To my sweet, wonderful, tolerant husband...

I'm going to get sort of sappy again. Because sometimes you lose yourself in the child and forget the man who helped you get one. And I don't ever want anyone to doubt that I love my husband very, very much.

I would like, if I may, to take you on a strange journey...

Fittingly enough, we're going to fly back to Halloween 2000. I had recently moved in with my parents (I grew up with my grandparents), and I was having a tough time with things. My then-boyfriend had a 'thing' for Britney, so I dressed up as Britney for Halloween. 'Baby One More Time' Britney. No, I don't have photos, but suffice to say I was hot in my plaid skirt, knee-high socks and heeled loafers. The braided pigtails were really hot, too.

That was the first time he saw me. It was a rough day, and I was a bit down. He told me later that he had the urge to come up to me and give me a big hug, but he was afraid I'd freak out a bit. Considering that we'd never met, he was probably right. :) He would see me every once in a while walking through the halls of the school. Then after the new school year began in 2001, he didn't see me once. He thought that perhaps I had moved.

Cue the second semester of school, 2002. My very first class of the year was Weight Training. We basically got to fuck around with the gym equipment all hour. Easy A class. Then, we saw each other. He was amazed to see me again, and I was stunned by the feeling I got the first time I saw him. I knew then that he was someone special, and I was right. The semester creeped by with him too shy to talk to me, and me trying vivaciously to get him to talk to me.

Junior year prom was rolling around, and I didn't have a date. I was going to take our landlord (Hey, he was a hot firefighter with a Harley. And better yet, he was willing to go with me.), and my heart dropped every time Erf described the night he had planned for his then-girlfriend for prom. Then, O! miracle of miracles! They broke up! I flew in there, regaling him with my woes of not having a real date for prom... Just a hot firefighter pity-date. :)

Then, he looked at me with his face blazing red and said, "Why don't we go together?"

Within a day, we were officially dating.

Things were bliss for quite some time, going on dates, talking every night on the phone... One of his favorite stories involves me trying on stripper heels, falling down, and knocking over a table full of shoes. In late April/early May of 2003 my Grandma fell ill. Her kidneys began failing, and her congestive heart failure was causing her heart to give out. We had been living with her for almost a year, and we had hospice nurses coming in to help with her care. It was basically just keeping her morphine dripping and waiting. Erf was the best boyfriend a girl could have asked for. He worked at a local construction outlet store loading/unloading trucks during the early (5 a.m.) shift, then worked at a local nursing home as dietary aide. When he was finished with work around 2:30-3:00, he'd come over to our house and do whatever we needed. Cooking, cleaning, helping with grandma's care, and just being there. Even when I wasn't home.

May 4th, 2003, my grandma passed away. Erf spent most of his free time with us, helping to do whatever we needed him to do. Shortly thereafter, things at his house became strained with his sister moving in, and Mom allowed him to move in since I had turned 18 on the 8th. (yep, 4 days after my grandma died. Good timing, huh?) In June of 2003, his mom died suddenly of a massive heart attack. I did what any good girlfriend would do, I spent time with his family alongside him, doing what I could. Soon after, things conspired and he ended up moving back in with his dad unwillingly. I followed within a month.

That began the first stressful period of our relationship; he shut down after his mom died. I persisted, because I'm a tough bird to shake, and not long after we got an apartment of our own he began to come around. Then we moved to Fargo. Another tough period of time for us. I tried to reconcile with my birth mother, and it didn't go so well. I was reeling from the rebuff, he was upset being so far away from home. Then Erflet pronounced his impending arrival. Not long after, our commission jobs failed us and we lost our apartment. We moved in with my grandparents before unceremoniously getting the boot in the form of my grandma paying the deposit and first month's rent for an apartment for us - even though I had to quit my job due to heavy weight lifting.

Stomach cramps during pregnancy - especially when lugging a 70 lb box - are never good.

So we were stuck in an apartment, me jobless, and Erf not working due to the lack of appointments in December. Erflet arrived, and things got worse. We fought all the time, I was a crazy bitch who was overly-protective of our son, he resented me for not giving him a chance.

The lack of sex couldn't have helped at all, though.

One day it seemed to snap us both; we needed to work this out. And slowly, we did. We put the effort and hard work into it, and we pushed through. We rekindled our love, and one night while talking decided it was time to finally make an honest woman out of him. ;)

On April 10, 2009 (Dude, we so got married on Good Friday. Getting married on the day Jesus was crucified = WIN), I became Mrs. Erf. And regardless of the hard times we're going through right now, we know that we can push through it together.

Baby, here's to us, 70 years from now, yelling at one another in utter deaf bliss. I'll love you even when you crap your pants and sprout hair long enough to be braided from your nose.

I even promise to dig on you when your glasses could double as a microscope.

I love you. :)

Yes, he is biting my shoulder. We're kinky like that.