Hidden Pines Chapel

Wedding Day

Wedding

Reception

Our Wedding

October 2014, I was sitting at a restaurant in Sun River, Oregon with my teammates getting ready to eat dinner. We were watching a basketball game when I got a text from a good friend back home. He asked me if I was interested in going on a trip to Costa Rica with a childhood friend of his. I agreed to look into it and pray about it. He shared my contact info with her and had her contact me about the trip. At the time I thought he would be joining us on the trip and I think that was one of the reasons why I said yes in the first place. When I got back home, I received more details about the trip from this girl. I was mistaken about the details of the trip, and came to find out it was a study abroad trip. Yet my friend would not be joining us. However, I felt like I was called to this trip and that there was an adventure awaiting me in Costa Rica. So I agreed to go and got signed up quickly after getting the details. I hadn't even met this girl yet, but yet I was already very drawn to her. I'll be honest, the more I talked to her, the more I liked her. Keep in mind we still hadn't even met. We finally met when she came to Dallas to visit a mutual friend of ours from Honduras who happened to be in town. Whenever I met her in person I hugged her and at that moment I thought " I never want to let you go". I was instantly hooked. I wish I could say the feeling was mutual though. We kept in contact with occasional phone calls discussing the details of the trip to Costa Rica. I would even drive to College Station and use the excuse that I was "visiting my sister." Don't get me wrong I love my sister and I still spent plenty of time with her. However I'll be honest and say that the reason I continued going to College Station was to visit this girl. I was full fledged in love with this woman and she had no intentions to be with me. She did her best to avoid me. But yet with her doing this, I don't think I ever changed my mind about her. Whenever Christmas break of 2014 came around, she returned home to be with her family. We spent a fair amount of time together but it was always around our friends. We got to know each other pretty well and I just loved being able spend time with her. With both of our birthdays being in January, I decided to get us concert tickets. At this point I was completely in love with this woman, however it was just upsetting that for months I continuously chased after her only to be turned away. When the day of the concert came, she cancelled on me because she got sick. I received a phone call Sunday afternoon from her. She apologized for cancelling and wanted to make it up to me by taking me out on Tuesday. Monday evening she invited me over. We spent some time talking with her family and then out of nowhere she gets up and tells her parents that we are leaving. In my stupor I had no idea what she was doing but thinking back on it I probably could've figured out that she was just wanting to talk to me one on one. We went out to the lake and talked. We joked around with each other and enjoyed our time. Out of nowhere again (this night was full of surprises) she says "Josh I know". I was confused by this statement of hers. Literally there could've been a million things that she could've known. My mind started racing and finally she said "I know your feelings for me". I kept silent. I did not say a single word and my heart pounded. I was embarrassed. Literally I never figured I would be called out like this. But what she said next changed my life. She eventually told me that the feeling was mutual. And by this point I was in shock. I had no idea what to do. She tried holding my hand and I just sat there. We left the lake and I dropped her off. We still had our "hangout" the next day which turned into a date. On our first date, I hardly said a word. I was taken back. I could not believe Shelby liked me. This ran through my mind the whole date. We hung out most of the day and I can't really tell you what feelings I had that day (other than pure shock) but what I did know was that I didn't ever want to be away from this woman. And I thank God that in just a few months I won't ever have to be.

Joshua & Shelby

Joshua & Shelby

J&S

Wedding Day

6:00 PM

Wedding

Reception