noun.
1. The greatest couple in the history of ever.
One amazing, hard, rewarding, beautiful, busy year as flown by us. I really can't believe we've already hit our first milestone as a married couple. This is exciting stuff, guys! In honor of this momentous occasion, and just because it's my favorite story to tell, I will give you the gift of our love story.
So let's rewind to August of 2012. I had just graduated from Desert Ridge High School and was preparing to move out of the house into my own apartment in Tempe. Ian had just come home from serving a 2 year church mission in Dallas, TX. Almost exactly a week later, on August 9th, was the first rehearsal of the 12-13 season of Resonance Vocal Ensemble (a choir I had started to sing in the year before). For a few weeks until that day, my mom would casually say:
"You know, the McHardy's son Ian comes home from his mission in few weeks."
"He's so sweet and so cute"
"If he asks you on a date, you have to say yes" and so on.
This entire time I'm thinking "Yeah okay whatever mom I'm gonna marry my missionary jeez think what you want".
On Ian's side, his dad kept telling him about me:
"You know there's this girl at choir, she just graduated high school and she's really cute. You need to ask her out".
He's thinking "Yeah okay whatever dad".
Clearly, we are very opened minded people, ;)
So. The first choir rehearsal arrives. We usually do a little social before we jump into the music, since we take the summers off. I was at the food table (OF COURSE) getting some cake and next thing I know it, a young man is standing beside me talking with me about the cake; which happened to be just Velvet Cake, since the gal who made it did not use red food coloring or cocoa. We're just chatting up a storm, and it was actually refreshing since it was hard to find anyone up until that point to have an intelligent conversation with or at least not have to try so hard to keep a conversation going. After a few minutes, Lorri (the choir director AND Ian's mom) decides to get rehearsal started so we start to part ways to our seats where I say 'I'll talk to you later' and he responds, 'Oh yes, we will definitely be talking later'. *aw snap* According to Ian, he wasn't interested in his dad's dating suggestion until he saw me at rehearsal and thought "Okay! I'm sold".
Time goes on. I was in the middle of a summer fling when I met Ian so I wasn't immediately interested but by the time September hit, I was so ready for him to ask me out. After rehearsal on Sept 6th, he said to me "I want food. Do you want food? I want food". Um, okay? lol Of course I agreed and he took me to Dairy Queen, where he purposefully ordered me a large Blizzard when I said I only wanted a small, just so that it would take me longer to get through it so he could keep me longer. Sly fox.
It became a tradition every Thursday to get Dairy Queen after rehearsal.
Now about a week later we had a 9/11 memorial concert at Tempe Towne Lake and I had mentioned on Facebook a while back that I wanted to go see Les Mis at Gammage for my birthday. Guess who asked me to go to see Les Mes at Gammage for my birthday? This kid. When he asked my reaction was "SHUT UP YOU ARE NOT TAKING ME ARE YOU SERIOUS OKAY I GUESS I'LL GO". So it was a date. That Friday, the 14th, we were to go see a Broadway show .
Fast forward to that Friday. We both got dressed up, had a fancy dinner at Subway, walked around Gammage til the show started. We are seated (the best seats, 2nd level front row), the show starts and I have my hand resting on my knee closest to him, just waiting to be held, but with no avail. He is leaned forward, completely sucked into everything that is a professional performance of Les Miserable. Which was cute, but frustrating at the same time. The show is over (which was FABULOUS) and it's barely 10 PM. The night is still young! We head out to Tempe Marketplace where we chat some more at a picnic table for another hour, and Ian asks me if I've ever gone stargazing. I respond no, but I want to. What do we do? Go out to Bush Highway, sit on the back of his car, look at the stars and talk until 3 AM. No biggie. ;) He drops me off at my apartment and was *this* close to kissing me but leaves instead. I then get a text saying I forgot something. I run down to the parking lot and he's standing next to his car with my ticket. I retrieve it from him, give him a looooonnng hug, his forehead is now pressed against mine, my heart is about to beat right out of my chest.....and he turns back to his car and we say our good byes. The bait has been set.
We see each other again the next night and then on Tuesday night, where we find ourselves back out on Bush Highway, looking at the stars. Here is where he starts to inch closer to me, our faces growing nearer, until our noses are touching and we hardly speaking louder than a whisper. Finally, I simply cannot take this game anymore. I don't play games. Involuntarily, I say "screw this" and I kiss him. What a wonderful kiss that was. What a wonderful last first kiss. It goes pretty quick from there. We started to date officially later that week on birthday, said our "I love you's" 2 weeks later. Here's the kicker. Ian had sworn into the Marine Corps in October and was leaving for 3 months in December. 3. whole. stinking. lonely. months. But we got through it. I may or may not have had a countdown on my phone.
I had started my new job at State Farm by the time he was 2/3 of the way done so it went by kind of quicker when I started to work. Finally, his boot camp graduation was here and my parents drove me to San Diego to attend his graduation and take him home for his 10 day boot leave. What a good day. :)
The first Sunday he's home, his family planned an open house for people who wanted to see him. I thought that was perfectly acceptable and normal idea. What fun! Everybody is over at his parent's house, a total of maybe about 60 ish people are there; both my sister and his sister in law Allora have their cameras taking pictures. Me? I'm thinking about how nice it is they brought their cameras so people could take a picture with Ian in his dress blues. After a bit, Taylor, Ian's best friend, shouts "SPEECH!". Everyone agrees, so he starts to talk about what he learned at boot camp and his experiences. I'm sitting off to the side of him, with his little cousin Mailani sitting in my lap. I'm thinking this entire time, WOW he is so good at public speaking he's so eloquent blah blah blah and finally Mailani goes somewhere, and next thing I know it, after his beautiful little speech he's on one knee in front of me, in front of friend and family, asking me to be his forever. I think you all know what my answer was. ;)
It was a wonderful week to follow, my sister took our engagements (WWII themed) that turned out simply beautiful!
it was great, except for the part where Ian had to leave me for another 6 months to finish up his MOS school. That was the hardest goodbye ever. We had our last date until he came home in late August. It was the longest summer of my entire life. It was good that he wasn't there physically during our engagement because I don't know if we would have been able to wait that long, if you know what I mean. lol but I was able to get wedding planning done and all Ian needed to worry about was showing up. I had been planning his arrival for Saturday August 24th. I even took part of my shift off of work so I could pick him up from the airport. THIS TURD knowing what an impulsive planner I am showed up at my doorstep 3 days early! haha As bad as it was, I had my schedule set and he messed it up. ;) I got over it quickly. 2 weeks later, on September 7th 2013, we were sealed in the Mesa AZ temple for time and all eternity, and let me tell you what a perfect day that was.
Happy anniversary, love. Here's to many more.
