I love wedding photos.

I don’t care whose they are. But I love finding the blogs of really great wedding photographers and just scanning through. I could do it all day.

Here’s a couple of my favorites:

http://meganwblog.com/

And of course, our wedding photographer: http://blog.angeleyesphotography.com/

I love the flowers and the colors and the kisses and the dancing and the hand-holding and seeing the grooms cry. And everytime I flip through them, it’s incredible to me that the divorce rate is what it is. How can something that starts out so beautiful and perfect just be ended, like that? I realize in some cases it’s appropriate, for lack of a better word.

In other times though, I think things really are salvageable. It’s messy and hard and makes your heart hurt and your eyes puffy. Cody and I were really great at breaking up, when we dated. I broke up with him my junior year of high school. He broke up with me our senior year. We broke up six months before we got engaged…and just a couple months before we realized we wanted to be together.

But I’m so thankful for what I’ve learned (so far anyways…long ways to go still):

• Time spent together, quality time, can never be underrated.
• A note, card, or letter is always appreciated.
• Surprises are always nice…even small ones, like when I buy his favorite crackers (the hot Tabasco sauce cheez-its…gross) or when he irons my clothes for me…or brings me Starbucks at work.
• Never go to bed angry. I’m surprised at how incredibly tempting this is sometimes because I SO don’t want to give in. But it just breeds resentment and anger and bitterness. Stay up all night if you have to in order to resolve it.
• Pardon this one, but make sure you make time for…you know…   😉 You’d be surprised how busy life gets.
• Don’t talk bad about the other to someone else…always build each other up. If you’re tempted to say something bad, think about why you’re upset and talk to your husband (or wife) yourself.
• Be supportive. In whatever way you possibly can. You’re each other’s biggest fan.
• As much as you can, retell your story to anyone who will listen. Even to each other. You’ll always discover one new little thing that was going through his mind when you started dating, when you  broke up, when you dated that other guy, or whatever. it’s so fun and reinforces how and why you got together.

And honestly, I have incorporated what I have learned about conflict, forgiveness, honesty and communication into my other friendships and it has been amazing.

Cody and I met nine years ago right around now. We started dating September 12th our sophomore year of high school. November 3rd will be our one-year wedding anniversary. *tear* Lots of crap happened in between all that time. BUT…I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

So we build, we build
We clear away what was
And make room for what will be
If you’ll hold the nails, I’ll take the hammer
I’ll hold it still, if you’ll climb the ladder
If you will, then I will build…