October 10th

Today is our anniversary. I wish I had a scanner so I could include some photos of the gorgeous bride and groom... perhaps I'll be able to do that next year:)

Our wedding day was perfect. It was sunny and about 70 degrees. A fair breeze and a virtually cloudless sky.

Our wedding was exactly as we wanted it - my dad did an amazing thing for us when we got engaged. He told us we had a set amount of money and we could spend it as we wanted... he gave us the license to have our own wedding - not the wedding of my mom's dreams or the wedding of my mother-in-law's dreams - OUR wedding. We knew how much we could spend and anything over that we had to pay ourselves - anything left over, he would give to us in the form of a check.

Fortunately, we are fairly simple in our tastes and desires and our wedding cost almost nothing compared to today's weddings. I had my dress made - and never did the wedding dress shopping thing. I had my bridesmaid dresses made and they were my favorite color (the exact color of this blog, in fact). I had gerbera daisies as my flowers. I had candlesticks instead of candleabras. And I had no opinions from anyone else - just mine and Cornbread's. All of these things made me very happy:)

Our reception was at Cannonsberg Ski Lodge. It wasn't fancy and it wasn't beautiful (although the picture in the link is much prettier than it was 9 years ago), but it was FUN!!! Our guests sat at long banquet tables, not round tables. The carpet was threadbare from ski boots being scuffed over it all winter. There were wagon wheel light fixtures and not chandeliers. We had cans of beer instead of draft or bottles. But we had the most fun DJ's, and we had a wall of windows behind the bridal party so we could see the trees with the changing colors. We had a huge deck on the back so we could hang outside in the wonderful weather. We were young and just out of college and our reception became an extension of the parties we had had at Fuller in previous years. All of our friends were there. We were the spotlight couple for the night and we had a BLAST!

But the best thing about that day wasn't the wedding of my dreams or the fun reception, it was marrying my Davenid. He IS and was all I have ever needed and wanted. He is my best friend. He is love and he has turned out to be so much more than I could have ever asked. He is my favorite person of all time:) He is the best father and constantly strives to be the best husband. He works to improve upon what he already is - not because he's deficient in anything, but because he doesn't want to be complacent, he wants to always be working on himself. And he inspires and pushes me to do that for myself. He works hard so he can be successful at his job - want to know why? His goal is to make enough money so that I can do whatever I want - not so we can have tons of stuff, but he wants ME to be able to make my own choices in life. He loves me and respects me so deeply, it brings tears to my eyes.

Every year I tell him that I've heard that marriage is difficult and I'm still waiting for that to happen. I'm sure we will have our downs, but I feel like we have had 9 years of ups so far.

I promise to love you with all of my heart;

I promise to be faithful to you;

to listen to you;

to pray for you;

and to put my trust in you.

I promise to cheer for you when you succeed, and to lift you up when you fail.

I promise before God and everyone here

to respect,

honor,

protect,

and to serve you

for as long as we both are living.

I can honestly say that my husband truly fulfills his vows. My hope is that I do, too.