3/4 of a year married, eternity to go!

The beginning of October marked 9 months since Eric and I were married. 9 months. Wow, it has really flown by! It also was the beginning of October of last year that Eric proposed, which was truly one of the happiest, best days of my life. The day he proposed was exactly a year after we had met, so a lot of exciting things to celebrate in this wonderful month of October! I thought it would be fun to do a little husband post to celebrate these momentous dates!

Husband Quiz:
How well do you know your husband? Answer these questions about him and find out:

1. Sitting in front of the TV, what's on the screen? football, Hell's Kitchen, 30 Rock, The Simpsons, Family Guy, Seinfeld, The Office, Kitchen Nightmares, The Apprentice, baseball
2. You're out to eat; what kind of dressing does he get on his salad? Ranch
3. What's one food he doesn't like? Spoon Me
4. You go out to a bar. What does he order? A Diet Coke and some wings
5. What was his high school mascot? The Spartans
6. What size shoe does he wear? 12
7. If he was to collect anything, what would it be? For sure boardgames. He loves boardgames.
8. What is his favorite candy? Twix probably, although I have been turning him on to sour sweet treats lately.
9. What would this person eat everyday if he could? Chicken wings
10. What is his favorite cereal? Chipmates (just like Cookie Crisp), Waffle Crisp
11. What would he never wear? A Minnesota Vikings jersey. Grosssss.
12. What is his favorite sports team? The Green Bay Packers, Milwaukee Brewers, Utes, and Wisconsin Badgers
13. What is his least favorite sport to watch? Nascar maybe?
14. Who is his best friend? Matt, Pat, Ryan and Sean-Paul... and me, of course
15. What is something you do that he wishes you wouldn't do? Hmm... probably worry so much. He even caught me being worried about being worried too much the other day- yeah I know, it was bad.
16. How many states has he lived in? Two
17.What is his heritage? Norwegian
18. You bake him a cake for his birthday, what kind of cake? Definitely chocolate
19. Did he play sports in high school? No, he was a rock star in a rock band by the time he was in high school, but he played football in middle school
20. What is his favorite holiday? Christmas- his favorite day of the year is the day they begin playing Christmas music on the radio
21. What could he spend hours doing? Watching football or the Brewers play, playing boardgames, thinking up a new business idea

The meeting:
Eric and I met by what some would call a complete coincidence. There are a million and a half ways that us meeting should have never happened. To this day, I thank a poor relationship, the Brewers and Jake Scott for us being married today. Eric was working at the time for 1280 The Zone, a sports radio station in town that my dad happened to be working for as well. It was a Thursday afternoon (October 2) and there was a University of Utah football game that night against Oregon State, so the radio show was doing their weekly pre-game deal at TGI Fridays. Eric was not supposed to work that day, but he had switched at the last minute with a co-worker so that he could watch a baseball game at Fridays while he worked. Normally on Thursdays I was never on the U's campus, but had been on a bad date the night before and randomly decided to go work out at the field house to blow off some steam. On the drive home, I noticed my dad's "1280" van out front of the TGI Fridays, and I thought for a second about going to drop in and say hi but then decided against it. For some reason, after I had already driven past the Fridays, I suddenly decided to turn back in and say hi.

I went in and and sat down at a table across from my dad. After saying my hello's, I noticed a pretty cute guy sitting over in the corner. Not wanting to stare or make myself too obvious, I started talking to a man on the other side of my table. At the end of our boring conversation, I turned back casually to make myself more "available" for the mystery stud to perhaps start up some chatter. At the time I didn't realize, but Eric had snuck his way over to a chair closer to me, making it easy for this chatter to begin. We talked... and we talked... and we talked some more. He taught me about baseball as we watched his favorite team, The Brewers, in their playoff game against the Phillies (the last time the Brewers had made it to the playoffs was in the early 80's, so it was pretty miraculous that they had made it this far). We talked about our lives: where we come from and where we were going. My dad left at some point during our conversation, but I decided to stay. We talked for a good three hours.

Finally, Eric left to go to the U game and I hung around the Fridays for a little while longer. My dad's coworker Jake Scott was still there watching the game on TV, and I knew that Eric would be coming back later to do the post-game show. After talking to Jake about it, I made a move that will go down in history as the boldest dating move of my life: I left my number for Jake to give to Eric later that night. Eric called two days later, and the rest is sweet, sweet history...

The engagement:
It was our one year anniversary, and Eric had planned a surprise date to celebrate. He told me to dress nice, and we ended up at the wonderful Roof restaurant with this beautiful view of the temple at sunset. We had an amazing dinner. I just remember feeling so comfortable with him that night and having really great conversation. We drove around for a while and enjoyed some beautiful downtown scenery (little did I know at the time that he was totally stalling while he was working his magic through his friends...). Finally, we pulled over to the side of a dark street in the Avenues next to an old fire station. After asking question after question about where we were and what we were doing there and getting only a simple smile from Eric, I zipped my mouth and simply began following him. We hiked down a windy dirt path for a while and suddenly came into a clearing...
There were candles lit up all across a field with a beautiful overview of the city in the background. At that point I was thinking, "wow, this is a lot of effort to go towards celebrating one year of dating!" We walked across the field and came to a table with some flowers and hot chocolate.
It wasn't any old table though, it was the very table from TGI Fridays where Eric and I had met one year earlier. Can you even believe it? We sat and talked for a while before he got down on one knee and asked me if I would marry him. Tears streamed down my face as I hugged him and said yes. It was perfect.

I am so lucky to have a wonderful husband who is truly my best friend. I love being married to him and I look forward to all of the wonderful adventures that we have yet to experience!