Friday, April 26, 2013

...As I was saying.

I ended the last post saying that we waited...
If you didn't read it, GO BACK!
Read THAT one, then THIS one....
and if you want some pretty pictures, check out this blog post :)

At this point, it was probably November or December, during which months, lots of other really cute things happened, and you probably want to know all of them, but I kinda wanna finish this story before I turn 34..... moving on.

December 2011 rolled around.  I had been planning on going to a conference, and Taylor was going to go also, with his cousin Jordan, and it was going to be awesome.  Those plans were cancelled because of my parents' fear of the possible creepy nature of a certain person who's name starts with a T.... 
{sorry for the ambiguity.  I'm just trying to preserve identities here.}
{HAH.}

So instead of seeing him after Christmas, 3 months after I met him...I got a huge package in the mail for Christmas.  It had a huge queen sized green fuzzy blanket {currently covering my bed}, a box of chocolate and macadamia nut delights from Hawaii, and a sweet little letter.  


Now, according to some he shouldn't have sent me a package.... but HEY!!! I would never turn down presents... and besides. I liked him too :)

January 5th was his birthday, so I compiled a small box of happy things for him to enjoy!! The thing I spent the most time on, was a little "Light Jar" that Taylor now keeps on his desk at work, that contains about 25 tiny handmade envelopes with little bible verses written on paper inside of them.  They were the cutest things ever!!!! He loved it!

We continued talking to each other, liking each other, skyping and praying with each other, and just getting to know each other for that whole year.  We studied together, read our bibles together, ate food together, laughed together, cried together {ok.. lies. I cried, he comforted}, talked on the phone til all hours of the night, shared what God was teaching us, sent bible verses, and just LIVED the same way we always had!!!! Except not.  Because we knew each other.  We were in each other's lives, and we knew it was not a coincidence, it was different...

On Valentines Day he sent me a package with a few gifts in it {earrings, bracelet, scarf, his sweatshirt sprayed with cologne....ya know...no big deal}

You betchya bottom dollar I said yes!!!!!

Continuing on in this love saga...
We worked hard, played hard, prayed hard, and studied hard together on skype! Finals came and went,  I decided to become a camp counselor that summer, and I turned 20!  I also got a birthday package and letter from this amazing man who was just completely showering me with affection!!


That summer came with lots of trials, blessings, lessons, friends, laughter, tears, and overall growing in God.  Me being a counselor meant that it would be at least the whole summer before Taylor and I finally met in person.  Taylor was supportive and dedicated and very loving last summer.  He was always there to listen to and soothe my sorrows and troubles, and he was always there to rejoice in my happy times!!! He prayed with me, prayed FOR me, turned me towards the Lord when I was turning elsewhere, and sent me countless bible verses exactly when I needed them... He was my stability!!

He was the calm ferris wheel to my roller coaster :)

Then towards the end of the summer I got an invitation to his friends' wedding.
I was actually invited!!! and I couldn't just turn them down now, could I??

Love, 
 


Monday, April 22, 2013

Happy faces!

I kinda miss Him today.... I'll write more of our story later! So stay tuned!!
Until then..... Keep on smilin!

















Thursday, April 18, 2013

That love thing...

If you didn't read the first part of this story, then you just STOP RIGHT THERE. 

read this one first... otherwise you're doing it all wrong! :)

So by this time it's 11 days after that fateful day when we became friends on facebook {that's Taylor and I, in case you broke the rules and didn't go back. for shame.}  We skyped for 10 hours that day, I didn't take a nap... he did....not that we're competing or anything? {we are}. The next day we skyped for another 5 hours... 7 the next day... 3 the next... 8 the next... etc. basically we skyped every night after that for the past year and a half.  

This was slowly becoming a "thing". I was excited! Kinda nervous because he's 6 years older than me and I knew my parents wouldn't be thrilled, but at the same time, this guy was SO AMAZING! He LOVES God, he's patient, kind, gentle, funny, a good listener, a great advice-giver, he laughs at all my jokes, he's protective, manly, mildly attractive {lol...}, and uh... he likes me!!!!! He even told me so... :)

This was the point in our relationship when he started sending me morning messages.  Basically extra long texts or e-mails often with a bible verse telling me that I'm special, and that getting to know me has been a real treat and privilege.  If you've never gotten a morning message from someone, then you are missing. out. they're basically the happiest, cutest things ever!

Tay sent me morning text messages... morning e-mails.... morning facebook messages... and eventually we started skyping in the morning! Just to say hi. We quickly became very involved in each others lives, without ever meeting eachother! We also started praying together on skpye.  We didn't know where this relationship was going, what was going to happen, or when we were finally going to meet, but we had a couple ideas of our own!! I'd continually say "I don't know what God's plans are, but I have a few suggestions".  So Taylor and I were really dedicated to submitting ourselves and our relationship to God (him more than me sometimes...I'm stubborn), and praying about it a LOT.

So it was perfect, right? Hah. wrong.
Complications:
He was 25, I was 19.
We had never met in person.
For all I knew he could be a creepy stalker predator guy!!!
My parents weren't too keen on this idea.

So when I first told my parents about him over fall break (beginning of October) they were kinda just like "uh....nope." which of course was upsetting because "come on mom, you don't even know him!" as I put it so elegantly... But I totally understood their point!!! It was weird: online communication has a bad reputation, as do online relationships.  My mom knew we were praying about it, but one time she asked the question "are you really listening for an answer?" and that really struck me hard.  No, we weren't.  So my mom asked me to take some "time off" from Taylor.  Taylor and I decided that we wouldn't talk for a week, and spend the time that we would have spent talking, praying instead.

it was so.difficult.

We both wrote each other letters during that week, and some of mine were tearful.  But it worked!!!  After a couple days, God showed me that if our relationship was going to have any kind of validity to it, we would have to wait...for a while...

and so we waited....
Love, 
 

Friday, April 12, 2013

...you know you want to know

So guys... I know you're all wondering, and because the story is really longer, and more complex than time allows for each person who asks, I've decided to blog about it! 
so here it is... remember that I TOLD YOU it's long.
you've brought this upon yourself.

Taylor and I began our journey together on September 11th, 2011, when Alyssa, a mutual friend, told us each about each other, and encouraged Taylor to at least look me up on facebook.  Taylor had been in a long distance relationship before, as had I, and neither of us were keen to try it again.  However, Taylor eventually decided to look me up anyway.  He read my "about me" on facebook and thought I was really cool {#winning} so he messaged me! My friends were wary when I received his message on September 13th, the day after he friended me on facebook, and they warned me not to reply, because meeting people online is rather unconventional and weird, and "we don't know the kind of person he could be".  Nevertheless, I was intrigued by his message, flattered by his "p.s. you have a beautiful smile", aaaaaand I'm always up for an adventure, so I figured.... "HEY! why not?".  I responded to Taylor's message, and as we began to get to know each other through these "20 questions" messages we started exchanging, our messages grew from a paragraph long, to a couple pages long.  We kinda liked each other! He asked me lots of questions, gave me lots of opportunities to talk about myself, and in turn, I made him laugh! It was a match made in heaven! 
{I asked questions too btw...let that be known}

I really wanted to give him my phone number, because texting is so much easier and less time consuming than writing paragraph after paragraph on facebook...but I also remember making a conscious decision NOT to give him my phone number, because I didn't want to be pursuing him in the relationship, I would let him pursue me.  Eventually, 5 days, 81 messages, and 11 "favorite song"s exchanged, he asked for my number! We texted on and off the next day, {he was busy helping someone move... #muscleprobs} and on the 19th he asked if he could call me that night... He called, and 2.5 hours later we had another conversation set up for the next night! We talked every night after that, and then on the 24th, we finally had our first skype session.  We were on the phone, he had sent me a friend request on skype a couple days before, but it was the wrong erika...I friended him that night, and then right in the middle of our phone conversation, Taylor mentioned the fact that if he called me on skype at that very moment, I wouldn't be able to deny his request because he knew I was right in front of my computer.  
Background info: It was 11:45 pm my time, 9:45 pm his time, I was wearing long boy athletic shorts, a sports bra and t-shirt, no makeup, and I hadn't showered yet that day (it was saturday, gimme a break)
So I'm sitting there, recognizing this is possibly the worst time to start a face-to-face relationship with someone, but HEY, whatever. live on the edge, no?
So we skyped..... and talked....and sent youtube videos...and I played some guitar...and we joked...and talked some more about more things...and looked at pictures of cute babies...for 10 hours.  We didn't get off skype until I went to church the next morning.  Needless to say, we were hooked.

...stay tuned for the next 19 months......... :)

{next post}

{pictures}

{next next post}

Love,