Getting to this point.

My wife and I have had a long journey. I guess the best place to start our family history is on the first day that I saw her.

It was my sophomore year in high school and for some reason I had decided that I needed to get involved with something that could make a difference. Yes, maybe I was head strong, naive, pubescent even, but I chose the "Environmental club" to make my mark. Instead, it seemed, at that first meeting someone else's mark would be made on me, my wife's. I should have known that my hormones cared more for the opposite sex than they could ever have cared about the environment, or living for that matter. Fortunately my wife had already became an important member there so it would play off perfectly, me making my mark, while still satisfying my hormones.

The courting process would begin on my first camping trip with the club. We were both very determined the whole trip not to allow the other to control anything that we could. This all started when our group of friends all decided we should go hiking around and see all the beauty of the park. Well you could call what we were doing the teenage version of leap frog, first she would lead and I knew she had no idea were she was going so I would take over and then, of course, I really didn't know so she would take control. Things of this nature took place, well... They still take place to this day, but it all started there. That night, unknown by our parents till this day, we slept in the same tent. This wasn't what you would call romantic seeing how there were at least 5 more of our friends in the tent with us, strapped in there sleeping bags bouncing around like worms, but I managed to pull enough charm out of the night to get her to ask me, after 3 days of not talking, if we were going anywhere.

We had what I would consider a typical high school romance. At times a roller coaster of a relationship but for the most part I knew I was "in love". I managed to do a lot of bad things that should have kept us from were we are now, but my wife being the forgiving or maybe forgetful person that she is seemed to see past all of it. She became a college girl and I was still in high school so we did not stay together, no matter how much I held on, it seemed to only push her away. Go figure. We had our separate lives for a couple of years, but we kept in touch. She expanded her mind as I expanded my debt.

Eventually I knew I had to let go and I did, but not before her father had made enough of an influence on me to make me to do something with my life. Her father was in the Navy long enough to retire as a commander and so he had a lot to say for the Navy and I guess I listened. I joined the Navy my second year out of high school. It was a good thing that I did, maybe I'll go into those details some other time. I think the initiative I took to join up got my wife's attention, at least enough for her to write to me in bootcamp. When time came for me to graduate I managed to get her to come to it, which wasn't easy considering she was dating someone else and going to college in Arkansas and my graduation was in Illinois. I still don't know how she managed it.

While I was on what little liberty I had after graduation we managed to convince each other we should get married. It would end up taking a little more convincing and some time on my part but she graduated and moved out to California with me. We were married there at a court house by some girl who was younger than we were, probably doing an internship. We started our lives together there in California in an apartment smaller than most bathrooms, but it was on the beach so we could pretend it was romantic. We actually managed to fit a cat, Phoebe, in there with us. She was our first "baby". Eventually we moved on base into more livable conditions. The house even had a back yard, that I could cut with a weed eater, but it was our back yard. We Decided here to entertain the idea of having children.

From California I promised my wife I would show her the world and so I took her to Guam. Guam, however, ended up being a spec of an island in the pacific where she could see at least 214 sq. mi. of the world. We wanted to start trying to have a child as soon as we arrived in Guam, but the Navy had other plans and every time it was that time of the month I was sent away. So with some reluctance, on my wife's part, we ended up with the best booney dog ever to fill the void.

After fulfilling my duties to the Navy, in Japan and Saipan, I was home long enough for us to successfully try and make a baby and that brings us to this point.