The Beginning

I think it is about time I made a blog. I started one a few years back... but hey, I forgot about it and didn't put to much effort into it. Now, I think that starting a blog will help me stay motivated on being positive and look for the blessings and fun things that happen in my life. Talking about blessings, the biggest blessing in my life happened just a few months ago. I married the man of my dreams.

Moving into a new area and going back to school, with people wondering why my last name changed has brought up the story of how Kevin and I met.

Here's the story:

So I was in a church program called Young Women, and I had three leaders over my age group. Now I'm not saying this just because she's now my sister in law... but she was one of my favorite leaders of all time! I don't know how it was brought up, but Amber (my sister in law/ leader at that time) told me that she has a nephew serving a mission where my mom is from, and I should write him.

Few things...
1. My mom is from El Salvador to those who are wondering
2. random
3. at this point I felt obligated to write him. We had something in common, and hey, if I like Amber, he might be cool too.

So of course I said I would write him. I told her to give me his address and I would. I feel like it was a month or so, but she'd ask me every Sunday if I was going to write him. My response: just give me his address!
After about a month of no address, I was starting to feel relieved that I was most likely not going to be given his address. One Sunday, she didn't say anything. I went up to her and I jokingly asked, "you're not going to tell me to write him?" and she was all, "oh! I have his address right here!" and handed me his email address. I was just thinking, "Crap. What did I do?.." but I said I'd write him. And I did!

We didn't know each other before she told me to write him, so we got to know each other for the last year of his mission. We emailed every week, and we got letters from each other once a month when he was in El Salvador. July of 2012 came around, and he got transferred to Belize. For some reason the postal system was a lot faster in Belize than it was in El Salvador, so we got two letters from each other every month.

This is Kevin in Belize. He took this picture to show me that he actually wore the pin I gave him! haha. If you look really closely to the left on his backpack, you'll see a CTR pin :)

So yes, we did get pictures of each other!This man of mine was very straight forward and told me in his FIRST letter (December 2011) that he wanted me to help him get married in the temple. My first thought was, "Who does he think he is?! Who did my leader tell me to write?! Geez! Oh well, I'll go with it. What the heck. I'll never meet him and we'll stop writing at one point." Oh, little did I know.. And right before he got transferred to Belize he sent me a letter telling me his feelings about me. This boy was persistent, and it definitely worked in the end!

The mission was coming to an end, and we were still writing and starting to fall in love just by letters and emails. Then he asked the question. Not "THE" question, but "the" question. "Where do you want to meet?"
To make a long story short, I told him that he needed to meet me at my house. Little did he know that I had talked to his parents and asked what they thought was best, and they invited me to come to the airport. So it was a big surprise!

He told me he'd call me as soon as he got off the plan in LA for his layover. The time he told me was supposed to call was to be around 1:30 pm, but I had forgotten about the time difference. So I was all bummed that he didn't call, and sure enough at 2:30 (which was 1:30 over in LA), I got a call from California! screamed and my mom was worried and I was like, "KEVIN IS CALLING ME!" So I answered the phone (I answered calm and collective, by the way.) And so we started to talk for a while. I asked him if he had talked to his family yet. He told me no, and that I was his number one priority. My heart just melted and I felt so bad that his family hadn't talked to him yet, but hey, I was in love with him so I wasn't going to argue. After we hung up, I went to his parents house and we went out to lunch, and then drove towards the airport.

I met his whole family at the airport, and we sat and waited. Longest wait of my life. Talk about anxiety! Then it was announced his flight landed. Everyone gathered around to where he'd be exiting the flight from, and I sat down on a seat that was a little ways away. They had a photographer capture the moments, and I'm so happy they did. Look at how radiant and handsome this man is :)

He hugged everyone and I felt so special to be apart of this moment! I realized that he was almost done hugging everyone, and his mom motioned for me to come up. He was done hugging everyone and he starts looking around to see if he had missed anyone, and his sister Annie pushes me right in front of him. He stares at me for a little bit and then freaks out. "Oh my gosh I'm still a missionary! Hi!" and he sticks out his hand. I laughed and shook his hand. You know a good missionary when a girl is pushed in front of him, an hour away from being released, and he still shakes her hand!

I went to his release, and we finally hugged! And yes, it was a long hug. But it was the best hug ever. We made it official that night that we were boyfriend and girlfriend. He proposed to me two months after he came home, which was December 6, 2012. On February 17, 2013, he proposed to me at the Mesa temple. Six months later on July 12, 2013, we got married and sealed for all time and eternity in the Mesa, Arizona Temple.

That is how we met.
Every day we create parts of a story, and that was just the beginning!