To Have and to Hold

Sorry, this post is later than I had planned. I had a hard time uploading photos of our wedding day. Anyway, I thought that I would share our engagement story and then some photos. Patrick and I had been dating about a year and half and I knew that the proposal was imminent. On Friday, I had lunch with my dear friend Ruth Henderson at work and she asked me what my dream proposal would look like. I told her I wanted it to be just Patrick and I (as we were never alone), that it would be simple and that he would get down on 1 knee and tell me loved me and ask me to marry him. Patrick and I had vowed not to say I love you until we were engaged and it would be the first time either one of us had said that to anyone (in that way :). The next day, on Saturday, March 11th, Patrick came over to my house. It was a rainy day and we were trying to decide what to do. My parents had gone to Texas to visit my sister and my younger sister Alyssa and I were home together. Alyssa was on the phone upstairs as Patrick and I sat on the couch trying to decide where we should go. He was acting strange - nervous and I could feel his heart pounding from where I was sitting. He told me he had an 11th gift for me in his pocket. He got me a little or big something on the 11th of every month to celebrate the day we started dating. I asked him what it was and he pulled out a box. I got very excited, and then said, "that better not be earrings." He joked back and said, "it better be what you think it is." He handed me the box, and as I opened it he got down on both of his knees and told me that he loved me and wanted to spend the rest of his life with me and asked me to marry him. I said yes and asked him to repeat the I love you over and over again. We kissed and I ran up to show Alyssa. Then we called everybody we knew. I found out later that he had asked my dad several weeks before for permission, and he had had the ring for some time, trying to figure out the the perfect way to ask me. He was going to do something big and flashy and worried that I would be disappointed at his simple proposal. Little did he know that it was the way I dreamed of.

6 months later, on September 9, 2006, I became Mrs. Patrick Murphy. We married at the Anaheim Golf Course on a perfectly beautiful day. I had my sisters and good friend stand beside me, along with my family and closest friends. It was a wonderful day followed by a fantastic honeymoon in Costa Rica. It was the beginning of a fabulous adventure together. The vows we said that day I said with all of my heart, and I am still trying to live them out. Though I believe them and try to live them, they are difficult. To honor someone 24 hours a day? That's not as easy as it sounds on your wedding day. It's hard to cherish someone when you've got 2 screaming babies, a barking dog and you are both exhausted. Yet this is what I promised to do. This is the covenant I entered with Patrick and with God. So I have to do my best each day. I admit I have failed greatly many, many days. But I pray that we both learn to love one another better each day as we grow together. As Patrick says, almost 4 years married - all the rest to go!