This year's events.....part 2 of 4

So there I was.....

It was December 17th, 2004. Josh flew into the Burbank airport. As I was picking him up, he was acting kinda funny - almost really nervous- like. The thing that seemed wierd is that he would not let me carry his video camera bag. He held onto it for dear life!
Later that evening, I took him to a really awesome country bar called, The Cowboy Palace. It was were Toby Keith made the video "I love this bar." So yeah - this place had alot of character and characters! We were sitting on the bar, making friends with this guy sitting next to us. By this time, Josh was still acting nervous, despite having a few cold ones. He got up, saying he was going to talk with the guitar player about his guitars. I really didn't think too much about it. Josh returned with his video camera in tow. I just thought he wanted to tape this cool bar. All of a sudden, the singer of the band called us out onto the dance floor. " Will Josh and Ryan please come out for a special dance?" Josh gave his camera to that guy we'd made friends with and took my hand. He had the hugest smile on his face.....then he got down on one knee and put the most beautiful diamond on my finger. "Ryan, will you marry me?" I started crying. It was at that moment where the world stopped and it was just us. I hugged him so tight. The band started playing "The Dance" by Garth Brooks. The crowd cheered and roared - I was oblivious to it all - all I could do was focus on my goregous man. As we were leaving the dance floor, this old cowboy with a fooman chew mustach flipped us off, jokingly, "Thanks alot asshole! You just made me look really bad!" His girlfriend was on his lap, waiting for her proposal. All we could do was laugh! The best part about the whole thing is that we got in on tape, so we can watch it over and over. It was that night that we decided we couldn't wait to get married. Here our parents wanted us to wait for a long time - but there was no way we could spend another minute apart. We could of gotten married that night if we could. We set the date for April 2, 2005 - enough time to plan an awesome wedding.

This year's events....Part 1 of 4

Awww whata year this has been. I'll write this year's events in a three part series 'cause I"m cool like that......
Part I: Meeting my soulmate

I actually experienced love at first sight with my husband. How we met should win some sort of an award or something!

So there I was....
I was on CMT (country music television) and got the AWESOME opportunity to hang out with Rascal Flatts while on a show called CMT Got Me In With the Band. This was in July of 2001. God what an experience that was!! The show aired - probably around 100 times. The band consists of 3 main members, Gary, Jay and Joe Don. Well Joe Don's cousin, my now husband Josh, was in the Air Force - stationed in Japan. Josh's grandma taped the show and sent it to him. After viewing the show, Josh proclaimed that someday he was going to marry me! What a confident young man he is! Well after searching and searching for my information, he came up empty-handed, until one fine day in August of 2004. I had went to a Rascal Flatts Fan's website and signed my name and email address. The next day, I got an email from Josh saying how big of fan he was of me. I'm not gonna lie - I did think he was some sort of staulker at first. But, something inside me said 'give this guy a break!' So I emailed back and after hundreds of emails, IM's, and phone calls later, I knew that I loved him. Well, Josh was getting out of Japan and was headed back to the states. We really wanted to meet face-to-face to see if our love was for-real. So, we decided to meet in Chicago in November 2004- where Rascal Flatts were playing.
So there I was....in the baggage claim of the Chicago O'Hara airport....walking down and seeing the most handsome cowboy with a bunch of roses....I knew right then and there that he was my soulmate. The wierd thing was, my dad was asking me just minutes before I saw Josh, if I was ready for my life to be forever changed. It was like he already knew....
The guys of Rascal Flatts were sooo surprised to see us together - like how in the hell did we get together! They knew us both but not together (does that make sence?)
From that weekend on, we knew that we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together.
In the first week of December 2004, Josh flew to Montana to ask my parents for my hand in marriage. He did this all by himself!! Yes! He is a brave one! And here are my folks just looking at him like "who the hell are you!" But they were good sports about it and gave him their blessing. Glad they did otherwise we'd eloped!

Goes to show you that everything happens for a reason. I'm now a firm believer in that!!

Stay tuned for Part 2 of 3!