Wine Down: Five Year Anniversary

Last Friday, Jared and I celebrated our five year wedding anniversary. I can hardly believe that it has already been 5 whole years since we got married. However, I will say that I does feel like it has been quite a while since our wedding, but not in a bad way though. I think this is mostly due to the fact that so much has happened in our lives in these past 5 years that our wedding feels like something so distant in my mind. Plus, we look so much younger in our wedding photos that I feel like I can even just see a huge difference in how much we have grown up.

When I walked down that aisle back in 2009, I never could have imagined that this is where I would be a mere 5 years later. I wouldn't have believed you then, if you told me that my dad wouldn't still be here with us now. I cherish that walk down the aisle with him more than anything else and I feel so lucky to have had the opportunity to experience that moment with him before he was gone. I have way too many friends who will never be able to have their fathers walk them down the aisle, so even though I am sad not to have my dad here with me now, I am so grateful that he was there for me then. I never would have expected us to have to do IVF or to not already have at least one child born before our five year anniversary. Thankfully, that ended up working out better than I ever could have planned and I am so glad that Jared and I got to experience 5 years of traveling and being "just us" before starting a family. It was truly a blessing in disguise. I never would have dreamed that I'd be resilient enough to be a middle school teacher at an urban Title I school (now turned stay-at-home-mommy) or be awarded Teacher of the Year at my school at such a young age. So much has happened in such a short time. We can plan our lives out all we want, but only God knows the true plans that He has for us.

I am very proud of Jared and I for building such a strong marriage together in the midst of a lot of happy times as well as many terrifying obstacles. In a time where marriage seems to just be kind of a joke to many people (check out that divorce rate), I am proud to say that Jared and I both take our marriage very seriously and work hard at it. Just like everything else in life, you get out of something what you put into it. I want nothing more than to set a good example for Peyton of growing up in a home with a loving marriage. I am beyond blessed to have such a wonderful husband and I can't wait to spend the rest of my life with him, watching him become the awesome daddy that I know he will be.

Jared and I are not big "gift" people. We don't really ever exchange gifts for any holidays. Instead, we prefer to have some sort of "experience" together. We go do an activity or go on a trip...basically, make a memory together instead of buying some more stuff that we don't need. While enjoying this activity or vacation, I'm all about the free souvenirs...aka: pictures. Yes, I own my fair share of crap that I've brought back from various European countries, but over the years I've noticed that my all time favorite souvenirs from any experience are the pictures. Which brings me to my anniversary gift for this year. Being the crazy photo-loving girl that I am, I came up with this idea (actually I sort of stole it from Pinterest). This was the only thing I wanted for our anniversary (and it cost absolutely nothing, so that's win win for all of us) so Jared was a good sport and cooperated with my wishes. In my eyes, no material gift could have compared to this. It was the perfect way to celebrate our 5 year anniversary for me.

We returned to the exact spot where we took our first photos as Mr. & Mrs. on our wedding day. I wanted to recapture the photos, now 5 years later, to show how much our lives have changed. I absolutely love how the photos turned out! Big shout out to my sister-in-law, Erika, for being our photographer. Location: The Casa Monica Hotel in Historic Downtown Saint Augustine, Florida.