A husband who loves me!  Awww......

It's our anniversary!  I thought I would share about our courtship, but we actually only dated for two weeks before we got married.  (Hardly a courtship, and yes, it was dating---and I don't recommend that at all, BUT we were both 29 already, so yes, we dated.)

Then I thought I would share about how we met---we actually met at church.  Imagine that.  Ken helped me and my co-teacher in Sunday school do a skit for the kids, ages 3 and 4.  We did the story of Ruth and Boaz.  (Ken was Boaz, did you guess that?)  But I don't think I will tell you that story yet......

Then there was the night he asked me to marry him.  We were out by a lake, listening to all the sounds and watching  the moon and clouds drifting across the sky at night with twinkling stars ......hearing frogs croaking, splashes here and there....a coyote yipping......and then there was that rock formation.  Oh, I want to try to tell you about that.  Imagine you are standing out in this kind of grassy area, tall grass and mesquite trees---with a lake and marshy area nearby.  The only light is the full moon, and it is really bright.  Ken had just proposed, and when I looked at the ground I saw this white shape.....lots of white shapes, white rocks.  There was a line of them on the ground, and it made a big shape.........you aren't going to believe this, the white rocks were in the shape of a giant heart and we were standing right in the middle of it. 

 I am not joking!  I know this is so romantically corny, or just plain corny, and Ken claims he did not put it there----we didn't even notice it until I looked down and the rocks were reflecting the moonlight so we could plainly see it.  It was so neat.  It was a big heart with an arrow through it---seriously! 

We went back another time just to see if it was still there, and it was gone.  A few rocks here or there.....but it was scattered.  But it was really neat.  Sigh.

Ok, so I didn't really plan to tell you that.

I thought about telling you all about our wedding day---all the disasters that happened. 

First, the gasket on the oil filter of my truck blew, and almost ruined our honeymoon plans.  So Ken got that all taken care of.  He was driving at the time when he heard a thump and decided to pull over and check.  He has very good presence of mind.  If he would have kept on driving, we would have been truckless.

Then, my good friend who was also our best man took me to lunch, and I left my purse on the patio of this restraurant (ok, so Taco Bell technically isn't a restaurant)  anyway, it was in the next town over.  So I was getting ready to go to the church and the wedding was in just a few hours.  I had to get dressed, finish decorating for the reception (not in that order) and now I was missing my purse with all my important belongings like credit cards, cash, drivers license, car keys, etc.  So after calling the "restaurant" and getting no answer, and calling the hotel next to it where a friend was staying hopeing SHE could go look for my purse--to no avail, my mom said she would go see if she could find it.

So off to the church I went, and I was so stressed :)

But everything went well, Mom got my purse, a good Samaratin had turned it in!-and then the wedding got underway.

So, we had the longest wedding in history, and if you want to watch a video of it, just block off about two hours and we will have a party ~  during one of the many songs sung, our ring bearer started "bouncing" up and down at the knees, and I thought "quit playing around!"  The poor kid was passing out and trying very hard not too.  So my photographer and the beau of my bridesmaid literally caught him and drug him down the aisle.  The poor kids mom was running the sound booth, and saw it all happening while her husband was singing......talk about a dilemma! But dad never missed a beat and finished the song while his son was wisked away and replaced.  "You Took My Heart By Surprise" was the song he was singing.

So my bridesmaids beau at the time, Myles Standish (the 11th--I kid  you not) took over the ring pillow and from then on was referred to as "Myles Stand-in."  Miles, where ever you are today, please forgive me.  You are forever immortalized because of this day in history----it's a lot more important than that old Mayflower stuff, right?  Anyway, have you ever seen a grown man being a ring bearer?  I was blessed.  Oh, well, I forgot to tell you that Myles was already "standing in" for one of the ushers that couldn't make it at the last minute.  So there you have it.

Next, um lets see.......oh, I think that is all the craziness that happened.  It was a lovely wedding.  Pastor Thomas preached a beautiful wedding.  It really was more than a wedding, it was church.  Our best man, Sam, sang "Stronger."  And a dear friend named Shelly sang "Love Will Be Our Home."  And her mom, Jan played the piano, for the recessional---"In My Heart There Rings A Melody."   

It was a budget wedding---I got my wedding dress, an 1890's antique taffeta lovely thing at a vintage shop for $50.  Kens tux cost $50.  The flowers were donated, and they were fall colored gladiola sprays.  Since it was a fall wedding, we went to the mountains and collected leaves, bark, branches, moss, etc, and decorated all our reception tables with all the trappings of Autumn. 

 My mom bought two lovely sheet cakes and I had a little two tiered cake made with a heart shape on top, with Waldorf-Astoria cake, or red velvet inside the white frosting.  It was lovely, and a dear friend of mine, Rose, made it for a song.  I also made our announcements---I wrote them with calligraphy and had them done up at a little print shop. I think they cost me about $10.  We had about 300 people out our wedding---it was at a big church and they all would come out to support any celebration, whether they really knew you or not.  What a neat bunch of folks---they really gave us a great send off.

Our church donated all the coffee, punch and stuff like mints and even the rehearsal dinner.  Our pastor made hot wings!  What a doll he was. 

So, there you have it--it was simple, yet  very lovely and completely orchestrated by God.  You know, Ken and I were born the same year, and our Mom's were born the same year and month?  And even though we grew up miles apart---different states---we have so much in common.  I knew that God was preparing me for marriage, and I just had to wait for His timing.  Sounds pretty story-bookish, I know, but we have had our ups and downs too.  But when we got married, it was not just a "contract" between me and my husband, it was a "covenant" between three people, Ken, Nancy and the Lord.  He is the one who brought us together, and He will keep us in His care---as long as we continue to trust and acknowledge Him as being the head of our home.

There have been some days that I wanted to bail out.  We all have those days---but how can you bail out when the God of the Universe is on your side?  And not just that, but how would you explain it to Him.  "um, well God, I just didn't think you were big enough to help me handle this problem---so I took the easy way out."  Nope, not an option.  Like the song says,

"When you are tired and empty,

And when you can't run any longer,

He'll take you to the finish,

'Cause His love is stronger.................."

Happily,

Mrs. Baetz