There's Those Eyes Again

What a joy!

The Big Anniversary Date

After 2 babies, a shortage of babysitters, however many moves, and re-doing this house

we were in dire need of a great date.

And what a great 5th Anniversary date it was!

Troy made the plans and surprised me as we showed up at "Simply Fondue" in Sundance Square in Ft. Worth. (I have always wanted to go to a fondue restaurant...and it was well worth the wait. I highly recommend it.)

There were gorgeous flowers and a card waiting for me at our very private table.
It was a 2 and a half hour dinner experience and with great conversation and food we loved every minute of it.

It was perfect even down to the music they played. Troy almost had me convinced that he gave them a playlist. They played our favorites all night from lots of John Mayer to Vertical Horizon to "Drops of Jupiter." It was pretty crazy.

We had a 4 course meal and every course was awesome.

We ended our night by a great walk around Sundance Sqaure and browsing in a bookstore. Then we realized that our babies were going to wake up really early regardless of how late we stayed out. So we opted to go home and get some much needed sleep.

It was a wonderful night.

Can't wait for 5 more years and year 10 anniversary! Boy will that be an awesome date.

Happy 5th Anniversary to Us!

5 years today!
I have a surprise waiting for Troy when he gets home today. We just finished putting together our living room in the new house and I hung a wedding collage.

The written page is my handwritten vows to Troy.
The blank page is for him to write his.

(It occurred to me one day that we all say our wedding vows and then rarely think of them or even remember what we said. I wanted to be able to see them and think of them regularly. They are such special words.)

I love it and it looks really great when you see it in the room.

The pictures are all kind of creative ones taken by our friends Max Fun and Michael Radovanovic at the wedding. We love them.

(Now off to get ready for my anniversary date. Yea!)

A Douglas News Flash...

The Story Continues...

We started dating the summer of 04 and were engaged on Valentine's Day 2005. I already described that day to you back in my Valentine's Day post so I won't go through it again. But it was a wonderful day. Very special.

So, we were engaged in Febrauary and planned the wedding for July 2, 2005. It was a short time to plan a wedding, but was perfect.

We recruited so many people from our church to help with the wedding. It really became a church event. Actually, our wedding was the first Hope Fellowship wedding. And we were the first couple, of many, to meet and get married at Hope.

We spent several months in marriage counseling with our dear friends and mentors Doug and Shelley Hunt. It was a special time with them and it helped us so much. We also really enjoyed spending time with some other married couples who were very special to us - Mark and Connie Stump and Curtis and Brandy Cook. We spent one evening with each of them sort of interviewing them about their marriage. That was a very meaningful time for us.

And just before the wedding Gia and Bapa, Uncle Eddie, Aunt Sarah, Cate, Caroline and Cole came in town and we all went to the beach together for a special trip before the wedding. Here are a few pictures of Troy and I in Ogunquit, Maine, on that trip.

This place is very special to us. Troy and I stayed in the cottage here in Perkins Cove many times. Even one time when you, Audrey, were about a month old. Hopefully we can all go back there as a family some day. You would love it!

Ode to the Red Sox

We cannot tell the story of us without giving much credit to the ever so amazing Boston Red Sox.

The summer that Troy and I started dating I had a minister's pass to the Red Sox.

Most of the time when someone asks about our dating we tell them that we dated over the Red Sox. It's very true. Troy and I spent most of our time together at church and with friends, but when we had time alone much of it was spent at a Red Sox game.

I could go to any game (except the playoffs) and take one guest.

Needless to say, after Troy and I started dating I took no other guests.

The only catch with the minister's pass was that we didn't have our own seats. We had "standing room only" seats. This meant that we spent much of the game scoping out seats that were empty that we could sit in. (We got kicked out of seats several times.)

But we did end up enjoying sitting at the very top against the fence.

It had a great breeze and view of Boston behind us.

We had many great conversations at Red Sox games.

And let us not forget that this was the year that Boston won the world series!

Another interesting point - The Sox won again the year that I was pregnant with Audrey.

Church, Friends and Fun in New England

That year of dating was full of wonderful friends, enjoying New England from the camping to the maple syrup farms and snow, to the wonderful city of Boston, and alot of time working at church together.

Boston skyline - what an amazing city~!

Hope Fellowship Church (your Daddy actually lived here in the church until we got married. He lived in a small room up where you see the top left corner window. I'm sure he has many stories to tell you about living in the church for a year. We love this church!)


This was Daddy and Mr. Odoi's birthday celebration in Boston with some of our closest friends.

Camping trip in Western Massachusetts

And a trip to a maple syrup farm in New Hampshire.

These are only a few glimpses of the wonderful things that we did together and with our friends while we were dating.

More to come...

Davis Square

As the story of Troy and I continues, I wanted to show you a picture of Davis Square. This is right around the corner from our church in Boston. You could walk to it from the church. And we ended up living very close to this after we were married (and when Audrey was born.) Davis Square is such a neat place. Very busy, lots of night life. In the evening there are white Christmas lights on all around the square.

This place is important because when Troy and I became interested in one another we walked to Davis Square together numerous times. I remember one time in particular walking to Davis in the evening and sitting at a table in the square talking about our lives. I remember how easy Troy was to talk to and how interested he was in my life and feelings about life. And I loved hearing about him. I think this was when I started to realize what a solid, godly man he was - is.

Here is Davis Square:

What a great place. I bet we will take you there one day. Although, Audrey, you have been there already. :)

The Story of Us...

In a little over a week Troy and I will have been married for 5 years. Wow. What an amazing 5 years it has been. We have said numerous times..."5 years, a cocker spaniel and 2 babies later...here we are!"

Since this blog is primarily for the purpose of recording our lives for our girls, I wanted to give Audrey and Alaina a record of Mommy and Daddy coming together. So over the next week I want to give little snippits of how we came to be "us."

It all started when Amy was living in Boston - working on staff at Hope Fellowship and as Baptist Campus Minister at Harvard. In the Spring of 2004 Troy came on a short-term mission trip to work with our church. After this trip, Troy felt like God wanted him to come back to Boston and serve the church for a Summer.

It was during that Summer of 04 that Amy and Troy began to notice one another. I think it all started one day at the beach...

Several times a Summer we would have a big beach day with anyone and everyone from the church. I think this was kind of the first of such days. And it was a fabulous day!

We were at Marblehead Beach on the northern coast of Massachusetts. Goergeous place.

We spent the entire day at the beach playing with friends and I remember the start of a little flirting between Troy and I. This is when it really started to be apparent to those around us that something just might be going on.


After the day at the beach we noticed that they were playing a movie in the park in the town center of Marblehead. So we all laid out our blankets in the park and waited for a long time until the movie began. They were showing the movie "Splash." And I just remember sitting pretty close to Troy. (As you can tell from the picture below it was pretty cool in the evening there with our bathing suits on.)

Here is a picture of Troy at the movie in the park. Isn't he cute? I certainly thought so~

This day was definitely the start for us. What a great day it was!

So Audrey sings pretty much all the time - and wants us to sing.

I can hardly ever get her to do it on video though.
Today she was ready to perform...