Four year wedding anniversary

Today is our four year wedding anniversary.  When I look back on that day I can remember everything so vividly, like it was yesterday.

I remember waking up feeling as excited as I used to be as a child on Christmas morning and yelling from my bed "I'm getting married today!!!" and my neighbour told me to shut up!  I remember spending the day with my family and best friends getting our hair and makeup done and laughing the whole day until we had to leave for the venue.  I remember the butterflies in my stomach as we drove there, how my dad held my hand when I got out of the car and it felt just like I was a little girl again with his huge hands dwarfing mine.

I can still feel the huge smile I had on my face as I walked down the red carpet and saw Tim at the end waiting for me.  How we held hands from the moment I reached him and we didn't let go of each other until we had to sign the registry.  I remember feeling blessed to have our best friends in our bridal party by our sides as we had our photo's taken near the water.  I remember walking into the reception and how proud I felt as they announced me as Mrs Race for the first time.  And then there were the speeches that made me laugh and made me cry, followed by dancing and singing until we had to leave.

What an amazing day.  I loved everything about my wedding day.

Since then, Tim and I have experienced so much together and I realise how much we've grown.  We had an amazing honeymoon in Thailand on Phi Phi Island, then we flew to Koh Samui and just a few hours after we landed and we went to go exploring, Tim slipped on some mossy stairs and broke his hand and badly lacerated his hand and wrist.  We had to spend the first night there in a hospital and Tim had to have surgery when we got home to have a plate put in his hand as the breakages were so bad.

In April of the year we got married I had fairly major surgery to remove some very large fibroids from my uterus and at the time we weren't sure whether or not I would be able to conceive due to scarring, but thankfully this was not the case and everything was fine but at the time that was my worst nightmare.

After my operation I returned to work after extended leave where all I had done each day was think about what we were doing with our lives.  We both had good corporate jobs but we spent so much of our time working and not actually enjoying life and this was something that I desperately wanted to change.  Shortly after we booked aeroplane tickets to America, quit our jobs, moved out of our apartment and back into my mum and dads place and spent three months travelling the whole of the USA.  This was without a doubt one of the best times of my life.

I eventually got a new job when we returned home and so did Tim.  He had decided that after working in industrial/commercial real estate that he wanted to try his hand at residential sales.  He probably picked the very worst time to do this as the housing market had plummeted and although he gave it his very best shot, he simply wasn't making the company enough money and so they let him go.  The job market was not good at the time either so he remained unemployed for quite a few months which was not good.  Tim, like many men, feel that they are supposed to be the breadwinners and so being unemployed for so long was a bit of a blow to his manhood.

During the early months of his unemployment my mum found out she had breast cancer.  They had found a lump in each breast and she had to have a double mastectomy followed by months of chemotherapy.  If travelling in the US with Tim was the best time of my life, this was definitely the polar opposite.  I had never been so scared in my life when I found out that she had cancer.  But all was well, and still is now, and I learned that good can come from horrible experiences.  Our family became closer, my mum and dad's relationship changed, it was as if they had found new love again as they realised that the time they had together was so much more important now.  They held hands and hugged more and I have never been prouder of the two of them as they stood by each other and supported each other in a way that I had never seen them do before.  The sobering reality of mortality made all of us realise what was important in life again, and just to forget about everything else.

At the end of 2010 Tim and I bought our first house.  We spent months repainting, knocking down walls, replacing all the skirting in each room, recarpeting and making it our home.  We moved in in early November, not knowing at the time that there was somebody else in the house with us too.  I had fallen pregnant in October.

Beautiful baby Ella came into the world in August 2011 and life has never been the same since.  Sleepless nights, gummy smiles, dirty nappies, giggles in the bathtub and the like are what consume us now, furniture in our living room have been replaced with toys and general mess.  I don't think either of us realised how hard it would be to raise a baby, but we wouldn't change a thing.  We love Ella in ways that we didn't know we could.

And that brings us to today.  I received the biggest bunch of red roses that I have ever seen.  I think our table legs are about to buckle under the weight!  Tim's mum is going to look after Ella on saturday while Tim and I go to the Picasso Exhibition and out for lunch to celebrate and I can't wait to spend some time with just he and I.

We've had so many up's and down's over the last 4 years and through it all we have always supported each other.  I am proud of us and can't wait to see what the next 4 years brings.

I love you Timmy.  200.