Happy 20th Anniversary!

 Today, Pat and I are celebrating our 20th anniversary!  I thought I would start out by sharing his card and a mini album I made for him.  The album pictures are terrible, but that is more than okay :)  I was in a hurry to get this long post done to share with you before we left on vacation without him knowing what I was up too.  I'll let you know if it was a surprise! 

It truly is an amazing feeling to celebrate twenty years of marriage.  It almost feels unreal, but I have to say that I feel so tremendously blessed.  If you would have asked me 20 years ago (at the age of 21 :)), if I would have been this happy living a life filled with love with my very best friend, I'm sure I would have said yes, but I really would not have known what it meant. To live each day with the love of your life and very best friend is a blessing beyond belief.  Doesn't mean that every day is perfect, but life certainly is wonderful.  We are so lucky to have four healthy boys and not just our immediately family to grow with but our parents and siblings too.  Happy anniversary to my Patrick!

And here's a quick view of his mini album and our 20 years together (with lots of laughter and some tears in between).

This front page was meant to be. I have five large boxes filled with extra pictures from scrapbooks I have done over the years.  How in the world I found this one in the first box, I'll never know.  But isn't it the perfect picture.  We'll see if Pat can remember when he did this (may have been our honeymoon in Bermuda, but I can't remember.)  My journaling says:  "Who would have known that after our first date to Putt Putt (golf) in 1986, that our love would grow into our wonderful family." 

And a picture of our wedding day.  We got married at our church where we first really got to know each other in our church youth group. Journaling, "Back at the scene where it all began, Good Shepherd Church.  On an unusally cool August day, I married my best friend."

Heading to the reception in our white limousine :)  "My dad said, "You do it once, you do it right."  We did it right, surrounded by our family and friends, we celebrated the start of our family together."  And let's just say we had an awesome reception!  We danced and sang the night away with our families. 



After five years, we had our first little man.  And could he be any cuter.  Look at those big eyes.  Seriously, Ryan was the happiest paby and we loved his big eyes and his hair that tended to stick up just a bit.  

Three and a half years later, we welcomed Jonathon. Opposite of Ryan in looks our brown eyed, toe headed little man.  We still had man on man coverage at that point...but man oh man did life change when we added number three!

We had this picture taken when Jonathon turned two.  Seriously I think my boys are the cutest things ever...must take after their dad :)  And yes, I did like to dress them in matching clothes...look at the next page.

And three years later, our first strawberry blond little guy.  Oh how I love the bottom right picture of Jonathon kissing him.  Going from man on man coverage to zone coverage in the number of children was a big adjustment. But oh how we have laughed over the years as the boys grow.  From not knowing how to breast feed, teaching them to ride bikes, not making a team, making a team, not getting your black belt, getting in trouble for running across the street without looking.  We've had lots of little lessons learned ourselves and with our boys.  And bigger, hard life lessons, losing my dad unexpectedly.  But we have figured it out together...talking, arguing a bit, but most importantly, doing it together.

We weren't quite sure we were done, so we had one more try (Pat says trying is the best part :)!) and Marcel arrived.  "And last but certainly not least, our Marcel Paul.  Our sweet angel whispering in our ear that God truly does welcome new little ones when he creates new angels."  Marcel was born nine months after my dad passed away and is named after him.

And one year later, look at all those handsome boys...yes matching again.

Our boys grow before our eyes and as they grow, we continue to growth together too.  These are pictures from Easter this year.

Sorry for the really fuzzy pic!

And the back cover, "After 20 years, life simply could not be better.  Thank you for being the love of my life and best friend.  May our lives continue to grow each and every year.  I love you, Patrick,"

And if you've made it this far...you deserve an award!!

PS Putting this together was super fun.  Like normal, I kept it very simple.  Here's my quick process:

- sorted through pictures to represent our 20 years together.

- picked out coordinating 12x12 paper for the pages that faced each other.

- picked out stamps (all from Verve) that went with the page and punched them out on circles and stamped an image behind them.

- type my journaling in a typewriter font and printered them out.