Anniversary Countdown: 2 days

With only two days left until our first anniversary, I'll be overloading you with pictures leading up to April 18. :-)

AJ & I met during our sophomore year of college. I was at Clemson. He was at SCAD, but couldn't stay away from Clemson football (that hasn't changed one bit!). Of course, at that time, I wanted to be single, so I wouldn't "commit" to him. Basically, I made my roommate (a mutual friend) come with me everywhere he was going to be. (Yeah, I know, I was silly.) Most of the pictures I have from back then are off all three of us.

I finally came to my senses, though, and we started "officially" dating April of 2007, right after our junior year of college. I immediately immersed him in all my family drama, making him drive 5 hours from school for my brother's wedding. He survived, so I knew he was a keeper.

[Wilmington, NC]

Before AJ and I started dating, AJ's grandmother died, and left him a little bit of money, so he and his brother organized a trip to Costa Rica for 3 weeks in the summer. I almost didn't go, because it was going to be so expensive and for 3 weeks (which meant 3 weeks without work). I'm so grateful that my mom convinced me that this would be my last opportunity to do something like this and that I should absolutely go without looking back. On top of that, AJ offered to pay for my trip, which was a super huge blessing. I mean, we weren't even dating and here he was offering to pay my way to another country for 3 weeks!! We did start dating a couple of months before we left, and we had a blast on our trip.

Senior year was really hard for both of us. We were 3.5 hours apart and my sister had just had another baby, so the only place I wanted to be was at home. Thankfully, between my classes, Gamma Sig, football games, and weekend trips, I kept super busy, and counted down the days until graduation. During the fall, AJ was up every other weekend for football games, and in the spring, I spent a lot of time in Savannah, because the weather was so much nicer. Logistically, it worked out really well, and we both made a lot of trips home to see each other. Oddly enough, my roommate's boyfriend spent a lot of time hanging out with me in our townhouse (my roommate was mildly allergic to my cat, which we found out after she moved in, so she stayed in her room a lot) and kept me from being uber lonely.

[I promise his hand is holding his shorts, it's not as bad as it looks.]

I graduated in May, and AJ's quarter didn't end until mid-June, but I was able to breathe a sigh of relief at having my entire family come up for a weekend at the lake and then I was able to be home with my family until AJ finished school.

[Graduation, May 9, 2008]

That sums up our dating life. Up next, our engagement story and how we planned our wedding. Then, on Sunday, our actual anniversary, I'll recap our first year of marriage.