Our Love Story: Part Four

Chris and I were a real couple now. We held hands in the hallway and passed notes in class. We went out on a date every weekend, usually to the movies or out to eat, or to one of our houses to watch a movie. My parents really seemed to like him, but they weren't too keen on their 16 year old daughter being so serious about a guy! About 4 months after we started dating, in February, Chris and I said the big L to each other. I was crazy about him and he seemed equally head over heels for me! One morning I got to my locker to find a note full of pink starburst (my fave) taped to the paper in the shape of a heart. What a sweetie! He had gone to the gas station that morning before school and bought like 10 packs of starburst to have enough to make a heart. He was always doing sweet things like that! For Valentine's day, I always got a huge teddy bear and roses. He was definetely a romantic at heart, and I loved that about him!!

Chris and I our Junior year of high school

(this photo was submitted for the "Cutest Couple" contest our school was having)

We dated for the rest of high school, going to both our proms together and arriving hand in hand at graduation. During our senior year, he had bought me a promise ring, and we started picking out names for our future children. We knew we wanted to go to college together, and would eventually like to live in Northwest Arkansas. We wanted to get married after 2 years of college, and wait 5 years to have kids. We have always been planners!

Our first professional photo together...complete with the promise ring (and my Mickey Mouse musical watch) :)

We headed off to Westark College together (now UA Fort Smith) at the tender age of 18 in the fall of 2000, with our majors declared: me-early childhood education and Chris business administration. Chris got an apartment with another guy, and my older brother and I got a mobile home to live in while we went to college. Our freshman year of college proved to be challenging-adjusting to living away from home and being "adults" along with all the changes and (stupid) decisions young adults sometimes make! After some turmoil and disagreement over our future plans, I broke up with Chris after the first semester of college.

Four months apart was more than enough for us both to realize we didn't want to spend another day apart. We reconciled our differences, forgave each other, and were back together again. In May of 2001, while in Mena to see our families, Chris took me out to the pier at a local lake at sunset, got down one knee, and asked me if I would spend the rest of my life as his wife. We both cried, and I started with the wedding plans the next day! We were only 19 years old! I look back and think, wow, people must have thought we were crazy! But to this very day, I have zero regrets about marrying so young. He spent the summer in Texas working for his dad and saving money, and that was very difficult to be so far apart from one another, especially after the breakup! He got me a puppy to keep me company while he was away, our first "baby", a Jack Russell terrier named Andy.

Vacationing at Lake Ouachita the summer we were engaged

I was so glad when he moved back in August when school started back. We were married in a beautiful Christmas wedding ceremony on December 22, 2001.

Can you believe they gave us a marriage license without our parent's permission? ;)

To be continued...