OUR FIRST YEAR TOGETHER

Today I was going through a box of things I had stored in our barn and found an album that I had made for my husband as an anniversary present after our first year of marriage. I thought our boys might enjoy looking at pictures of their parents that first year. How young we looked then!

On our July Honeymoon we traveled across from Texas, where we were married, to California where my husband had a fellowship to attend a leadership training program at San Fernando Valley State College beginning the next January. We planned to find a place to live and enjoy the sights as we drove to the Los Angeles area. I think we visited every Indian ruin between Texas and California, but we had fun along the way. First we stopped in Albuquerque and visited hubby's aunt for a couple of days.

After we left Albuquerque, we headed west, stopping at interesting places until we reached California. In Northridge, we stayed with friends who were in the program that hubby would being the next January. We found an apartment and made arrangements to rent it when we arrived in January. We returned to Texas and began our last semester of teaching before pulling up stakes and moving to California. Here is a picture of the first house we rented--fully furnished.

We spent the first Christmas that we were married with my parents and brother and sister, and Fancy, the dog that my parents inherited when we all left home.

After Christmas, we packed up all our belongings in a U-Haul trailer, hooked it up to our Chevrolet Malibu and headed for our great adventure in California. For me, it was a bit like a big vacation because I did not plan to work. I had a wonderful time exploring all the new shopping places, discovering a world of new fruits and vegetables in the ABC Grocery Store where we shopped and exploring the wonders of Topanga Plaza--a wonderful shopping mall (before shopping malls were popular in Texas). I did end up doing some part-time work for the college and typed papers for hubby and some of the other students for spending money.

While we were in California, we did a fair amount of sightseeing, saw some snow, the Redwood Forest and local attractions, including Universal City and Busch Gardens. I also went with friends to Disneyland, but hubby missed that trip.

My sister came to visit and we had a wonderful time showing her around. We even picked a few oranges from the orange trees on the campus.

Graduation time finally arrived and we began to pack for our next adventure. It was hard to say goodbye to so many friends that we had made while in the San Fernando Valley but we still stay in touch with some of them even though it has been more than 40 years since we spent that time together in California. From California we moved to Chicago because hubby landed a job there and that was a whole new adventure for us.

Lots of memories were packed into that first year of our marriage--fun memories, interesting experiences and wonderful new friends!