Wedding Blog

Now that the wedding has passed, and we are starting to get into planning for a family (not family planning!), I thought I’d start talking about how we met, and how things ended up the way they are. So, here goes, the story of us.

The Beginning

When you’re just coming out of high school you have a sense of freedom. Finally, you are done with the mandatory 12 years of education, and you can proceed to learn as you wish. I was already enrolled in the local community college (although that sounds very crappy, it’s not; Santa Monica College is one of the best community college in the country!), and I needed to get a job to fund my college life. I know most people have their parents paying for college, but mine just couldn’t. So, I would do it myself.

Since I didn’t have a license, I needed to get a job somewhere close to SMC, and the perfect place was the 3rd Street Promenade, which is a three block long open mall, with the Santa Monica Mall at the south end of it. All along the promenade are stores and restaurants, ranging from high end clothing stores to a Mc Donald’s. The promenade is where it’s at. My friend Natalie and I set out to put applications in at all sorts of stores. She chose clothes and shoe companies, and I chose book stores and the Jamba Juice that was just put in a few years before. I figured there was no better place for a vegetarian nerd!

Luckily for the both of us, we were both asked to come in for interviews at two places. I was going to interview at Borders and Jamba Juice. Natalie was going to Charles David and BCBG shoes. The day of the interviews, I was a nervous wreck. As you all know from previous posts, my dad is a huge support for me, so he came with me, only at a distance. My Borders books interview was unremarkable, but my Jamba Juice interview was perfect. The person who interviewed me was Carlyle, a chubby guy who was just adorable. I knew then (my boy-crazy self), that I wanted this Jamba Juice job.

During the interview I let all sorts of tidbits about myself slip in… I love juice, I’m a vegetarian, I was a girl scout for 12 years, I help old ladies across the street. Basically, I just talked myself up and let that be that. A few weeks later I was offered the job, my first REAL job! I was now a smoothie master. Okay, I had a few more weeks of training to become that master of blending, but I loved it.

Other than a broken bra strap on the first day of real work, things went smoothly (ha, pun intended!). I got to know my co-workers, and fell in adoration of one particular co-worker, Stephen. A few months older than I was, I was gone. The funny thing is, at that point someone else had fallen for ME- Mr. Kiwi. Stephen and I dated a few times, and as I got to know him better, I fell even harder. Little did I know my life was going to take an interesting turn!