This is the love story of your silly parents. I know I've probably told you a hundred times by now, but here's one more. I started working at Loma Vista Middle School in the fall of 2002 right after I graduated from Cal Baptist. I was an 8th grade language arts teacher. It was a difficult year because everything was so new, but I finished the year and felt positive about the ones to follow. When I got to school the next year for our teacher orientation day, some of the staff was teasing me about a new teacher coming to teach at our school that year. Apparently he was young, single, and moving from out of state. When I asked what his name was they said Ian Fish, to which I replied that was a ridiculous name and I could never date someone named Fish.
The next day your daddy came to campus and we met for the first time. We have very different versions of what happened that day. I believe that I was nice and helpful and introduced myself and then went to my classroom to work. It always took me a long time to set up my classroom because I decorated so much, so there was no time to waste. Your daddy says I ran up to him, said my name in one second, and then ran away. We worked on the same team that year, so we had the same students and prep period and worked closely with each other.
Daddy was from Michigan and looked really different than any of my friends from California. He wore fancy clothes and shoes, had a haircut we started calling "Michigan hair", and wore Velcro sandals he will still defend to this day. He was definitely not my type, but it didn't matter anyway because he ended up having a girlfriend anyway. However, we did become friends and started going to lunch together, to happy hours, and dinners with friends. We saw each other often in and out of work and daddy started hinting that he wanted our relationship to become more than friends. I said no, a lot partially because he still had a girlfriend and partially because I was used to dating guys who were so different.
Over the next couple of years I grew very close to your daddy. The second year he was in California, daddy decided he wanted his girlfriend to move out here from Michigan. However, when he went back to get her, she decided not to come. That was when daddy became single for the first time. He kept asking me to go on a date and finally I agreed to go to dinner but ended up telling him I was in love with someone else. It wasn't entirely true, but I still didn't think your daddy was right for me. But he kept asking. I kept saying no. All the while we were dating other people and I got very jealous when he went out with a girl he met while attending a conference. He kept talking about her being beautiful and perfect, and it was the first time I wondered if I did want to date him. Of course, I didn't tell him that.
The turning point in our relationship was when we went to a colleague's Christmas party. Daddy cornered me and kissed me for the first time. I told him I wasn't interested and his face fell. He left the party early and I left with a stomach ache. I can still see his face at that moment. I worried about him all night and kept asking myself why I cared so much. The next day I called him and told him I would go on a date with him but that we couldn't hold hands, kiss, cuddle or anything romantic until I decided it felt right to date him. Our first real date was to the Crystal Cathedral to see "The Glory of Christmas" and we went with several friends. I still wasn't sure.
The moment I knew that I wanted to be with daddy as when I was driving back from Grandpa Dave's and talked to daddy the whole ride and didn't even realize how much time had passed. I went to daddy's and told him how I felt. From then on, we were together. There was one week we broke up because I was scared he wouldn't support us spiritually, but we couldn't stay apart.
I proposed to daddy at the top of the Mandalay Bay hotel in Vegas (not really, but that's when we started planning the wedding). We got married December 28, 2007. I am the luckiest wife to have married such an amazing man who is the best father to you that I could have ever hoped for. He loves you more than life, and it makes me love him more each day.
That is how I went from saying "No way" to "I do."
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