanted him to work for him!  I smile at how even when we were first married and picking out our apartment, Dan always tried to give me what I wanted. While signing papers on a different apartment he realized I really liked the other one better, so he stopped the paperwork and we drove back to the first place and moved in there instead. I smile at the memories of our first 'baby', our dog Alexus, and how she was such a big part of our family. I smile remembering when I was pregnant for the first time and every person he would meet he would tell them within the first 5 minutes of conversation "well, you know, my wife is pregnant with our first baby" and he was beaming so big you couldn't have concealed that excitement for anything! I smile when I think of the plain, regular, humble beginnings that we came from. We started our marriage like most people, with hand-me-down furniture and college decor in our apartment, and we always lived within our means and we were always happy. Truthfully, until we had kids, 10 years into our marriage, we had only had 3 real fights in all that time!   (Now after kids, they are too numerous to count ha ha, because changing the dynamics from 2 to a family definately changes each's expectations of each other. But we always talk and work it out and know that we are in this together for the long haul and NOTHING will break us apart!)
Its hard to believe that 20 years later, we are now building our dream vacation home together! Who would have EVER thought that Dan and Rene' from little ol' Bellaire Michigan, would someday be STILL married after 20 years, and be in a position to have two homes?????? I'm sure no one who knew us did. Heck, we couldn't have even imagined this. But, we give all the credit to God. He knew what he was doing when he brought us together, and we continue to honor Him and give hime the glory for EVERYTHING in our lives!

Twenty Years.
Amazing.
Awesome.
Wonderful.
In today's society we unfortunately don't see it much, its more common to have friends who have been divorced than to have friends who have been married as long as we have, especially considering we really aren't that old :)
I am super happy about this day and I love my hubby more than ever. I think one of the most cherished things I have in our relationship is the memories of 'where we came from'. That where we are today is not where we started, yet we did it together with God in our lives and we are now in a new place. We look forward to all the other new places God wants to take us in the future as well :)

Happy Anniversary Honey!