7 Years ago Today......

At the end of July, Peter and I will be celebrating our first momentous Anniversary. As we approach that date, I have thought back on where we have come and how we have grown together as a couple. Last year, I did a little recap on every year of marriage, and I really enjoyed reflecting on each of those years. This year, I thought I would do something similar and see how my perspective on the past years might be changing as we pile on more life experience!

This year, I thought I would take it a step farther, and reflect on the REAL beginning of our relationship. So join me over the next few weeks as I reflect on us and prepare to celebrate our first milestone anniversary!

So, the beginning of what is now the marriage of Peter and Amy Keyser. To start us, we have to journey back to our senior year of high school. Before that time, we knew of each other. I was homeschooled throughout middle and high school and Peter attended a small Christian high school. It is weird now to think of all the times our paths may have crossed. Now we found out that in middle school we would have done homeschool testing together. Peter also rear-ended my sister-in-laws car. We knew of each other our junior year when I played basketball and Peter kept stats for the girl's team.

But we truly didn't know each other until our senior year when I started going to the small school part-time. Here is a picture of us and our very small class our senior year. And yes, my husband is wearing a skirt and a pom-pom on his head (haha, wait until he finds out I posted this one!)

As our senior year came to a close we became better and better friends. We started hanging out more and talking more, but neither one of us expected anymore than just a friends relationship.

As we graduated, I was totally wrapped up in my little niece's

And Peter was very involved (and very good!) in finishing up track!

So there is the back story. So, how did our strictly friends relationship become more? I always admired Peter as he was always a leader at school and everyone liked him because he was a nice guy. He also had a deeply rooted, growing Spiritual relationship and that was exactly what I was looking for in a boyfriend. This is when I started to consider that I would like more than to be just friends with him. He says he started liking me more because I was nice and fun to be around :) And that is all it took :)

Actually it took some work on God's part to get us together. You see, both of us had a hard time being honest with one another because we were afraid of rejection. So we graduated together and off to grad-night we went. This could have been the end of our story as we would have gone on with our lives and that would have been it. I remember some of my friends telling me I needed to tell him how I felt, but I never saw anything from his behavior that would lead me to believe he wanted more than a friendship. So away we went on our bus to Grad-night. In a class of 12, you can imagine how in everyone else's business people were.

We hung out together the entire grad-night and in the morning our class took a little walk on the beach together. Peter kept trying to get me alone so he could find out if I was interested in him and that never happened. Anytime he would try to walk just a little ways away from the crowd to talk with me, people would follow us (he was a leader!). So at some point he just gave up and was not going to even bother asking me.

So we got on the bus and headed back home, where we would part ways and probably not talk to each other anymore after a few months. Well, God clearly intended for us to become a partnership because the bus broke down a short ways away from the beach (and yes, to this day I believe that bus broke down for us!) Finally we were able to talk with each other. Peter asked how a guy would know if I was interested in him, and I said "Well, I usually wait to show any interest until a guy shows interest in me" and Peter said the famous Peter quote that is engraved on my wedding ring today "I'm Interested!"

And now the rest is history! We were an inseparable couple forever and ever!

Even though we were so young at the age of 18, things moved quickly for us. It didn't take long before we were two young kids in love. By the time we were together for 2 months, we knew we were in the forever type of love and would be getting married. Unfortunately for us, we were young and had no money, no jobs, and 4 years of college before us.

Yes, we were crazy! Something we are told A LOT in our lives. You must be crazy to to think you could possibly be ready to get married! You must be crazy to think you can buy a condo at 20! You must be crazy for getting married while still in college! You must be crazy to adopt at 23! You must be crazy to think you can survive on one income in this day and age! You must be crazy to have 2 kids in 9 months! You must be crazy to be considering adding a 3rd child! Yup, what can I say - society thinks our entire marriage is crazy... so what?!?

So we dated throughout the summer and before we knew it, it was time for Peter to go 6 hours away for school. It was VERY tough for us to be apart, but this is when we knew for sure our love was real. We could not stand being away from each other! We talked for hours and hours and HOURS on the phone each day which was so great for our relationship. We reached a place where we really knew each other very well in a short amount of time. It was very strange just dating a voice, but we grew so much during that time.

There was no way this separation would last 4 years of college and so at the semester break Peter transferred back to the school in our hometown so we could be together!

Changing schools was not the only big change at the semester break! But that will have to be saved for my next installment :)