One Thrifty Chick: Wedding Dress Anniversary Surprise { Celebrating 10 Years }

August 13th 2005 is the day I married my very best friend and true soul mate. I knew that hitting 10 years was going to be a big milestone, but it didn't go at all how I thought it would.

We got married at one of the oldest historic minor league ballparks in America, just before a game in front of hundreds of fans. This was a complete dream of mine, and you can read more about that here, and also see our wedding video by clicking here.

(photo credit)

On June 29th, my vision of our anniversary was shattered. I got a phone call from my husband and he had asked me what was going on by our house and that he could see a lot of smoke. I headed to the front door, looked to my left and this is what I saw.

Of course I went straight to facebook to see what was going on, to find out that our beloved stadium had gone up in flames. It was gone, there was no saving it. It hurt really bad, and most people don't have the connection to the stadium like we do, but this was a HUGE loss in our hearts.

The stadium has been vacant for 6 years now, but not being able to drive by and remember all of the great things that happened there was a heartbreaking thought.

Moving into July, my anniversary plans were well underway. I knew I wanted it to be special and I wanted to steal my husbands heart all over again.

I started by ordering and designing him some simple meaningful gifts.

Part of his surprise was that he would come home to his bride and I would be holding this sign that I made asking him to take me out to the ballgame. (I already had our tickets)

On our anniversary we both went into the office for a couple hours in the morning, then we were going to meet at home and head out golfing. Well luck would have it that he was called out to a job site which gave me the perfect window to pull this all off.

I pulled my dress out of my youngest sons closet (how they never spilled the beans is beyond me) and had my best friend (who happens to be our nanny) help me get into my dress and do my hair.

I laid out our shirts that I made, along with the very hat he wore for our wedding.

As I tracked him on find my phone I knew how far out he was from the house, so we all took our places as he got closer.

The music was set playing our wedding song and the kids and Heather were hiding under the kitchen table with the video camera ready. The butterflies in my stomach were unreal, just like the day we were married. Grab a tissue, you may need it!

The fact that he showed up with a giant bouquet of my favorite flowers was the icing on the cake. He is truly my prince charming and I wouldn't trade him for the world.

After this, we headed out to the country club to have lunch and play a quick round of golf.

From there we headed home, changed into our baseball gear, grabbed some dinner at our favorite Italian restaurant and then headed to the ballpark.

I had arranged with the Eugene Ems to have a special video message played on the big screen during the game, but to my surprise they asked us if we would be interested in throwing out the first pitch among some other fun things they did.

I had invited friends and family to join in the celebration at the game and we had about 30 people come out. My sweet mom found a banner from our wedding and had it hung in our section. Now, my husband had NO idea that he was throwing out the first pitch until this day, and he also had no clue friends would be there.

We headed out to the field and he threw out that first pitch perfect! It was at that moment that he noticed the large cheering section with familiar faces.... surprise honey!

During the throw they displayed the photo from our wedding where we also threw out the first pitch of that game.

Then we had a brief 30 seconds of photos and autographs with the player / staff.

We headed up to our seats and enjoyed the game with some of our amazing friends and family! If you were one of them THANK YOU, it truly meant the world to us both! We took the banner down and tried to get a group picture, however it was after several people had already left.

We stayed until the very end of the game and enjoyed every second of reminiscing over all the ballgames we've attended together in the last 15 years.

After the game he and I went out for ice cream (his favorite) and then headed home to an empty house...........

I look forward to the many years we have ahead of us and can't wait to celebrate 20 years at this very same ballpark!!

I hope more than anything that this will inspire other women around the world to do the same romantic surprise for your spouse. This truly is up there in my list of most amazing days of my life. When do you ever get to wear your wedding dress again?

And let me tell you, the surprise on his face when he saw his bride again was priceless. It brought a tear to his eye and he kept telling me all night now awesome that surprise was.