Wow! Is it true that I haven't used this blog since 2003?!?! What can I say? A lot has happened since 2003. The absurd picture is of my husband and I at the Timberwolves game on March 2. It was crazy wig night and this picture was #5 in the quest for me to get one where my eyes looked normal--however, as you can see, John sabatoged my efforts! So just for him I am putting it on my blog.

Speaking of John, that brings us to the topic of who is he and how did he end up my husband. I have been meaning to get this down somewhere so here we go. I don't remember the first time I met John. We were freshmen at Hope College in Holland Michigan. When you are a freshman, you meet everyone at least twice and rarely remember their name, major, or hometown. So we met as freshmen. We were both on the swim team, which is a fraternity/sorority of its own. So somewhere between being freshmen and being on the swim team we met and became friends. That honestly is all I have to say about our friendship until summer before our senior year of college. We both started attending a summer Christian fellowship group called Veritas that met at the Holland State Park Beach on Sunday nights. I didn't know he was a Christian and vice versa. This started our real friendship. Our senior year we both were dating (not each other) and busy. After graduating from Hope in 1996, John moved to Chicago and I stayed in Michigan trying to figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up. Since Chicago wasn't too far away, I visited once. I remember looking at John in a slightly different light after that trip. It wasn't love-it was true friendship. I decided to go back to college to become a teacher and John decided to move to Minnesota. I began classes at Grand Valley State University in the summer of 1997. By this time the internet had become a fascinating new place filled with great ways to stay in touch with friends that lived hundreds of miles away. John and I became Instant Message buddies. For the next three years, we would chat on AIM and meet up when ever he would come into town to visit his family.

On Christmas day 1999, I found out that I had won and SUV on the internet. Not just any SUV-- a Nissan Xterra in bright yellow! Now you might ask how this impacted John and my relationship, well here's the story. I decided after driving the Xterra for a few months that it wasn't for me. I sold it and put the money in the bank. Joyfully, I went back to driving my beautiful seafoam Plymouth Colt. Seriously, joyfully. This windfall let me do something that I had always wanted to do, but never did before--work at a Bible camp for the summer. I started dreaming about all the amazing places I could work at a camp--California, Maine, Oregon, North Carolina... The list went on and on and at the bottom of the list was the state I ended up at--North Dakota. All I can tell you is that God knew exactly what he was doing. Now to get to North Dakota, I had to go through Minnesota. So it was the perfect time visit John and use him as a place to rest for the night for free. So I did. I stayed an extra day and had a great time. Then I headed off to camp for the summer 2000. During the summer, I received a package from John in the mail. It was filled with things we had talked about while I had visited. I was impressed, but he was just a friend. After camp, we continued to use the internet as our primary communication. I was doing my student teaching and finishing up school. I landed my first professional job in May and decided to return to the camp for the summer. On my way out, I stopped and visited John again. It was wonderful. Again, he sent me a care package that showed he had really listened to me. Again, I was impressed, but he was just a friend. (If I hadn't won the car, so I could work at a camp in ND so I had to go through MN and visit John, our friendship probably would have just stayed minimal.)

The next couple of years were busy since I was a beginning teacher. We used the internet to keep in touch. John got into a serious relationship. I really thought that I would get the email some day saying that he had popped the question to her. It never came and we became closer friends. As he was in this relationship, I began to see all the wonderful qualities he had. I thought I had missed the boat. Eventually, his relationship deteriorated and ended. We spent A LOT of time emailing and chatting. I questioned how much work he was getting done. :) We would see each other when he would come to town to visit family. Spring of 2004, John called me out of the blue Memorial Day from northern Minnesota. We talked for a long time. It was really nice to talk instead of type. When he visited Michigan in June, we saw each other for 5 straight days-the most we had seen each other since college. Still we were just friends. He invited me to meet up with him at Cornerstone Music Festival in Illinois on July 4th weekend. I told him I had to think about it. The night before the festival started, I decided to go. We had a great time. On the last evening as he followed me to wash off my dirty feet, he asked me to consider being more than friends. I left the next morning with the promise of something more than friendship. We talked daily and prayed about changing our friendship and being in a long distance relationship. Sometime in late July, we agreed to go on a date and see what happens. Of course since we lived in separate states, this required travel. I drove out to Minnesota and we went on our first date on Friday August 13, 2004. On December 27, 2004, in front of a winter campfire John proposed to me and I said "it's about time" just kidding... I said "yes!" We got married on July 15, 2005 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I moved out to Minnesota that summer and here I am-- now a Minnesotan and married. That's the story... thanks for reading.