The next Sunday rolled around and I had a very strong impression that Chris was going to ask me to join him for dinner with his grandparents after church. I laughed at this, but the feeling was pretty strong, so I made sure that I arrived at church ready to go. An hour later, in the middle of Sunday school, Chris handed me a note inviting me to lunch.

I accepted, having no idea what I was getting myself into. I knew it was basically a pity date since I was from out of town and didn’t get to go home to Sunday dinner on long weekends, but it sounded like a good time. It was Super Bowl Sunday. I had no idea. We had a pleasant dinner with Chris’ grandparents, and I was ready to go when his extended family showed up in droves. There were three sets of aunts and uncles, and each set brought what seemed like an awful lot of kids. I was introduced to everyone, and eventually squished onto the couch, watching a game that made absolutely no sense to me, feeling very out of place in the middle of the huge and immediately accepting family. So yes, on my first “date” with my husband he took me to his grandparent’s house and introduced me to 3/4ths of his family.

Later that evening we ended up at Chris’ uncle’s home. We were having a conversation where Chris was explaining his theory on dating everyone so he didn’t get stuck. His uncle was wondering just how much fooling around was going on with these dates when Chris told him that he wasn’t kissing anyone until he knew she was going to be around for along time. Immediately, Uncle David asked me if Chris had kissed me yet. I’m sure I blushed three shades of red while I explained that we were just friends.

Over the next two weeks Chris’ family hounded him mercilessly about when he was going to bring that girl back, and how was that going anyway? He even brought another girl over to his grandparents, but they were undeterred. They had us married from the minute they met me.

Finally, Chris invited me over to his grandparent’s house again. It was President’s Day weekend, and we were two of the few students still hanging around campus for the long weekend. We ate, talked, enjoyed the beautiful Utah weather, and just had a great time. That night we were watching a movie in his grandparent’s basement. There was a fire in the fireplace and Chris had his arm around me and he asked me if I would go steady with him.

I completely wrecked the moment and asked him if he was serious. This right here should have warned him about what he was going to be in for if he married this crazy North Dakota girl, but he replied that he was serious, and no joke was intended. I said that I would.

So we were an item. We both sat on that couch, ignoring the remainder of the movie while in my head a little voice was trying to figure out how in the heck that had happened. I had NEVER agreed to go steady with someone before. I had no idea at the time that he was sitting next to me asking himself, “What did I just do? I’ve never asked someone to go steady before.” Yet, it just felt right.

Part 3 to follow.