Blair and Chris – Spokane Wedding Photography
Title: “When you know, you know.”
By Blair Fredrick
I grew up hearing my mom tell me, “When you know, you know.” It never really made sense until August 23rd, 2014 when a childhood classmate asked me out for a drink. By no means were my feelings for Chris love at first sight, in fact, it took about 14 years to have any feelings other than friendship towards this man. Our story began in elementary school, sharing a class or two, until a calling moved my family around the states for many more years. Chris and I kept in touch online, through texts, emails, and occasionally when I was in town visiting, we would hang out and catch up. Our relationship was nothing more really than a cyber friendship. In 2011, God called me back to the Pacific Northwest. Chris and I got together a couple of times for coffee downtown but we were both in committed relationships so our friendship was simple and appropriate. The first couple of years being back in Washington were really rough and life changing for me. I went through a tumultuous breakup, I lost a job, I lost my sense of self. But the curly haired, weirdo I remember from 5th grade, was right there to put the pieces back together.
August 23rd, 2014 is an engraved date in my mind. I had just lost my job two weeks prior and was sitting on my couch binge watching Netflix. Chris text me and asked to meet downtown for a drink; the night was life changing. We stayed out until 4 in the morning, half the time sitting in my car talking. We discovered so many things about each other that neither one of us realized about the other. Our love for microbrews, the band Boyce Avenue (who is virtually unheard of), our love of food and nature.
I went home that night (or really early morning rather!) and that’s when it hit me; “When you know, you know.” It took me 14 years of off and on communication and visits with this man before it really truly hit me, I knew Chris was the man with whom I’d spend the rest of my life with.
Chris proposed to me December 8th, 2015 in our Christmas-decorated living room, with our two dogs (fur babies) who were excited I had just gotten home. We had talked about my idea of how I wanted to be proposed to, and he did it exactly as I had dreamed.
We spent the next 9 months saving money and planning for our wedding. We decided, after changing our minds plenty of times, to have our wedding outside at our home as we live on property close to Mt. Spokane. The weather had been warm and sunny the entire week, until the day of the wedding, then it poured. All. Day. Long. Thankfully, the ceremony started at 5 in the afternoon and the rain has ceased by about 4 o’clock. Chris worked so hard to give us a beautiful ceremony. He set up canopies, dried off chairs, and did whatever else he could to ensure I would be happy.
I could not have asked for a better day. As cliche as it sounds, I would have married that man rain or shine. Our wedding was intimate, beautiful, and everything we could have hoped for.
September 17th, 2016 I said “I Do” to the man I know I have been destined to be with. And, when you know, you know.
