Luke & Megan: Where It All Began

This has been the day of "bodily fluids"- cleaning out the toddler potty, changing poopy diapers, wiping up a larger amount than normal of spit up, and cleaning up after two cats throwing up their food. Thankfully, Luke sent me off to have some me-time and I am happily sitting in Panera typing away and eating delicious food that I did not make.

And now for something that's been on my mind for a little while.

For the sake of recording it somewhere, I wanted to write a few posts taking me back to when our little family began.  Back to the beginning of when there was just Luke and me.  Because without Luke, we wouldn't have our adorable Wiedeman littles.  It will probably take me awhile to get all my thoughts and memories together, but I want it written down somewhere!

Some parts I'll speed through and others may require more detail.  I'm not much of a story-teller, but more of a list the order of events person, but I want to remember and record it before I get too much further away from that time in my life.  Hopefully it will also help with my New Years desire to focus more on my husband and growing that relationship.

So I'll start at the very beginning.  Back to when Luke and I were 9 years old.  I started to go to a Christian elementary school in fourth grade, and Luke had attended the school first through third grade.  While we just missed going to school together, his dad did drive the bus for my fourth grade class to go to our outdoor school.  And since he was driving, Luke got to come along (fourth grade was the start of his homeschooling career).

my siblings and me on the first day of school (I was in either 4th or 5th grade)

I really have no memory of him being on the trip, just some possible thoughts in the back of my mind wondering who the random kid was that was on the trip with us.  But really, I don't think the two of us interacted one tiny bit on that trip.  Pretty sure I straight up just didn't talk to boys at that time in my life.

Fast forward to the summer between freshman and sophomore year of college (aka 2000).  I had just finished my first year back in the good ol' public school system and Luke was still being home-schooled.  My younger siblings still attended the Christian elementary and middle school so my mom was still in contact with my teachers.  One day when she was volunteering she got to talking with my 8th grade English teacher about a missions trip he was leading that summer through the church associated with the Christian school.

Now my mom has always pushed me to be less shy and do more things.  She has always wanted my siblings and I to grow in our faith, and so her immediate thought was that a missions trip would be the perfect thing for me to do.  What a great thing for her incredibly quiet, introverted 15 year old to spend six weeks away from home talking to complete strangers.

At least that's how I viewed it, and I thought it was a not so good idea.  BUT in God's amazing goodness and providence I ended up going on the trip.  Prior to leaving, parents and team members had a meeting one evening at the church to go over logistics, and it was the first time I laid my eyes on Luke (aside from probably seeing him during our outdoor school trip in fourth grade.)  I can still remember the black zip-up Oriole's windbreaker he was wearing, and his crazy brown hair and cute smile.  And even thought he was shorter than me and weighed less than I did, it was definitely like at first sight!

Let's just say it was like at first sight for both of us and pretty much the entire trip was me avoiding all eye contact with him while wanting desperately to hang out with him, and him being a little flirt.  I can still remember one evening when a few of us were hanging out (with our female leader by the way) and someone offered Luke a mint.  He took it, and while looking directly at me, said something about how it makes a person's breath kissable.  Everyone in the room died laughing because they all knew that we were crushing on each other.  And I'm pretty sure I turned bright red.

please excuse the picture of a picture

That was pretty much how the summer went (and Luke was officially taller than me by the end of the summer).  The Lord grew me and stretched me in so many ways that summer.  It was the first time in my life where my relationship with the Lord was real- when I learned to spend time with Him and rely on Him.  And when summer came to an end, Luke and I had a ridiculous conversation over Instant Messenger (the good ol' days) where I basically told him that we could not be more than friends.  And his response was basically "duh, I know, we're 15 years old", and that was that.

I saw him on occasion when I went to his church's youth group or hung out with him and the rest of our team members from the trip.  Things just kind of eased into an easygoing friendship and life was good.  I went to high school dances with other guys, but never dated.  I knew I didn't want a high school relationship because I knew I would put too much of my heart into it and would be crushed when it ended.  But Luke and I were friends, and we were content with where our relationship (or lack thereof) stood.