Our relationship began in high school, we did not go to the same school but through mutual friends our paths crossed. We both have different stories from when we remember seeing each other for the first time but the first time we actually met is one neither of us will forget. We had gotten a bunch of icy weather the few days prior so Anthony and a couple of our friends decided to “skate” down a steep hill on the back side of the Vineyard apartments in Olive Branch. Anthony hit a reflector in the road on his way down and hit his head when he landed. He had a concussion as a result of this fall and was talking with a lisp totally unknowingly. If you know Anthony, you know he wasn’t letting this concussion slow him down and was out and about with the group of friends when I showed up separately with others from the group. Anthony approached me for the first time with a head swollen twice the size it usually is talking with a lisp so I asked him what was wrong with him and he replied with this lisp “I hit my head really hard.” We proceeded on to McDonald’s as a group and once inside I was trying to keep my distance but Anthony came to sit next to me and with his balance off due to the concussion he ended up spilling a large sweet tea all in my lap.. if you know me you know my mind was made up at this point, I thought he was insane and was not interested in any further interactions. Fast forward through a few other occurrences where I had it in my head I didn’t like Anthony because he talked to much, which I know now was his way of flirting, my dance banquet was approaching and I needed a date. I actually asked Anthony to be my date because quite a few of our friends were assuming I was going to let them take me and I thought Anthony was the only one that hadn’t shown interest. It was the week of and I asked him what he was doing that Saturday and he responded with “hopefully taking you to your banquet.” I was wearing a purple dress so Anthony asked me at the end of the night “to be his fairytale princess” and I think at this point it’s obvious I said yes. We were faced with many challenges in our early years with an age difference that in most everyone’s opinions at the time would ultimately result in us being at different stages in life several times and being the cause of us not making it long together. Instead, we grew separately and figured out how to grow together at the same time.

After years of wanting nothing more than to marry Anthony and many hints thrown his way, he proposed June 25th, 2017. By this point I thought it was never going to happen so I didn’t see it coming whatsoever. He planned with my best friend Jessica, and everyone knew it was happening except for me. He took my breath away by getting on his knee in front of my favorite truck at Scrapin’ the Coast in Biloxi, MS. We both share a love for custom vehicles and have spent a majority of our relationship at shows, in the shop, at the racetrack, or on road trips to get vehicles or parts so it was the perfect place. I will never forget that moment, I was SHOCKED and overwhelmed with happiness. I definitely ugly cried in front of hundreds of people at the show.

We originally planned to get married in October of 2019 but life happened and threw many more challenges our way. We ended up buying our house in 2018 and spent a few years putting all of our time into slowly renovating it. We also added to our family and got our only child, Maggie, in 2018. Last year, approaching our 10 year anniversary we decided we had waited long enough and no matter what life threw at us, it was time to finally be husband and wife. We got married October 1st 2021 with a small ceremony at our house and have spent the first months of marriage planning the wedding to celebrate with all of our friends and family. The wedding will take place on our one year anniversary and we are beyond excited to finally celebrate us and how far we’ve come together in the last 11 years. If we have learned one thing, it’s that life is full of challenges and obstacles but at the end of it all, love will always come out on top. We feel certain we can survive anything as long as we have each other.