I was so excited that she wanted one!
An Easy-Bake oven was the one thing I always wanted for Christmas when I was a little girl and never got. Momma would always say, “you’re big enough to cook in a REAL oven, why would you need that?” Practical Pam, I guess. Ha. Ha. (In her defense, now that I’ve eaten from the Easy Bake oven, I will agree, why would we need that?!?!?) Ha.
When DW & I were still just friends, we were talking about being kids at Christmas and our favorite gifts when we were kids, etc. and apparently I had told him about how I’d always wanted an Easy Bake oven and that was the only thing I could remember ever really wanting and not getting.
Fast forward a couple months, when we were now dating and it was Christmas Eve. We’d planned to meet for lunch that day to exchange gifts. While we had been talking for months, we’d not been dating that long, and certainly weren’t serious enough to see each other on Christmas Day or spend the day with the others’ families.
DW picked me up from the bank and then we drove back to Williston for lunch. Ivy House was packed, so we had Green Shutters instead. I only had an hour lunch break, but I’m sure the branch crew told me I could have a little longer, but I still had to get back to work. So, as soon as we got back to the bank, we opened our gifts in his truck.
I was so nervous the week before, about picking something out for him while Christmas shopping. This was the first gift I was buying for him. We had been on several dates, and had been talking as friends for months before that, but I wasn’t exactly sure what we were. I wanted to make sure my gift didn’t give the wrong impression or send some signal I didn’t intend for it, too. I didn’t want to look like I wasn’t serious about him and wanted to just be friends… but I also didn’t want it to look like I thought we were more than we were either.
I put a lot of thought into it, and settled on an orange and blue hammock from one of those vendors in the center of the mall. I’m dying laughing at myself right now and wondering what the heck I was thinking, except for the fact that it was down to the last minute and I had to pick something. The tent was like $60.00, so I felt like that was a decent price point, and for bonus points, it was orange and blue. It was one of those single person hammocks that you could hang inside or out and looked like it was made from string. Looking back, what an awful gift. A year and a half later, right before our wedding, when I was purging his closet to make room for my stuff, I tossed the never-been-used tent in the yard sale pile. Ha! This is the closest picture on the internet that I could find to what it was…
He was super sweet when he opened it and acted so excited about it. I really thought for a minute I’d nailed it and done good. Why? I have no idea.
Then I opened his beautifully wrapped (thanks to his wicked step-momma) box.
I knew the minute I opened that first present he’d ever gotten me that I was going to marry DW.
Underneath that pretty paper and tulle ribbon was an Easy Bake oven box. What came next sealed the deal when he told me he “wanted me to have everything I ever wanted and all my dreams to come true.” Yep, in that moment I knew I was marrying him and also that I’d never ever top him in the gift department. (That’s still true. DW is the best gift giver hands down. I don’t know how he does it, but he can hear me say one time 6 months ago that I like something and somehow remembers it when an occasion comes around.)
Later that afternoon, I hauled that Easy Bake oven in my house singing “Today I met the boy I’m gonna Marry” to my mom and dad! Gosh that’s such a sweet memory for me now.
That was also the day I knew DW and I were seriously dating. We hadn’t had a discussion defining what we were or where we were headed, and while he was the only person I was interested in dating or talking to, and I assumed I was for him, it hadn’t been nailed down, yet. To 18 year old me, that was important, but definitely not important enough to bring up just yet. ;)
I’m pretty sure the fact that DW had just gifted me with the “one thing” I always wanted and never got should have solidified his feelings for me and intentions for us. I still wasn’t sure though, until later that afternoon when he was telling me about how he didn’t tell the checkout lady at Target that he was buying an Easy Bake oven for his GIRLFRIEND, he lied and told her it was for his little sister, when she asked. Ha.
And that is the story about the day I knew DW was IT for me, and coincidentally, the day I got TOLD I was his girlfriend. ;)
The easy bake oven still sits, unopened in the top of my closet, and I see it every single day.
~amw~
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