The Picture That Changed My Januaries...

January is a big month for us.  I first met Lee in January of 1990; we were both 13 years old and in the 8th grade.  I'd just moved to Florida from Ohio and started at my new school after Christmas break.  And there was Lee.  He was as cute as can be, kind of shy with a slow southern drawl.   He was as calm and steady as they come (still is), but tenacious as a pit bull and wild as a jackrabbit, too (still is).  He wasn't anything I was used to, telling his barely believable (true) tales of stuffing rattlesnakes into buckets and taming wild horses.   We became friends instantly and kept in touch over the years with phone calls and the occasional visit.  Our lives eventually took different paths, and somewhere around 1998-ish, my sister, Susan, came back to our new home in North Carolina from a visit to Florida with this photo...

...and stopped me dead in my tracks.  I believe my exact words were, "how am I going to get him?"  She laughed and said, "I don't know, but you'd better or someone else will!"  It took us awhile to get ourselves together, but in January of 2003 we were finally married.  We just celebrated our 10th anniversary on the 4th.  We took the kids out to dinner to celebrate, and Benny gifted us with one of his portraits.

(It's a little blurry, which works out perfectly for me.  You may or may not be ready to see every single megapixel my 36-year-old face has to offer.)

Lee's birthday is the 17th of January, giving us even more to celebrate.  He's worth it, y'all.  He's a handful, don't get me wrong, but aren't we all a little?  He's got the spirit of a pioneer while oddly I've got the spirit of a fraidy- cat, so we're a little yin and yang.  He's the kite and I'm the string, so to speak. But it works.  We've got enough in common to hold the rest together.  And he loves our babies like nobody's business, which just might be the best part.  I think Salt 'N' Pepa put it best when they sang..."what a man, what a man, what a man, what a mighty good man."  Amen.

(I have to take most of his photos with him unaware.  This one was through the window.  That's right, they're pointed directly at the window.)

(graciously losing at Jenga)

(Fireworks preparation with Benny.)

(Hey, whoa, how did this one get in here?!  Look away, grandmas)

(Lee and his shadow, again a through-the-window shot.)

(Cue me melting.)

 Never a dull moment around here, thanks to him.  We celebrated him at Disney World yesterday, which is fitting seeing how our life is nothing short of a wild ride.  But I can tell you, there's nobody I'd rather be in cahoots with than Lee Strickland, that's for sure.

Here's to many, many more happy Januaries.