Happy Anniversary to Us!

It’s official. We have been successfully married for five years. Five years! A miniscule number compared to some, and a seemingly impossible number compared to others.

But actually, we have been in one another’s lives for 11 years. And been involved in a romantical way for 9 years.

Let’s take a little stroll shall we?

We met when I was a young whippersnapper of 15. I remember the fateful night to this day. Youth group Bible study. John Cordray’s house. Drew Gilliam brought a friend along. Ian was his name, hotness was his game. Well.. at least cuteness. I definitely thought he was cute.

Fortunately, he kept coming. Then he came to church camp and gave his tenderized heart to Jesus. And he got so much cuter! I have little recollection of our pre-dating game. The few things I do remember involve trying to shyly hint at him that I liked him. I made him a journal.. tried to make sure we were hanging out in the same groups.. He was older you know (one year!) and I wasn’t sure I’d make the cut. We spent a lot of time in the church parking lot after events talking (and maybe flirting here and there). We were usually the last two left to go home.

Then, January (January!) of my junior year, after some embarrassing moments brought about by my beloved sister, Ian asked me to prom with great fear in his heart that someone else might ask me first. I said yes (ummm.. yes please?).

Two months later, we took a little drive down to one Taco Bell on McGalliard and made it official. He finally asked me to be his girlfriend. Whew! Then came the big courting vs. dating debate. Then the question of whether we should kiss or not. If my memory serves me correctly, we decided that we were, in fact, courting, but quickly got tired of explaining what that meant to everyone, so relinquished and called it dating. And, I think we made it about four months before the first kiss. (Though there was a scandalous rumor that went around church that we had been spotted kissing in the parking lot. It was not true. Just to be clear.)

That May, we went to my prom and his prom (two nights in a row!) as an official couple, and both nights were amazing. I felt gorgeous, and he was so handsome.

Ian’s Senior prom, Muncie Central High School, 2002

See? Told you. Hi Shea and Drew! Incidentally they’re married now too and expecting their first bambino! :)

We even did it again the next year for my senior prom!

Corrie’s Senior Prom, Frankton Jr/Sr High School, 2003

I was a runner and a tennis player and a skinny-minnie whose hips had yet to meet any children. I don’t know how he kept his hands off me :) but he did.. He was very respectful of yours truly.

After great debate, I decided to attend Taylor University. I really wanted to go to Wheaton to put some distance between Ian and myself. We never broke up, but I was beginning to feel a bit, how shall we say, overwhelmed by our relationship. Fortunately, God knew that Taylor would actually be far enough and that everything would be just fine.

Talk of rings started to come up every now and then. We knew we wanted to get married, the question was only a matter of when. Initially I thought we should wait.. then I thought it should be as soon as possible. Then Ian came to Upland for a late night visit after work on Labor Day of 2004. Little did I know the plans he had in store.

We went for a walk, and the story of our engagement is really quite a funny one thanks to well, me, who actually had no idea what was going on until he was down on his knee. But, he got me to shut my mouth for a few seconds so he could ask me to be his wife under a hazy, light drizzle, and placed a perfect solitaire on the finger that most needed decorating.

We set the date on the way back to Muncie that night because my sister had to see us :) July 16 would do nicely, we thought. Ian would be done with school, and it gave me plenty of time to work on my tan (I promise that didn’t actually come up in the decision-making process).

Those next 10 months dragged on for ages. But we made it with our virginity and dignity intact, solemnly swearing to never suggest a long engagement to anyone. We had a whirlwind wedding day, capped off with our favorite, Thai Smile :)

July 16, 2005

Doesn’t the poor scan quality on this image make it look like we were married in 1932?

We honeymooned in romantic Ohio, and if we got to do it all over again, I think we’d do the exact same thing. Except we’d remember to bring Ian’s tennis shoes so we could actually do the hiking we had planned on.

Since then, it’s been one adventure after another. We found out we liked each other more than we ever thought we did, and that we are both quite quirky. We got some birds, let our dishes grow mold in the sink, learned that some ovens have a space below the burners that you really need to clean out on a regular basis, and made more than a few trips to Ivanhoe’s. We saw each other through some tough days in Upland, danced through some fabulous days, but overall we couldn’t believe how much fun it was to be married.

I graduated, we moved to Scotland. I cried a lot. We took pictures with photobooth because we literally had nothing else to do.

Sometime in our first week of being in St Andrews, 2007

We took a trip to Amsterdam and watched a 3D movie in Dutch about cells.

Amsterdam, January 2008

We carved pumpkins with friends.

The Tallon's House, October 2008

We celebrated American holidays even though no one else was.

Our flat, Thanksgiving 2008

We danced on a beach in Panama City, FL.

Christmas/New Year's at Gma and Gpa's House, 2009 (Aed is here too, in a very tiny, unborn state!)

Our last anniversary we found ourselves in the midst of preparing our external selves to move house, and our internal selves to welcome our first babe.

July 16, 2009 (Aed is here again, but now he is over 35 weeks in utero!)

The last year of our marriage has been filled with change and struggle and blessing. We still randomly break into song and dance around the living room, but now it’s usually to hear the giggles of our baby boy. We still hold hands while we walk around town, but now one hand is being held and the other is pushing the buggy. We still enjoy waking up to one another in the morning, but now it’s accompanied by the sound of babbling in the room across the hall.

God is so good to have given me such a life. He is so good to have given me such a husband. I have been blessed beyond belief by my marriage, and I pray that it will only continue to flourish as the years go on. Thank you, Ian, for five spectacular years. Happy Anniversary!