Years of marriage and laughter.
12 years ago today, I met you at the end of a church aisle and promised to love you forever.
In sickness and in health.
For Richer or for poorer.
They really should add “in times of sleep deprivation”, because we all know that’s what consumes us when kids come along.
We have made the most out of this life we have been given.
I love you just the same as I did 12 years ago. I love you differently. I love you more.
In those 12 years, I have learned that time changes things. You, me and us.
I’ve learned that marriage does take work, even if (for the most part) marriage has been easy for us. We still need to work on it and maybe that is why it has been easy because it hasn’t always felt like hard work.
I’ve learned that our love was strong enough to stand the tests of infertility, children after infertility and all the other pressures of parenting, working, living. I’ve learned that my love for you grew when we became parents. It grew each time we shared the journey of a pregnancy and the birth of each one of our daughters.
I’ve learned that there is much more to a marriage than holding hands and date nights. Things no one talks about. Like how you will miss grocery shopping as a couple. How there will be days when you and your spouse are like ships passing in the night. Times when our kids take our best and there isn’t much else left for us. Times when we fall into bed at the end of the day exhausted. Times when our bed will be full of children while you and I hang off the edge. Feet in your ribs and arms everywhere. Times when our nights consist of vomit and fevers. And laundry. Oh the laundry. No one ever talks about the laundry.
I’ve learned that through it all, you are still the only one that I would ever want to do this with.
Anyone can be happy and deeply in love when times are good. That’s the easy part. I’ve learned that it’s being happy and deeply in love when times aren’t so good that signifies a strong marriage. It’s surviving infertility and still our marriage is a rock. It’s becoming parents after infertility and still our marriage is a rock. It’s deaths and job losses and moves and changes…. but our marriage is the rock that never shifts under it all.
A dozen years of marriage is no small feat. In a society where the Divorce rate is high, where the time it takes me to eat a meal, lasts longer than some hollywood marriages. I know that we are so perfectly right for each other. That you were meant for me. I know, because I miss you when you are gone. Even when you are just gone to work. Or out to get groceries. Traveling for work. I really miss you. Our marriage is made up of a thousand little things. Holding hands in the car. Making my coffee in the morning. Doing your laundry. It’s all the little things we do that make up the fabric of our relationship. Even the girls notice it. Like the time, I tried to give up coffee in the morning (I know, right) and Piper asked (in a very concerned way), why you were no longer making my coffee for me.
Let us never stop doing the little things.
I am excited for our future. With such a great past, a wonderful present…. I can only imagine that the best is yet to come. Raising daughters is hard work, but you are the perfect partner for it. We are definitely in a “hard-working” stage of marriage, trying to balance our family life with our careers and raise well-rounded and happy children. To do all that and still have time for us. You know, even when (for those fleeting minutes) I think we might not be doing a good job, I look at the big picture and I know that we are. I feel it in my core and I know that we are.
So when I look at our photo album over the last 12 years, I see you. Me. Us. A wedding and babies. Toddlers… kids. Travel, trips and vacations. A house that truly is a home. The greatest loves of my life under one roof. And I know that we have been so very blessed.
To 12 of the happiest years of my life. Happy Anniversary, Craig. You make this life worth it.
