I keep thinking about the post where I asked for some Frequently Asked Questions,  but when I go to answer them I am very overwhelmed! I am a blow horn, so for me to try to answer all of your deep and thoughtful questions in one post makes me laugh out loud! Not gonna happen, it would be 1000 pages long. So I am bucking up and tackling the big hairy beast one question at a time.

Question: How did you and Jarrett meet? Why did you get married young and have children early?

I really should have Jarrett tell this story. He is the only one that remembers the first, second, and third time we met. hehe, I remember the fourth as the first. One day when talking about the first time we met each other, I told Jarrett it was at his birthday party in December 2002 in his college dorm. He then told me that we had met 3 other times before that, but I did not remember any of them!

our engagement photos

We met our Freshman year in college in 2002. We were both attending East Texas Baptist University in Marshall, Texas and we were both from Denver, Colorado. I guess we would have been 18 almost 19 years old.

We started dating at the end of our Freshman year and had a long distance relationship over the summer. I stayed in Texas and worked as a youth group intern for a church in Texas and Jarrett went home to Denver. We wrote letters, isn’t that cute?:) Facebook hadn’t been invented yet and I don’t think I even had a computer.

I went home at the end of summer 2003 to be with my family in Denver and we had a lot of fun going on dates and meeting each others’ high school friends. Jarrett says he knew he wanted to marry me almost as soon as we started dating. I was in love by the end of that summer. We said “I love you” for the first time on July 4, 2003. I still have the piece of paper from the first time he wrote “I love you” to me:)

We went back to college in the Fall of 2003. Jarrett was in full force Prince Charming mode, he would drive an hour round trip just to surprise me with a Starbucks. He once stood in the pouring rain for hours waiting for me to come down from my dorm room, I was mad at him for some reason, hehe. All the girls of the dorm kept coming to tell me that he was outside, but I never went down, we laugh about it now, he was so smitten:) I remember telling him to wait at least until Christmas to ask me to marry him. He did not listen and asked me in October, he came to school that semester with the ring! That is so Jarrett, once he makes up his mind about something he goes for it full force.

I was very suspicious on the day he proposed when he picked me up from my dorm room. He was wearing my favorite shirt of his, again, for the 3rd day in a row. I mean I know college guys are bad at laundry, but I was like “what?”. I knew it must be a special occasion and he took me to a little lake that we would walk around between classes. He got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. I don’t remember anything he said, but I remember how he looked and how I felt. It felt like all my dreams were coming true all at once.

my favorite shirt he wore the day he proposed

So I was 19 years old and engaged to be married and I felt like it was the most normal thing in the world. I was ready and so was Jarrett, we both always knew growing up that we would get married and have children young.

So the rest was history really. We were married 8 months later on June 4, 2004. We were both 20 years old. We got married in east Texas in a town near our college. We then moved into married housing at our school. I was a bank teller part time at a bank, and Jarrett preached at a church and waited tables at a Mexican restaurant. We spent the first year of our marriage going on dates, watching movies, making a home, and just having plain ol fun together. Even though we were bringing in a small amount of money from our jobs, rent was cheap at college and we did not have any bills, so we felt so rich!

I was ready to have a baby right away, like on the honeymoon in the Bahamas right away, but Jarrett wanted to wait a year. We split the difference and Peyton was born 15 months later on September 6, 2005.

our first baby, I had been dreaming about him my entire life

After sweet little Peyton was born, we were both still in college full time. I would pump bottles and we would switch off the baby between classes, which we had organized so one of us would be home with him. We lived on campus so we would run back and forth between our house to class. Jarrett was still preaching and working, and I had quit my job and eventually went part time at school. Jarrett graduated on time when Peyton was 6 months old, and I did not graduate until after Conner was born. I finished my degree online from Liberty University.

the love of my life

That is our love story! It has brought up many wonderful memories, even though that was all only 8 years ago, it seems like a lifetime ago. I am so thankful that Jarrett and I found each other. I can’t quite explain it, as I am sure all of those in love have trouble doing, but we just fit together. Like we were destined before time began to live our lives hand in hand.