Monday Memories {link up} #1

My dear friend Nicole is challenging us to get some of our best memories out of our heads and onto paper. She's beginning a link party, so if you're a blogger and you'd like to join the Monday Memories link party, please feel free to join in and share your memories!

Because it's always my intention that this blog will eventually adorn my three grown children's coffee tables, I thought I'd write a little about who we were before we were 'mom and dad.' It's a story I feel like people often ask...how did your parents meet. So let's be sure I lay this out for you. Here we go. The story of 'How Mom and Dad met.'

He hates this photo, but I love it because it reminds of how he looked when we met...

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Dear kids,

Did you know that your mom and dad were once, NOT yet, mom and dad? We were super heroes. Can you believe it? Your dad and I had both been in love with other people for many years and for different reasons, we parted ways.

Cue your "Auntie Jen." (You must know by now that she is my best friend from college and my sorority sister...the way I tell it, she's the one who made your mom do all kinds of naughty things.) hee hee. So in other words, she was the fun friend.)

Anyway, one day she called me and asked if she could give this guy my phone number. Having been recently single after a long relationship and engagement, I was a little hesitant. "Well, what's he like?" I asked her.  "Well, he's a police officer and he works with the wife of a guy on my squad." 

Phillip & Marcia..the other couple in on our 'set-up' 

She said she didn't personally know him well, but that she'd seen him at the jail! (Don't worry kids, your dad wasn't a criminal, he was there representing the other side of the law.)  :)

Anyway, with some reluctance, I said she could give him my #. And then, not long after, he called.
Aaaannd....I let it go to voicemail because I was deep into the 'Million Dollar Trading Spaces' episode that I'd been waiting and waiting for. (I haven't lived this down yet.)

Well I DID call him back, if you must know and we talked for several HOURS that first night. Then another several hours the next night, and so on and so forth. (By the way, kids, you must know that 'so on and so forth' is a phrase your father uses ALL. THE.TIME.  I'm sure you all say it by now too.) I obviously do. And we talked about EVERYTHING. Literally-from preferred toothpaste, to favorite foods, to craziest things we'd ever done, etc. They were great conversations.

Anyway, we were trying to arrange a group date of sorts, where we could finally meet each other. Well, your dad, being the impatient one that he is (surely you also know this about him by now) decided that he wasn't waiting. So he arranged to drive down to Tucson to meet me.

On October 5, 2003, we met in the back parking lot of my school, Cottonwood Elementary. When I pulled up in my car, he was already there, waiting in his parked truck. I WAS SO NERVOUS trying to figure out how to 'nonchalantly' MEET someone I was already pretty sure I was going to marry (yes, I had a feeling even before we met). Crazy, right?

Anyway, I got out of my car, walked around and there he was, dressed in jeans and a blue plaid shirt, neatly pressed, and very proper, with a belt and all. And oh, so handsome.

Anyway, I honestly couldn't tell you what words we uttered at that moment if my life depended on it. I was all a flutter. We hung out in my classroom for a while, just talking. And may I just say how strange it was to meet someone for the first time, that I already knew so much about....weird. (Oh and by the way, apparently, what I thought was a completely BLIND date turned out to be only half blind.  Your dad got to see a picture of me before we ever even talked! NO FAIR, I say!)  :)

So after chatting a while at my school, we walked around a nearby park, then headed for Applebees . As we drove away from school headed for Applebees though, I sent out a mass text to my sister and friends, who were waiting anxiously to hear about this blind date, "He's HOT."   :)

And the rest, as they say, is history.  (Well, almost.) We were engaged about 6 months later, on the tailgate of his truck, in my driveway.

(Dates on the tailgate had kind of become 'our thing.') We planned to get married in October, when our plans were suddenly shot to hell with the news that your Dad's unit was deploying very shortly.

As such, we were married 3 and half weeks from the day we got engaged...June 19, 2004. Do the math and you'll quickly realize that you little cherubs wouldn't come along for another 5 years almost.

As the saying goes..."Good things come to those who wait." Whoever said that, was right. :) But that's a story for another day!

Hanging out, trying to plan a wedding. 

THE WEDDING SHOWER

L to R: Heather, (that's Taylor's mommy, kids), Leigh, Aunt Mary, Liza, Mommy, Kelly, Sarah, Kim (that's Autumn and Tonio's mommy), Cindy and Nicole. 

Auntie Kim and Cristina

Rosey and Grammy

Mom, Auntie Kristen, Audrey and Aunt Phyllis

Starting with Aunt Mary's blonde hair in the foreground, then Kim, Sarah, Nicole, Heather, Leigh and Cindy

Gigi

Nana, Aunt Phyllis, Audrey and Auntie Kristen

THE BACHELORETTE PARTY

Auntie Jen and Mommy. (They were playing patriotic songs in the bar and Mommy was a little sad that Dad was going to be deploying.) 

Leigh and Mommy

Take a good look. That's your mom. On a box. In a bar. 

Mommy and Auntie Anabelle

PRE-WEDDING SET UP

Aunt Mary, Heather, Mommy, Jen, Nicole, Anabelle

This is your Aunt Mary dictating how this wedding was to go down. She earned her nickname 'The Boss' at this event. And thank God. Without her, this wedding would've been nothin'! (Please note your dad's face. Hilarious.)

Mom, Dad, Auntie Jen and Auntie Anabelle!

The Wedding Place (Corona Ranch) before...

And after. It was a remarkable tranformation!

And that's your Great Grampy Daniels at the bar with your Uncle Jungle Jim.  :)

THE REHEARSAL DINNER

Dad and I waiting for our friends to show up. 

But...they were busy having drinks at the CowPony.  :) 

PRE-WEDDING PREPARATIONS

Aunt Mary, Mom, Grammy

Me! Gettin' my hairs did! 

AND...THE WEDDING!

Ponka and Mommy

Smoochie smoochie! 

Auntie Valerie, Auntie Darlene, Auntie Donna

Your Great Grampy and Grammy Daniels and me

Auntie Jen, throwing away the wedding cake. (I told you she was the naughty one! lol.
(Not really. )

 Obviously, these are only a few of the photos from our wedding extravaganza, but these are the ones I could find readily in my little rinky dink album. (Our real wedding album is packed away... somewhere...) Someday, I'll bust those out!  Either way, hope you enjoyed the story.

Now, how about a vote? Only 2 more days.  :)