The Story of Us- Part 1...

In order to tell you the story of how we met and became the US we are today, I have to go all the way back to somewhere around the year 2000. No one is for sure when or where exactly we met but we both attended the same school and had to have crossed paths around this time. Maybe even before...

Senior Pic 2001

 

In 2000, I was a 7th grade girl suckered into keeping stats for the high school baseball team by my uncle. I secretly loved doing it though as what Junior High girl wouldn't love hanging out with high school boys!? Kyle was a Junior in high school playing for the varsity team and getting coached by my uncle and dad. Throughout Kyle's junior and senior years I rode the bus with the boys and attended all of their games. I can't remember talking to Kyle specifically but I knew who he was...

7th grade

Now I know what you're thinking about the age difference, a 7th grade girl and a Junior in High School? But we are actually only 3 years apart in age as Kyle was ahead in school and we never had real interactions until years later...

 

Fast forward about 4 years.

 

I was still a baseball manager for the high school baseball team and getting ready to graduate.

 

Senior Pic 2005

 

Kyle was living up the college life in Emporia, which just happened to be the same town where my older sister Jen was attending school. And "The Dugout" where Jen bartended, just happened to be Kyle's favorite bar. Hmm...

 

 

 

All three sisters at The Dugout during a visit to see Jen 2005

 

 

 

I would come up to visit Jen in Emporia quite a bit and started going down to the Dugout my senior year of high school. I would spend nights just sitting at the bar while Jen worked and a guy named Kyle Bentley, who had attended my high school, would always come chat me up.

 

I had a serious boyfriend in high school but would always welcome the attention I got from Kyle. He was always so nice and never acted like a creepy older guy preying on a high school girl. (Definitely encountered some of them at Emporia.)  

 

On my 18th birthday my sister brought me down to Emporia and took me out dancing. The only person to go with us to the club and spend all night following us around...Yep you guessed it, was Kyle...

Jen and her favorite boys at The Dugout

From left: Larry (My future brother-in-law who married my oldest sister Niki, my sister Jen, Kyle, and JRand (Best man at our wedding and still one of our closest friends)

At this point Kyle had made a drunken admission one night in Emporia that he liked me but I chalked it up to alcohol. We both were in relationships and I was getting ready to head to Barton County Community College on a dance scholarship. I laughed at him and blew him off... Little did I know...