Ten Years, One Great Marriage

10 years ago on a wintry day in Ames, Iowa, Ben and I were married. We were young and just out of college, and we had lots of friends and family in attendance. It started snowing during the reception, so when we were ready to leave, all of the "attention" our friends had given Ben's truck was hidden by a couple inches of soft, powdery snow. After a fun week at Disneyworld, we came back, packed up our few belongings and moved to Texas.

In 2002, we moved from an apartment into our house, where we have lived for the past 9 years. (That would be the longest time I have lived in any house by the way.)

For the past ten years, I have written 8 Christmas letters. I skipped 2002 and 2005, thinking I wouldn't do one every year but then I changed my mind. I keep a binder with all our Christmas letters (except for my very first letter - I didn't keep a copy!). It is fun to look back through the years.

We are lucky that Ben hasn't had to travel for work all that often, usually just a couple trips to Germany. On average, his trips last 7 days. Fortunately for us, we can stay in communication through email and an occasional phone call.

Over the years we've had 6 repairs and remodels done in our home (well, 6 that I can think of anyway). Some changes were our choosing - like putting down laminate flooring, buying a front loading washer/dryer and remodeling the 2nd bathroom. Some changes were forced upon us... our microwave going out and having to replace our microwave/oven unit... our water heater rusting out and spraying water all over our laminate flooring... and having our roof reshingled after a hailstorm. 

Since we've been married, we've owned 5 vehicles. We came down to Texas in an old, red pick-up that Ben drove during college. We bought a Dodge Neon which turned out to be not the best car! Ben's truck was rear-ended (and totaled) so we replaced it with a somewhat newer pick-up. We finally got rid of the Neon and bought a Honda Pilot. And when we made the plunge and bought a mini-van, Ben gave up his truck and took over the Pilot. Hopefully we'll have these two vehicles for a little longer, despite having to replace a cracked windshield on both (and my own recent rear-ending of the Pilot).

We've repainted 4 rooms in our house. Well, technically we've repainted one room twice (so a total of five paintings) thanks to my sweet husband who was willing to paint over the green that didn't *quite* match :)

We have three beautiful children: Lila, our craft-loving, my-favorite-color-is-blue girl; Wyatt, our all-energy, repeats everything, puzzle-solving boy; and Piper, our if-I'm-awake-I-must-be-bounced baby (wait, I think that was all of our babies). It is fun to watch their personalities emerge and develop... to see in what ways they take after their Dad and Mom :)

Shortly after we moved into our house, we adopted 2 stray pups and named them Maggie and Kelsey. Some days I really wonder what possessed us to keep that 2nd pup, but they have been good dogs (usually) and tolerated the human additions to our household.

All in all, we've had 1 great decade together.

Happy Anniversary to Us.