Southern Weddings

We used wedding window for my wedding website and we love it!!! The winner of this prize is lucky, lucky!

Favorite memory was one of our first dates in which he instructed me, "wear comfortable clothes and bring a hat". He picked me up around 2 in the afternoon and we started driving up into the mountains in NC. We stopped along the way at an apple orchard that overlooked the Appalachian Mountains to pick apples and grab a gallon of apple cider which we would sip throughout our day. We reached Pisgah National Forest where he surprised me and taught me how to fly fish. We spent the afternoon fishing the streams but he did not cast one, but instead watched and guided me the whole day. (I did manage to catch a few fish… and a few branches) Afterwards we went to the closest mountain town and filled up on barbecue and beer. We are now getting married in a nearby town that has a trout pond and apple orchard on the property and having barbecue for the rehearsal dinner, which ties in nicely with this shared favorite memory of ours.

My favorite memory actually all started back in 2003 when I met Reed. We were in the same college English class in Pensacola and I pretty much fell for him the moment I saw him. I thought he was so good looking and there was just something about him. He ended up making small talk with me and we went out a few times. I really liked him but at the time I just wasn’t looking for anything super serious. Mainly because I had just gotten out of a lengthy relationship. I broke it off with him by just not answering his phone calls. I know how rude of me and that is SO not me. I don’t know what was wrong with me. He eventually got the hint and just stopped calling me. I got back with my ex and then we broke up again sometime later. It just ate away at me what I did to Reed, so being silly and young I wrote him a letter on some cute little stationary telling him that he didn’t deserve what I did to him and he is a great guy. I also told him if he didn’t have a girlfriend that I would love to get a drink with him or catch up. (I wrote a letter before facebook ha) Anyways…he called me and told me how sweet he thought it was, but he did have a girlfriend now and blah blah. Anyways jump to 2008 we met up again bc I have always had a crush on him and found him on fb and we met up and had a drink and have talked everyday since. The cute thing about this story is about a month after we had been dating I was sitting on his couch and he told me to hold on a second he wanted to get something. He brought me the letter I had written him way back when. I about died!! I was mortified!! It was sooo funny. I think that is priceless and I wonder why he saved it after so many years…I guess it was meant to be because we are getting married in November :)

My favorite memory is hands down our first date. I remember when my guy asked me on a date, I was so worried that he wouldn’t talk (he is a shy boy) and that there would be tons of awkward silences and crickets chirping…..well, the date was just the opposite! He managed to talk so much and keep the conversation going as well as ask insightful questions. We had the best time! The date involved dinner and we ended up staying at the restaurant for 4 hours! I couldn’t believe how the time had flown on by. I still smile to myself when I think of our first date!

One of my favorite memories of my dear and I was right after he proposed–we were so excited! Most people would break open a bottle of champagne, or spend a night on the town, but the first thing that we wanted to do was to go get celebratory ice cream cones. We go back there all the time, not only because the ice cream is delicious, but because we always like to reminisce about our wonderful, and very "us," engagement celebration.

My favorite memory of my fiance and I was a trip we took to my families mountain house in NC to enjoy a week of cool weather (it was in the 60’s and at home we had been in the 90’s!) and enjoy the 4th of July fireworks from our mountain top home away from home. It was a week of car riding, outdoor time together and our first time really realize how much we still had to learn from one another (My fiance caught a fish, cleaned it and cooked it for us on the grill one night.. still one of the most delicious meals I had eaten and WHO KNEW a lawyer could clean a fish!?) I think the wedding window would be great for us so we can share memories we have with our wedding guests!

One of my early memories is finding sweet notes from him in the most random places. I remember the first note was scibbled on a napkin and stuck underneath my windshield wiper. It had the chorus to one of our favorite songs. That was 7 years ago, and I still have that napkin to this day.My fiance and I have spent much of our relationship as a long-distance couple. When they say "distance makes the heart grow fonder", I have no doubt this is true. The worst part about visiting each other was when one of us had to leave. He came up with a lot of creative ways to make me feel loved after he was gone. My favorite was when I progressively found about 20 sticky notes hidden around the house. In the end, they spelled out just how much he loved me, and it was such a sweet surprise.

My favorite memory is the moment he told me he loved me for the first time. It was such a beautiful night. We were gazing at the stars and laughing without a care in the world. We were talking about how thankful we were that God had brought us together. He looked over and whispered "ich liebe dich" which is German for "I love you." I began softly crying and he had a very worried look on his face. I then began smiling and laughing and told him they were tears of joy and that I was so happy. I feel incredibly cheesy when I say this, but he honestly took my breath away in that moment.

My favorite memory with my fiance has to be the incredible proposal story that he gave me. He completely surprised me! The proposal started at 7:30am on Sat 2/13 and he didn’t propose until 1:30am on Sun 2/14! He and I met at Pine Cove Christian Camps working as family camp counselors during college and we’ve been going back every Valentine’s weekend since. They have a couples conference that weekend, and we go to help cook, serve the meals and help run camp activities. So when he asked me to go this year, I didn’t think anything of it – it was our third year to go. Well…when we got to camp Friday night there was snow on the ground (in Tyler, TX!) and the power was out–I could see it was going to be a LONG weekend. Fortunately, he stuck with his plans. Saturday morning before breakfast he told me we were going to celebrate Valentine’s day a day early and handed me a box with a letter in it and ticket stubs and momentos from dates we’ve been on. I just thought he was being sweet and romantic…I didn’t get to finish the letter before breakfast, so we came back in the afternoon to keep reading it (he had me read it outloud). It stopped in the middle of a sentence…and that’s how each letter ended — except the 6th one! So in between other boxes and letters we had to go serve dinner and clean up…I got a heart shaped chocolate cake with one of the letters and then a bouquet of gerber daisies – my favorite! And THEN…the last letter…we walked into the last building and there were candles lining the path and rose petals, two bouquets of roses and two boquets of gerber daisies, music playing and champagne glasses with a bottle of sparkling cider…and ANOTHER BOX (#6). I read the 5 pages of letter in that box (for a total of 31 typed pages) and then at the end it said he had something to read to me. He reached over and grabbed his Bible, read from Proverbs 31 and told me he loved me for the first time and then got down on one knee, pulled out the ring, and asked me if I would marry him. I said YES!!

Peter and I have had too many great moments for me to pick just one. While I love that we are constantly laughing with each and making the other smile, my most memorable was actually BEFORE we really started dating. We were matching on e-harmony on February 1, 2008… and ironically we signed up on the same day and were each other’s first matches. After a couples weeks of communication online, we decided to meet each other in person – on Valentine’s Day nonetheless! We were both grad students on the same campus and decided to meet up at a local place for lunch. Nothing romantic or demanding – we were just getting to know each other over a casual lunch. We had a great lunch with great conversation. While I did not tell him at the time, I will be honest and say that I had a dinner date that same evening with another guy from a different online dating website that I had been talking to. Now, the memorable moment hasn’t occurred just yet, but keep in mind that this background information is key to understanding that my most memorable moment with my love occurred when he WASN’T there! I went to meet the other guy for dinner (scandalous, I know!), and as soon as I saw him, I knew this wasn’t right. It was in that moment that I KNEW that I wanted to be with Peter. With no other person have I ever been able to be so myself. I could pick a moment that included both of us, but in a way, Peter was involved in the moment. The moment I knew it was me and him will always me memorable to me, and I am sure that the moment HE knew I was the one will always be memorable to him.

all of my memories with my fiance are fantastic. There isn’t just one I would put before any of the others, but the very first would have to be the night we met. We didn’t meet in person until a whole month after we met online via an art website where I was posting my photography and writing and he was posting his poetry. We started commenting back and forth on each other’s work, he wrote mini poems for my pictures and I wrote responses to his story poems. We soon moved to email where we continued to write poetry back and forth to each other for a total of 52 emails, each one of them a fresh poem expressing how we felt about each other with beautiful visual lyrics and lines filled with wonder and excitement, knowledge and fear. It was so intimate, so safe and open, there was no judging, just complimenting, that eventually he got my number, called me, and bought a ticket to come meet me in person. I was living in Tucson at the time, he was from New York City. A few weeks later, I picked him up at the airport and we drove 3 and a half hours north to Sedona. We talked the entire time, stroked each others faces, laughed, and shared everything else we couldn’t fit into that night of flurrying words. It was so romantic and heartbreaking to think this might be the only weekend we ever get to see each other or enjoy each other’s company, that I managed to fall in love with him despite only having just "met" him. Luckily, he was so smitten with me, he moved me out to New York a month later so we didn’t have to be apart any longer. I realize this is a lot of memories rolled into one, but they all are so tied together and so crucial for our story to continue, that I feel they can only belong as a mish-mash. If one thing hadn’t happened, none of them would have. I thank my lucky stars every day for that time he left me the first comment on my picture, for being online the same time he was regardless of the time differences, and for finding my innocence once again thanks to his patience and understanding.

I am a girl who truly enjoys anything special. I am easily amused, lucky for my sweetie. My sophomore year of college (we had just started dating), the flu attacked me. When I get sick, I really get sick. I did not look like hot stuff- skin was broken out, my hair was a mess, my nose was dry and red and I was totally rockin’ the sweats. Lucas (previously noted as ‘sweetie’), asked if we could spend some time together but I let him know that I was a walking viral plague and that he probably did not want to see me. He played it cool and said we would hang out soon. Well, not a hour later I hear the doorbell ring. I hesitantly went to the door, and who do I see? You guessed it; ‘sweetie’. Insecure as I was, I found strength to open the door and let him see my zombie(ish) features. He answered, "Hello beautiful." That was all it took and I was ready to say "I do!" He had my favorite smoothie in one hand and a single rose and ‘The Little Mermaid" (my FAVE movie of all time) in the other. I will NEVER forget how special and beautiful he made me feel when I had previously felt like death. From that moment on, I knew that he was a keeper!

Memories are something that mean more than gold itself. I have many memories with the love of my life. However, the one that sticks out the most was a very special date. My family owns a ranch, which I knew would be aperfect place for a date. I had spent several hours getting everything set up just so it would make for one of the most perfect moments that we would have in our long relationship. I picked her up around mid evening when the sun was just getting ready to start setting. We got out to my property when I made her put a blind fold on. 10 minutes later we pulled up to a pond as the sun had just slipped below the horizon. Before her lay a fire with a candle lighted area around it and a nice bed of pillows and blankets for comfort. I had packed a bottle of wine and a nice dinner of chicken kabobs which we cooked over the camp fire under God’s beautiful master piece above. Itr was a wonderful night as we listened to the summer time cricketts and the frogs on the pond while talking and dreaming the night away about our future together. It was not the first time that I realized how much I loved her but it was one of the many times that I knew from deep within my heart, that she was the girl for me, the one I would spend the rest of my life with. The one I wanted and will grow old with and be together for all of eternity. I love you Jessica, you stold my heart everytime we look into one anothers eyes!!!

My favorite memory is meeting him for the first time – it was like a dream come true since I had noticed him and thought he was so cute several months before, but I never thought we’d have a friend in common. Then that friend threw a house party and the rest is history!! :)

My fiance and I graduated from college in May 2009. Shortly after graduation, we headed to Europe for a 3 week vacation. Spending that time with my boyfriend (fiance) brought so many emotions: happiness, excitement, joy, etc. It was an incredible memory that I will cherish forever.