Happy Anniversary

Each morning I wake and every night I fall asleep I can't help but think of how lucky I am for so many things, but the one thing that I always feel so blessed for is my marriage.  When I look back to my dating years and I think about the boys that I dated, I can't help but think how different my life would have been had I taken a different path.
How amazing it is that my brother Travis served with Erik in the MTC and remained good enough friends for 2 years that Trav invited Erik to lake powell.  Then by some  miracle Erik and I became friends; he lived an hour away, is 5 years older, and was at such a different time in his life than I was.  But somehow, through one year of dating, one year of being good friends, then one more year of dating and being best friends he asked me to marry him.
He is my best friend, and an amazing husband and father.  He works harder than any man I know to create a happy, loving home.  He provides, he plays, he loves.
Marriage isn't easy, but it shouldn't be hard either.  I can't help but think that there needs to be a balance of everything.  You have to work at it, but you also have to play; and play hard.  Of course there is always going to be a fight, but if you didn't fight then you wouldn't make-up.  There is a certain balance in our marriage; I know his role and he knows mine, when one of us can't fill our role then the other steps in.  Every time we go to Costco as a family we get home and we take on our roles; he unloads the truck and brings everything to the stairs of the house, the boys then bring everything from the stairs to the kitchen, and then I put everything in its place.  Each time we go to Costco as a family and we go through our routine I work in the kitchen smiling; these are not only our responsibilities after a day of shopping, these are our responsibilities for our life.  Everything we do in our life, our marriage, our family; we do it together.  We are not always smiling and happy while we do it, in fact sometimes we are crying, screaming or whining; but we still do it.....together.
Each year on our anniversary since having kids Erik and I struggle with what we should do to celebrate if anything at all.  We can never seem to decide if we should get a babysitter and go have a nice dinner or do we take the kids somewhere with us?  As we casually discuss the day we almost always come back to us as a family, we would not have the marriage that we do with out our handsome boys.  They entertain us, they play with us, they help us, they make us mad; really mad sometimes.  So when it comes to the Happy Anniversary celebration we typically choose to celebrate with our family.  It is our family unit that makes our marriage click, it is why the last thirteen years have been so rewarding and it is why the next thirteen plus are going to be just as wonderful.
Thank you Erik for the best 13years of my life, I will continue to love you, work with you, play, laugh, and cry with you.  I would not be who I am without you in my life;