Eleven

Today marks the eleventh year that Patrick and I have officially been a "couple". We've been together longer than a lot of Americans have been married! It's hard to believe it has been this long already. We are surging foward into year twelve, looking forward to new memories. Surely the road has not always been smooth, but it has been lots of fun! In honor of today, I wanted to share eleven facts about us and our relationship that you may not know about.

1) Patrick and I met in September 1997. We were introduced by my freshman year roommate, Jessica Rose. At the time, she had a crush on him.

2) Our first date was in January 1998. We went to see Alien Resurrection at the movies.

3) For Valentine's Day that same year (prior to becoming an "exclusive" couple) Patrick treated me to an indoor picnic in his trailer with food from The Italian Oven, complete with a picnic blanket and candles. He's always said he set the bar too high when he planned this!

4) He asked me to be his girlfriend in my dorm room, 5 Dadisman Hall, on March 4, 1998.

5) He asked me to marry him in the above-mentioned trailer on March 14, 2002.

6) Although it was not originally planned this way, our wedding colors were blue and yellow (Patrick always says to match WVU's school colors!). My original hope for a wedding was peach and blue. I couldn't find a pretty bridesmaid dress in peach, so we went with yellow.

7) Patrick gave me a 3 foot tall hand-carved wooden otter statue (which I named Winston) for a wedding gift. I gave him a watch.

8) We went to Disney World for our honeymoon. To celebrate our first anniversary, we went to Virginia Beach (I had a work conference there, so we just extended the trip a little).

9) As an anniversary gift to each other, we purchase season tickets to WVU football games.

10) I have spent every Thanksgiving with Patrick's family since we became a couple. It's been so long I can hardly remember a Thanksgiving when I was NOT at the Tenneys!

11) Tonight we spent the evening together as a family doing something we all love, attending a WVU basketball game. It was a great way to quietly celebrate the day!