The Chester Drawer.

When I was in the second grade I dropped the hot glue gun on my left ankle. I was sitting Indian style in my parents’ front foyer gluing the frill on an apron that I was making. My dad was responsible for watching me and Megan, and he was obviously more lenient with the more dangerous craft tools. My mom was pretty mad when she came home to a screaming child and half finished apron in the floor. The doctor told us to cover the burn with vitamin E cream and wrap it in saran wrap, and I wore that get-up to school for about two weeks until the wound healed. I still have a nice white scar on that ankle that won’t tan or grow hair to remind me of the event.

I suppose if that doesn’t deter someone from crafts, I don’t think there’s much that will. The Good Lord made me a crafter, and for as long as I can remember I’ve piddled with crayons, yarn, paint, glue, and glitter. And I say that it's definitely a gift, because some people don't have a crafty bone it their body (Jeremy Haynes, but that's okay). My dad worked at Hancock Fabrics for years, and every once in a while he would bring home scrap ribbon and what-not. I think most kids think their dad’s are cool for things like toughness, strength, or athleticism. My dad got me with the ribbon, and so this wonderful journey began.

I’m not sure when The Chester Drawer was conceived. I think it was sometime during that horrible year in Columbus. Misery makes a person conspire of better options, and there was lots of conspiring going on at that wretched place. At that point in my life this girl right here had full intentions of being a school teacher, so the idea of having a craft business seemed perfect for summer, you know, something fun to do with Megan. Maybe retirement with the grandkids. I graduated from State in the spring of 2011 with a degree in Elementary Education, and got a job teaching ninth grade pre-biology at Shannon High School. I was a professional school teacher for a total of 7 days. The day I resigned was one of those days that every little detail will forever be etched in your memory, like the day you get saved or the day you met your spouse. I am very proud of myself for that day.

It’s hard to explain because I don’t fully understand the situation myself. I know that before the teaching thing the Lord had be nudging me and nudging me, and then he finally shoved me in His direction and I feel like I didn’t have any other option but to go with it. Shortly after I resigned (I like “resigned” better than “quit”), I was graciously given an opportunity at the bank, and worked at the call center for a good year. Learned some valuable lessons there, like how important people's money is to them, and continued lessons in how to communicate with the human race. I am currently in the compliance department working feverishly at my patriotic duty as an anti-money laundering specialist. This weekend, however, I will make my debut as what I feel that God made me to be. What I’ve done and enjoyed for my entire life, and was too stubborn to ever make it a serious option. The Chester Drawer will make it’s grand opening at the Amory Railroad Festival as a full- fledged craft vender.

People don’t like quitters, and I’m afraid that is what I’ve appeared to be to most people since that day I resigned. Of all the things in the world, I don’t want to appear lazy or undependable. Back in December, I couldn't sleep one night, which is incredible abnormal. I woke Jeremy up and we decided together that we were going to make this craft thing a reality. In the middle of the night we picked April 2013 as the kickoff, I wrote it on my marker board, and it's been there ever since. I've spent every spare moment on craft projects, and will make my appearance at the festival completely exhausted. But proud. I don't know if I will every be able to make a living as a crafter, or even if The Chester Drawer will see the light of day after this weekend, but it doesn't hurt to dream, right? It's 12:15 in the morning of the grand opening. I am scared to death and so excited that I can barely contain myself all at the same time. Come see me if you can. 

Forever crafting,
Mallory

The Love Story by Jeremy.

Mallory and I both graduated high school in 2006. She went to Shannon, and I went to Mooreville. Both, obviously, in Lee County. That proximity brought us together in three ways. The first was that both our graduation honors announcements were in the same section of the Daily Journal. She was valedictorian and STAR student at Shannon, and I was STAR student at Mooreville. She’s got a better story about the newspaper part than I do. 

Anyway. She saw me in the newspaper next to her, so she added me on facebook to offer her congratulations to me on STAR student. Once again, our proximity brought us together because it made it easier for her to determine which “Jeremy Haynes” I was on facebook. I remember her messaging me on facebook and I remember thinking it was just another random girl adding and messaging me on facebook, which was more common back then when I was in football shape than it is now that I’m sort of oval shaped! We messaged back and forth a time or two and I sorta blew her off.

I looked back on my facebook messages and I blew off several attractive and available girls that summer that tried to flirt with me on facebook. I’d learned a lesson or two about crazy facebook girls, so I wasn’t in a hurry to meet her.

The third way that our Lee County Schools education brought us together was that we both chose to go to Lee County Schools 13th and 14th grade at the same place, AKA Itawamba Community College. Most everyone in my senior class from Lee, Pontotoc, and Itawamba counties went to ICC. 

The Lord worked it out that she and I both had the same majors’ biology class together. So the first couple days of Dr. Lay’s class I remembered hearing the name “Whitehead” and thinking it sounded familiar (and a little odd). Somewhere in my mind tho, I remember being facebook friends with a Whitehead girl, but I couldn’t remember her name. Seemed like she had two names or I was getting her confused, and since that was pre-iPhone days, by the time I made it back to a computer to match the face with them name, I forgot about it. I eventually realized she did have two names, Mallory and Megan. That was why I was confused. I’d prolly looked at a different twin each time I saw the name Whitehead on facebook, and if Mallory hadn’t mentioned it earlier, I wouldn’t have ever remembered she messaged me on facebook over that summer.

"Chick-getting Shirt"

Keon, who seems to be connected to every significant life story I have past the 10th grade, knew Mallory and Megan from the spring 2006 tennis state championship in Jackson. He and his doubles partner were competing and the Shannon tennis team was there as well. Like he does with strangers, he made friends and had fun. So, lo and behold, the first Wednesday or Friday of college I can’t remember which, Keon and I ran into his shannon tennis buddies from Jackson. We were walking towards the Grill on the sidewalk opposite the parallel sidewalk in front of the ICC library, Mallory and Megan were walking towards us, away from the grill. He introduced us and I finally got to put a face with the Whitehead name from Biology that I neglected to look up on facebook.

She sat in the middle of a group of boys and girls in that class that she was apparently friends with, or at least she wanted to create that illusion. Dr. Lay however, wasn’t one for any kind of foolishness, and when one of the boys in her group started acting up in class, Dr. Lay called them all out in the middle of his lecture! So we met on a let’s say Wednesday, I assume Dr. Lay called them out on a Friday, since that would have been our next class together, and Monday when I sat down in Biology, Mallory came and asked if she could sit next to me, so she wouldn’t get in trouble over there talking. So she talked to me instead, but just not rudely during the lecture. 

We had that class from 11:00-11:50 on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and the BSU luncheon was kicking off that same Wednesday. So, since I’d already planned to go, and we were getting used to sitting together, we walked across campus together. She still claims credit for inviting me to the BSU for the first time, but I was planning to go anyway. Either way, that’s how our love started.

I got them digits, texted her up and then we went to the first ICC home football game together on a Thursday night August 31, 2006. She joined me up to the same Small Group Bible study a the BSU, and our first date was Fulton Burger King where she wrote our names in mustard on the burger paper. I kissed her on the banks of the Tennessee Tombigbee on September 21, 2006. We became “facebook official” on October 2, 2006, and I told her I loved on November 2 on our one month anniversary.

2006 ICC Football Schedule

We spent most of our free time together for those two ICC years, we survived our year of separation when she went the the “W” and we made it back to Starkville together. God didn’t make either of us patient but both of us long suffering, and we’ve held together through thick and thin. We made a deal when we first started dating that we would never “take a break” and that if we ever broke up it would be for real, not for just a day or two. I guess that’s like saying we’d give our love every opportunity to succeed, and if it did not succeed we would break up, but only after every ounce of patients and long suffering and love and forgiveness we could muster was exhausted. And we came bad close a time a two. There were times that we were both about tired of each other, but we knew that if we broke it off it was over, so we never did. 

They say that once a bone has been broken, when it heals, it is stronger than it was before the break. People try to apply that to relationships, but I think mine and Mallory’s relationship is strong today because we never took a break. You don’t get breaks in life. You don’t take timeouts when things are hard, you work through them, and with the Lord’s help, we always have. She’s my ally and my best friend, and outside of the Lord Jesus, she’s the best thing that has ever happened to me. She’s everything I ever wanted, and everything I need. She’s like the Eve to my Adam, she’s just what I was missing. She’s a help that is mete for me. She makes my blood flow.

These weren't the original profile pictures

I never delete my messages. I’ve got messages on my iPhone from the day I first turned it on. Every conversation. And I’ve got every facebook conversation I’ve ever had still on facebook. I didn’t delete them. The reason is that I guess I knew back then that someday I might want to look back at those messages. Maybe they might be important or mean something, regardless of how trivial they were at the time. Mallory said she couldn’t find the facebook messages that started our romance in June of 2006, but I found them. I kept them. But as I scanned the archives of my facebook messages, I remembered something about myself. I found more girls than just Mallory. I would never have remembered if I hadn’t looked, but I had multiple girls that initiated conversation with me, flirted with me, and wanted to meet up and hang out over that summer...I blew all of them off. 

Notice the dates...I blew her off!

I don’t say that to brag, it’s just true. I can show you the messages. But I didn’t blow them off because I was some kind of stud that had tons of girls to choose from (not that that wasn’t true!! j/k). I blew them off for reasons… One girl was flirting with me rather persistently and I asked about her church. She said she was Catholic, and I blew her off. Another girl was telling me what she’d done over the weekend and she said she’d spent some time partying, so I didn’t message her back. I’d decided that I was gonna wait till I found a righteous girl that God wanted me to be with. I’d learned the hard way, in high school, about jumping ahead of God to the best available girl instead of waiting for the best girl, and I made up my mind not to do that anymore. I don’t think Mallory included this in her story, but she had several eligible suitors during her senior year and freshman summer. She blew all of the off. I blew those girls off because I was waiting for Mallory, and I didn’t even know it. I blew her off because I didn’t know she was who I was waiting for.

All my life I’d been waiting for her, now we are waiting for June 23, 2012 together.

The Love Story By Mallory.

Every Spring the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal publishes a section of the paper dedicated to special honor graduates from the local high schools: the valedictorians, salutatorians, STAR students, class presidents, and so on. That section of the paper is set up in a way where the students, with their carefully written awards lists and future plans paragraph, are sectioned off by counties. Pontotoc County students are together, Union County students are together, Chickasaw, Monroe, Itawamba, and Lee County are all sectioned of in neat little groups. It just so happened that in May of 2006 Mallory Whitehead was named valedictorian of Shannon High School and Jeremy Haynes was named STAR student of Mooreville. In that black and white thin paper sheet that I'm sure both of our mothers still have put up in some keepsake book, was the first time I laid eyes on him. We were right there together, only about three inches apart.

I suppose I was in that post senior year arrogance where I thought I could take on the world, because he was so handsome that I added him on Facebook. I, being Miss Hospitable, sent him a message explaining who I was, why I added him, and congratulating him on his recent accomplishments. He, being always polite, responded with "Thank you, you too." My futile efforts to create a conversation with this handsome boy who likes fishing and football and whose life goal is to follow God's will for his life, literally ended with an unanswered question on my computer screen. What a jerk.

The following fall I, like nearly every other graduate in Northeast Mississippi, went to Itawamba Community College to continue my education. My first day of college was on a Tuesday. I took English Comp I and then college algebra. Wednesday was my first day of whatever that computer class was, Chem I and Dr. Lay's general biology class. Out of the five thousand or so ICC students, I cannot explain how or why it happened but by The Good Lord's sovereignty, but Jeremy and I were in the same General Biology I class. I have a memory like an elephant (Jeremy will laugh at that), but when sweet ole' Dr. Lay called the class roll the first day and I heard "Jeremy Haynes" I knew immediately that he was the boy from Mooreville who had ignored me on Facebook... and he looked just as cute as he had in the newspaper. After that class was lunch, where I happened to run in to him and Keon Poindexter on the sidewalk outside of the cafeteria. Concerning Keon, I often find myself saying, "Keon knows everyone!" I suppose he's always been that way, because he knew me from the state tennis tournament, where the prior April we had played card games together in the lobby of the hotel. Even though I was fairly confident back then, Keon broke the ice between Jeremy and I right there on that cracked sidewalk, which is where I first spoke to Jeremy in person. I still remember what he was wearing that day: his green Mooreville baseball t-shirt, which I later found out was his "chick-getting" shirt. I guess it worked, because within a week we were sitting next to each other, passing notes and batting eyelashes in biology class.

Things came incredibly naturally during the next months or so. We flirted, had our first date at the Fulton Burger King where I wrote his name in mustard, went the the first football game together, and rode a thousand loops around that community college campus. Eventually Jeremy mustered up the courage to take me on a date to the Tombigbee river bank one night. We sat on that Superman blanket and he sang Alan Jackson songs to me, and then he finally kissed me. We officially became boyfriend and girlfriend on October the second, and a month later he told me that he loved me. I would have told him sooner, but I think it's only proper to wait on the boy to say it first.

It really is a lovely story, how the two of us met and all. If you know us at all, however, you know that we can argue with the best of them. Jeremy and I may be the two most stubborn people on God's green earth, so that has invoked many squabbles, and I'm sure there are many more to come. God made us just stubborn enough, though, to not give up on each other. Once, Jeremy told me that he didn't think we were going to work out and that he was going to break up with me. I told him that I didn't believe him, and after about five minutes of sitting on my front steps and neither one of us saying a word, I guess I confused him enough to stick around.

After dating for nearly five years, Jeremy decided to ask me to marry him last July. I knew that it was coming because Jeremy is a terrible liar and not so great at hiding surprises. He got on one knee at the bench  on the southeast corner of the Lee County courthouse, and I said yes... after I asked him why I should marry him. I admit, that was a mean, dirty line to say to a man on one knee with a diamond ring in his hand. I still don't know why he thinks I should marry him, but I said yes anyway.

He's my best friend. I really have loved him since before that one month anniversary. He makes me think and he holds me accountable for what I think. He thinks I'm the most special thing ever created. God made us both peculiar enough to not only deal with each other's peculiarities but build on them. Every time that I see "56" or something to do with fishing or football, I think about his sweet self. I tell him everything that makes me laugh or makes me mad. Even if for some reason he left me now, he would leave me better than he found me.

In a few weeks they are going to print our engagement picture in the Sunday issue of the Daily Journal. I'm sure that our moms will cut out the black and white picture printed on the thin paper, and put it in a keepsake book somewhere. So I guess that brings this story full circle. 

Wedding Braces.

It's no secret that I've gotten braces for the wedding. I suppose adult orthodontics can be a sore subject for some, but I think my braces are legit. 

I'm pretty sure that I could have bought a small car with the money I've spent on my teeth. 

I had my wisdom teeth taken out in May.

And since then...

I've been to the dentist a lot.

A whole lot.

Did I mention that I make regular dentist visits?

Had a lot of dental work.

Finally got all of the dental work completed and on Valentine's Day, 

got the tin grin.

Last picture with crooked teeth.

Legit.

The teeth are surprisingly straight already. I really don't understand orthodontics at all. They clip metal wire to your teeth, and somehow the teeth magically know where to go. 

For the first two weeks I ate mashed potatoes and complained a lot. 

They feel a lot better now, though. 

Jeremy thinks they are cute, and tells me when I get spinach stuck in them. Sweet boy. 

The plan is to have them removed for the wedding and then put back on afterwards. 

Worth it. 

Megan Whitehead.

What to write about my sister? My twin sister. It just so happens that today is our 24th birthday. I didn't intend for that to happen in the beginning, but it does kind of make this post a little special. I've always known that Megan would be my maid of honor. I mean, really, the twin sister is a shoe in. When we were little, we would get in childish spouts and oust eachother from the position, but that never stuck for long. So here we are, grown ups and being the "of honor"s in each other's weddings this summer. We obviously met in the womb of Mae Whitehead. We are identical twins born one minute apart in the grand ole year of 1988.

We really have done everything together. Went to nursery together, started school together, graduated together, went to college together, and now are planning weddings together.  When we started kindergarten my mom took us to the school on the first day to introduce us to the teacher. Instead of Megan and I being upset, my mom was the one that left the school crying. That's pretty much how life has gone. I've never been afraid of much of anything because I've always had a partner in crime to go with me. Megan has seen the good, the bad, and the real real ugly. She's been there through all the crushes on the good lookin' high school boys, the first boyfriends that you didn't speak to except when you invited them to our birthday party, the first love, and the horrible break up that that ended with, and of course my college years with Jeremy.

A question that everyone in the world ask twins about their boyfriends: "Have y'all every switched places on 'em?!" Well… I can tell you a little story about that. Jeremy and I started dating in the fall of my freshman year at ICC. One weekend Megan and I were home in Shannon, and he was at his house in Mooreville. I must have been getting ready to go out that night, because when he called I told Megan to just answer the phone. Before she could get out that she was Megan instead of Mallory, Jeremy starts in a romantic speech… "I'm in the middle of a field watching the sunset, and I wish you were here…" Of course Megan burst into laughter, tells me what Jeremy said, and then we both burst into laughter. That is the only time that Jeremy Haynes has got mad and hung up the phone on me. So technically, we have never switch places on our boyfriends, but there are occasional misshaps that are bound to happen with two people that look and sound just alike.
Another question is how in tarnation are we going to split all of the piles of stuff that we have shared for our entire lives? Clothes, shoes, the hair straightener, television, movies, socks, underwear, a crock-pot, the metal chicken... (Yes, we share underwear. I've really not ever thought that as being weird. They are clean, and it would be incredibly troublesome to separate them from the dryer after they were washed. Do you know what all of your underwear looks like?) The solution is a NFL style draft that will take place closer to time. We're just going to have to take turns picking from the pile like grown women. This is the only solution that we could think of that would be more civilized than a legal divorce. (I feel a post about The Draft coming on later.)

Megan has been my rock throughout most of my life. She's steady, and up until now, I always knew that she would be there when I experienced new surroundings. I suppose she'll still be there in a sense that we're both going to be newly weds at the same time, just 15 minutes down the road. People have asked me how I feel about Megan and Ben deciding to get married three weeks after Jeremy and me. Do I think she's stealing my thunder? Absolutely not. For Pete's sake, we share everything. We might as well share the wedding summer.

I will conclude this series of posts with a quote I got out of the Daily Journal from a set of twins from Oxford that wrote a book about being twins: 
"People will ask, 'What's it like being a twin? We don't know what it's like not the be. A lifelong gift, she's it. The greatest gift God gave me, she's it."

Brittney McPherson.

I suppose at 24 years old, not many people have friends that they went to kindergarten with. That's where Brittney and I met, I'm guessing. With most friendships, I can remember the first time we met each other, but my memory gets fuzzy about where us two met, like she's always been around. It's kind of like the memory you have of first meeting your grandmother or the first time you brushed your teeth. You don't have that memory because you've always known your grandmother and it seems like you've always brushed your teeth. Although after thinking about it, I guess you couldn't have brushed your teeth before you had them, so I guess you haven't always brushed your teeth. But what I'm trying to say is that the exact moment that we met is unclear. I believe that means that I have a good friend. We were both in Mrs. Christian's first grade class, and accomplished many life goals that year together... learning to read, to not absolutely have to take a nap during the day, and to walk down the hall in a straight line to the bathroom. We also had our first theatrical debut together with our 1st grade Peter Rabbit performance. Brittney acted out the role of Mother Rabbit while Megan and me were Peter's twin sisters (we were a shoe in) Floppsy and Mopsy. Embarrassing. I'm sure that we have many of the same life memories, because like Megan, Brittney and I have pretty much experienced many of the same things together.

 Elementary school came and went and we found ourselves in junior high where they gave us access to real live lockers and a great view of the good lookin' high school boys. Between the two of us, we've probably used twenty packs of wide rule notebook paper stuffing letters decorated with hand drawn stamps about those good lookin' high school boys in each other's lockers. The funny thing is that we drooled over the same boys, and didn't think that was strange at all. Some of my favorite junior high memories are from staying the night with Brittney when we watched the Scream trilogy and rolled half of the Brewer community's yards every October. Like Hillary, me and Brittney grew up in the same church and eventually in the same youth group. Like I said earlier in Hillary's story, that group of friends had a huge impact on my life, and I wouldn't take anything for those times. After high school, Brittney and Hillary tried to go down the unbeaten path to Northeast Community College instead of Itawamba, but they eventually saw the light. In the fall of 2009 we found ourselves both headed to Mississippi State, so naturally we paired up as roommates in Starkville. I can say one thing about Brittney if anything. She is a fantastic dishwasher. I had this weird thing about our Tony Lin dishwasher in Starkville where I didn't want anyone to use it because 1. It left food particles on the dishes like you hadn't even washed them and 2. It ran up our electric bill, and like all college students, money was sparse. Bless Brittney's heart, she humored my peculiarities and me and her washed I bet 95% of the dirty dishes in that apartment. Brittney is a fantastic friend. She's one of those friends that I know will always be my friend, even if we move to different ends of the country. We'd pick right back up like nothing ever happened. That's just the way she is.

Kelsey Crawford Russell.

When Kelsey got married, she hosted a bridesmaids brunch, and she gave us all sweet little handwritten notes that inspired these sweet little typed notes for my bridesmaids. (To give me a little cred, these were originally handwritten.) In my letter she wrote about how I had Maw Maw's sweet, easy-going spirit. That's funny, because I think Kelsey has the same sweet easy-going spirit. All of Maw Maw's grandkids do… at least until we are pushed. Then we get the temper that we've inherited from Mama and Aunt Celia  that they must have gotten from their dad. Like most cousins do, we spent many Saturday afternoons playing at our Maw Maw's house. There's a magnolia tree that's still there that was perfect for climbing. Brittany, Kelsey, Megan, and I would climb as high as we could get in that tree before our mamas started screaming at us. We carved the initials of whichever 3rd and 4th grade boy from Shannon and Pontotoc Elementary that we taught was the cutest at the time. Kelsey and John dated for a long time before getting married, but I'm not so sure that his initials are there. I'm positive that JRH is nowhere on that tree surrounded by hearts. The Good Lord knows that probably all of the boys who's initials I carved in that tree are either in jail now or have three or four illegitimate children. Kelsey's only a year older than me, so she was sort paved the road for me and Megan growing up. She broke Uncle Tommy into the idea of us little cousins having boyfriends so that he didn't pick at us too much, she let me know how high school was really like, and when she went to community college she let me and Megan get a taste of how it was by hosting us in her dorm room. That's what older cousins do, and she's a good one.