Top Five Reasons I've Really Loved the Last Nine Years With Isael Barreto

Look at this picture. Oct 2000.

The setting: Glorious - the sleepy, white-washed town in thebackground is La Herradura, Spain.

A small Spanish village snuggly fit in a horseshoe beach on theMediterranean Sea.

The couple: Young, hopeful and excited about the future they've just decided to spend together.


9 years, 8 months, 13 days ago - we met in the electronics department of the Best Buy on Harlem at the North Riverside mall. 13 days later I moved to Spain to live out a dream I'd been saving for and planning towards for most of 1999 and 2000. 5 weeks later, Isael joined me on the adventure. We have not been apart since.

Today - we celebrate our 9th wedding anniversary. Happy Anniversary, Darling! It's sort of funny to say that today since we really celebrate in August - the day we met. Honestly - we've just made a habit of celebrating period. Every day. Every occasion is an excuse to have fun and enjoy one another.

So today - I give you the Top Five Reasons I've Really Loved the Last Nine Years with Isael Barreto

5. The Food - for someone who grew up with four sisters and a doting mom - this guy can throw down in the kitchen! I remember the first time he made black bean quesadillas - I wanted to marry him again.

4. The Culture - marrying my Mexican love has been an adventure in culture and understanding. My life is richer for having him, his family and his culture in it.

3. The Temperment - We are night and day. He is chill and I am nuts. He is tender and emotional and has taught me that I can be as well. He has just as much adventure in him as me so we make a great travel team. We compliment each other wholly.

2. The Kids - Emma and Evan are wonderful. They are a great mix of the two of us inso many ways. Emma with Isael's body frame and quiet yet hilarious demeanor. Evan is 100% me energy yet all boy and all Daddy. The second great loves of my life.

1. The Laughter - Not a day goes by that we don't laugh together. At each other. At others. Even in some really hard, dark times - we found ways to laugh, every day. I am laughing as I write this thinking of some of our inside jokes from the early days in Spain "Mama, bebe tiene hambre" would send us on the floor or street anytime we said it.

Thanks Isael for these great years. I love you and know that many more adventures await us.