Well, I think it's about time I wrote it all down... It's a different kind of story... Not the kind that you would read in any traditional romance novel... In fact, I don't think I've ever heard any story quite like ours before in my life! I love it. And what I love the most, is that it's not over yet.

This whole thing started about a year ago. I was on a christian dating/ blog site thingy for reasons other than dating and had no intention of actually dating or even flirting with any of the other members. To avoid playing with any one's hearts, I clearly stated my convictions on the matter in my "about me" section on my profile. I briefly explained the relationship I had with my dad as my God-given authority and protection, and that I had no intention of dating, courting, or even flirting with anyone he had not already inspected and approved.

Even though the duration of my membership there was so short (roughly a week), I was bombarded with messages from guys who didn't even read my profile. They saw a picture, and started flirting. I was, in all honesty, quite disgusted.

But then one day, I got a short message from a guy named Johnathan... It was unlike any message I had ever received... Even off that site. The only thing he had to say, was how much he admired my father. He said he had never seen a father with such a love for his daughter that he would play such a protective role in her life. He said he would shake my dad's hand if he could.

That message held no trace of an ulterior motive, or ill intention, and it was a breath of fresh air! I gladly began talking to him about my dad, and how much I loved him. That led to conversations about the Lord's place in our lives, and concepts found in the scriptures. I thoroughly enjoyed his fellowship, and never once felt like he was at all interested in anything more than the pure, simple, God-centered friendship we had developed.

When I decided I had found out all I wanted to know on that dating site, we exchanged email addresses, but Johnathan did something else unexpected and refreshing... He actually offered to ask my dad's permission to email me. This was surprising because he didn't come from a community where the concept and procedure of courtship was known. In fact, he had never even heard of them at all, and here he was following them perfectly, just out of respect for both my father and myself.

I gave him my dad's email address and then I left for Miracle Mountain Ranch Missions in Pennsylvania for the summer. While I was there, my parents would give me brief updates on how Johnathan was doing, but other than that, I basically forgot about him and focused on the work I was doing up there. Meanwhile, back on the farm, my dad drilled the poor guy. He had a sneaking suspicion that he liked me, and he wanted to get all the cards on the table before anything further developed between the two of us. But we were in the process of a move (which failed) and the two of them lost contact with each other.

I came back from the ranch full of inspiration and fire for the Lord! The teaching I obtained there cannot be compared to anything else I've ever found anywhere else in the world. I made lots of friends too, and it seemed like every one of them had a facebook accept me. The first thing I did once I returned home was create a facebook account for myself.

In the process of finding friends on there, I ran across Johnathan again! I remember being so excited when I called my dad and asked him if I could add Johnathan to my friends list. My dad had a small talk with me to remind me to keep my guard up around my heart, then he gave his consent, and I clicked "add".

Johnathan picked right back up where we left off, and learned quite a bit about the scriptures from each other. He was very respectful and gave me no reason to suspect he even liked me beyond a sweet respect and friendship. When our emails became too long to keep up with, my dad gave us permission to talk on the phone. (again, Johnathan respected my dad's authority over me voluntarily)

The day he called I was actually in the middle of my day and hadn't even really had time to acknowledge the fact that he was supposed to call. I remember being out of breath for some reason when my sibling handed me the phone, and being conscious of the fact that I was rattling the poor guy's ear off for no good reason. He was very patient with me and kindly listened to everything I said. He asked such good questions, and soon we were both lost in deep, analytical conversation about Character First, ATI our families and everything else under the sun we could think of to talk about. I am normally slightly shy, and have never felt so comfortable talking to anyone on the phone before. I felt like I had known him all my life. He offered to pray with me before we said goodbye and I thought, "How considerate. This is a really nice man." And then he prayed.... All thoughts of "really nice man" flew out the window! This guy knew Who he was talking to... He had talked with Him recently... And it was quite evident. I remember making a mental note of that. I was impressed.

The next email I sent him, I asked him if he could share with me some scriptures to explain his conviction against sci-fi and fantasy. He called me again and had spent 3 hours preparing a list of all the passages of scripture he knew of that covered witchcraft, Websters definitions and word searches. He didn't once give me his "opinion" on the matter until he had read the scriptures. By then, I had come to my own conclusions, and they were in perfect agreement with his.

Second mental note: Scripture rules his convictions... Not the voice of the popular vote, or even the voice of a well known preacher... It was simply scripture. And he gently persuaded me over to his same convictions by simply pointing to the bible, instead of out theologizing my slow brain. I liked that, and my respect for him grew, but I still had no other thought for him other than, this man is kind enough to share his wisdom with me.

Over the course of time, we grew more and more comfortable sharing incites, and ideas. I collected quite a list of mental notes and qualities about him that I certainly admired quite a bit. Then in December, he asked my dad for permission to court me, even though it would have to be over the phone, email and webcam. Quite a bit of details were involved in this decision, as you can probably guess, and the Lord clearly directed me and my parents to go ahead and say yes to him.After that point, we spoke on the phone extensively about twice a day. He would call at 7:30 every morning so we could read the bible and pray together, and then in the evenings, after the kids were in bed and our days were over, he would call again and we would talk for literally hours into the night. (word of advice... When you watch the sunrise,... You stayed up too late. lol) We also took advantage of my parents' webcams whenever we could, and chatted for a long time that way too.

Our hearts grew closer and closer together through this process, but we were still guarding ourselves from admitting it until we had a chance to meet face to face. Then, on march 7th, he came down here for spring break to spend a week with us. Man, we ran him through the ropes, poor guy! Anything we could think of to share with him, he got his fill of it, I'm sure! We took him square dancing, mountain climbing, Mr. Jestes let me bring him to my Character First classes, we spent all day at the church on sunday and then went to my best friend's house that evening, we introduced him to every good friend who could line up their schedules with ours to do so! During free time, the kids took him outside to see forts, special trees, etc, etc.

The kids were all over him! My dad warmed up to him right away! If you don't know my dad, you don't understand the significance of that statement. For as long as I can remember, my dad has been extremely protective of me. Even as a four year old, a cute little boy would bring me presents in Sunday school, and my dad did NOT like him. When my father smiled at my mother and I and said, "He fits right in; just like he was already part of the family." My heart skipped a beat and I thought, "This is it, then!" *chuckles*

Living in a big family made it exceptionally hard for Johnathan to be at all romantic, though. The night he told me he loved me was peppered with interruptions when anyone of the little ones would walk up and want to tell him something. He had a beautiful poem he had been writing for years that he wanted to show me. It was seriously the most beautiful thing I've ever read... But mom's classical music downstairs was, at the time, playing the flight of the bumble bee, and kind of ruined the mood. I laugh every time I remember!

The next day, I didn't know it, but he was searching everywhere for a ring so he could ask me to marry him. He couldn't find one anywhere that he liked.

We went out to eat that night with our dear friends the Linzeys, and it was really fun to watch Johnathan and Mr. Linzey talk. Most of what they were saying was way over my head, so I just listened, but it was so encouraging to watch Mr. Linzey get all fired up and excited, and read on his face that he liked this guy. I've known the Linzeys since I was 5 years old, and I respect their opinion almost as much as my own parents. Joy filled my heart when I knew that they approved of Johnathan.

We took them back to their house, and Johnathan and I sat in the back seat, while Mr. and Mrs. Linzey sat in the next seat up, and Mom and Dad were in the driver and passenger seats. Mom and Dad got out to talk with the Linzeys and see them to their front door, while Johnathan and I stayed in the car to talk and watch Deborah Anne. I didn't know it, but Johnathan had made up his mind to propose to me without a ring, and every time he would work up to it, one of my parents would open the door to say, "I'm sorry, guys. We'll be just a little bit longer." or the baby would cry, and once even, my mom open the trunk right behind us to look for a bag of tomatoes. Finally Johnathan gave up and said, "lets just play with the baby" who was fussing again.

We got back home and out of the car, and Johnathan was again looking for an opportunity, but my dad took his arm and said, "Kaytie, go on into the house, I need to speak with Johnathan for a second." So I went inside.

~(they later told me that while we were at the Linzey's house, Dad had asked Mr. Linzey to pray with him because Johnathan had asked to marry me. Dad explained Johnathan's predicament of not being able to find a ring, and after they prayed, Mr. Linzey said, "You know what? Wait right here. I have one." Now, when Mr. and Mrs. Linzey got married, Mr. Linzey couldn't afford the ring he WANTED to buy his new wife, and so bought one that neither of them liked, but that was affordable. When they renewed their vows a couple years ago, they both got new rings for each other and the old rings were put away as a memory, but nothing more. In fact, when Mr. Linzey handed the rings to my dad, Mrs. Linzey said, "If they don't like it either, they could always melt it down and make another one." lol!

So when my dad pulled Johnathan aside, he handed him the rings (which were tied together with a string) and basically said, "how about you propose to my daughter now?" Johnathan just said, "Thank you!" And threw his arms around my dad! But all this I didn't know until later, so if you want it from my perspective, forget I ever said anything. *laughs* ~)

Dad and Johnathan came back inside and Johnathan asked me if I wanted to take a walk with him. Of course I did. We walked around a bit, and when we couldn't find anyplace to sit, we just sat on an old hay bale outside our barn/garage. We talked a bit more, and then Johnathan said he had a surprise for me in the trailer (that's where he was sleeping while he stayed with us). So he got up, and I waited for him curiously. ...He really astonished me when he came out and handed me a box of raisins... He handed it to me and all I could think was, ..."raisins?"

Then of course in the dark, I couldn't get the silly box OPEN, so I handed them to him and asked if he could help me. He couldn't do it either, and turned it over like, "Maybe it opens this way?" I laughed and said it would be the first box I ever met that opened upside down. He laughed with me and just chucked it as far as he could into the woods!

Now of course I'm even more perplexed than before! I'm thinking, "Ooookay. No raisins." And then it all became clear when Johnathan slowly slid off the hay bale and got on one knee in front of me and asked, "Kaytie, will you marry me?" I wasn't really in the mind set of a proposal, to be perfectly honest with you. I knew I loved him, and that I was going to marry him, but I was still thinking about flying raisins. I stared at him and just asked, "Are you serious?" Over and over. Finally I realized how stupid that was. Of course he was serious. So I said yes. :)

He told me he had a ring, but if I didn't like it, he could buy a different one later. He slid it onto my finger and it fit perfectly! It was so dark, I couldn't see it, so I pulled out my cell phone and used it as a light. It was small and dainty, but I couldn't really see much more than that with the light from my cell phone, so I turned it off and just gave Johnathan a big hug!

We couldn't stay out there for very long, because it was rather cold, we were sitting on a hay bale, a cat, a dog, and a couple goats were there with us, and Johnathan's allergies demanded that he supply them with a tissue asap. So we got up and went to his trailer to meet their demands. While I waited outside his door, he noticed me shivering a bit, and handed me his scarf, which I promptly wrapped around my head. He thought that was so funny, he gave it to me. It's been a very good friend to me since he went back to Virginia, which was the next day.

The date we have set for the wedding is June 20th of this year, and I would like to extend an invitation to everyone who would like to come. It's going to be at Western Hills Church, and the exact timing of everything still has to be worked out, but I will certainly post more as soon as I find out more details myself! *Smiles and laughs again*

Now your aaaaaall up to date. :) That's our story so far, and it keeps getting more and more interesting as the days go by. I will do my best to keep you posted!

Have a good and Godly day!

Kaytie