Ten Happy Years

Today marks our ten year anniversary!

Over the past 10 years we've:

- lived in 7 different homes
- lived in 5 different states
- been blessed with 3 wonderful children
- earned 2 degrees - 1 bachelors, 1 PhD (+my bachelor's degree 4 days before our wedding)
- managed to complete 8 years of (seemingly never-ending) schooling
- had 0 fights

Ok, I'm lying on the last one, but we can say 0 fights that haven't been resolved, and that's what matters, right :)   Here's a little timeline of us over the years...

2003:  We met at a Taco Party through a mutual friend early in the year and were married in August:

(this was the night we met)

(our engagement picture)

2004 - Lived in Alaska for the summer; we went on a helicopter ride to see and walk on glaciers:

2005 - We became parents:

2006 - Mike graduated from BYU; we moved to Vegas for a year:

2007 - We became a family of four!  We moved to Texas to begin 5 years of graduate school.  This picture was taken the first month of graduate school and we were just realizing what we were in for!

2008 - Still in Texas.  Survived the first year of grad school.  Celebrated our 5 year anniversary with an overnight trip to Dallas to go to a Stealy Dan concert (I informed Mike on this trip that I would be in charge of our next milestone anniversary, which I was):

2009 - Still in Texas.  Somehow surviving grad school with 2 kids.  

Here we are at Steve & Ashley's wedding:

2010 - We became a quintessential American/Canadian family and adopted a dog.  This was a great year for us: school was relatively stress-free, the girls were pretty independent (meaning potty trained and talking), and over all just a fun year:

2011: We became a family of five! 

2012:  Mike (finally!) graduated with his PhD.  We moved to Maryland.  It was the first move where I felt like we had really established some roots as a family, and it was probably the hardest move I'd made since moving away from Calgary at age 15 (and I'd moved on average every year until moving our move to Texas 5 years previous).  I had this overwhelming feeling during that move that I was so glad that we were doing it as a family and that despite everything else changing, the five of us stick together.  It was a good feeling :)

2013:  10 years together!  We have a job.  Three kids.  A dog.  A house to live in.  And many many blessings.  10 years has brought us so many great things.  I'm also glad that we got a weekend away (pictures to come) to celebrate.  I am a lucky girl:

I love that picture of the two of us and will always remember what a beautiful weekend we had celebrating 10 years together.  But in reality, my life right now isn't sailboats and weekend vacations - not yet, at least :)  This picture below shows our current life a little more accurately, and characterizes the best things that these past 10 years have brought me.  I am thankful for the man that I married and the wonderful family we have together