Congratulations, babe :-)

My Sweet Sixteen

My very dear friend Rebecca Bausum (Soon to be 'Marshall'!) is getting married today. She is my oldest friend... we went to elementary school together! I remember my first encounter with her: We would both wear Princess Leah buns on our heads, and fight over who was the real Princess Leah. (Oh and Becca, TOTALLY me. Just sayin' :-)
After we got over our "differences", we became best of friends! We'd have special weekends where she'd come over on Friday night to sleep over, and (What the heck!) my mom would let her stay Saturday night as well! Which was a HUGE deal, by the way. We had so much fun, squeezing ourselves in my closet with the Mini TV, eating ice cream with Indiana Jones. We'd also go on bike rides and pass cute neighbor boys that we named Nigel Pinopscott. Mid-afternoon we'd usually kick each other's butt on the Super Nintendo, or go exploring in the fields. We'd end our days playing ping pong in the project room, while listening to Gretchen Wilson's 'Redneck Woman' over and over and over again. Other weekends I'd go over to her house, playing hide and seek in the dark at the church her dad pastored and getting in trouble for locking the younger tag-along neighbor's daughter out :-/. We so wanted to be like our older sisters Laura and Suzy (Who were best friends as well) and decided to take up our own language...Which meant substituting various names so we could talk freely. Our favorite people to talk about were 'Banana', 'Eyeshadow', 'Chalk', 'JD' and 'Eddy'. 
Then, when I was a freshman in high school, she moved to Germany...which was heartbreaking. We lost communication for 4 years... But last year, my mom went to her older sister's wedding and called me. I answered, and it was Becca! Apparently, we both haven't changed a bit ;-)

Mom and Becca

Over 12 years we've known each other, and we've laughed together, cried together, mused together, planned together, and sighed together. Rebecca, congratulations on your marriage! I'm so extremely blessed to witness God giving you such a marvelous gift and calling. I pray that you both serve each other with love and patience, and that I will soon have some 'nieces or nephews'!!! :-D

Summary of our Friendship :-)