Our love story……..

HER SIDE:

When I first saw Burgess I was in psychology class and he was coming in late just as Ms. Wolfe-Rocca was reading his name off the roll. He caught my attention because first of all he had to reassure her his name was Burgess (strange name), and also he was a little funny looking. He was wearing jeans that were full of holes and 3 sizes too big. He was also wearing an over-sized ninja turtle t-shirt and of course Nike’s. Though he was very white he had a fro and it seemed his facial hair had no end and just continued right on down his chest. Not to mention he had the thickest uni-brow I’d ever seen in my life! My thoughts were “that kid seems interesting….”

Only a couple months after that my mom came home from a missionary coordination meeting and said that there was a young man in my high school who the missionaries were teaching and they felt he could use some friends around here who were also members of the church (Burgess was originally introduced to the church through some friends and a girlfriend back in Thailand). They had some suggestions of some guys in the ward but my mom was excited to tell me about him.

This was my last year in high school and for years I had been praying to have opportunities to share the gospel with someone in my school. I was studying the scriptures, I was trying to strengthen my testimony and praying everyday for missionary opportunities. So when my mom told me I was so excited because I instantly felt like he was the one that I had been praying for. I told my mom that I had a class with him but I had never talked to him before and that I would try to think up a way to talk to him. My mom mentioned that she thought the missionaries said something about him living in the Philippines and I could talk to him about Christer’s mission there. I thought that was a good idea, so I walked up to him after class one day and said, “So I heard that you used to live in the Philippines…” He said no, and was confused about why I would think that. It was a very awkward short conversation about traveling and Asia…and then it just kind of ended and that was that. Not very successful….

The Lord had showed me my weakness so I turned to Him. I told heavenly Father that I really felt the desire to share my testimony with Burgess and I really felt a connection to him. I told heavenly Father that I felt He had placed us in this place for a reason and I prayed and prayed and prayed for the opportunity to help him in any way that I could. I did a lot of pondering about it and I realized that we sit on opposite sides of the classroom and so there is never good opportunities to have a natural conversation. So I prayed for a seating arrangement for 2 months. I fast and prayed and the Lord heard my prayers.

One of the first days of second semester our teacher became very annoyed with the chatting in our class and announced that there would be a seating change. My heart instantly stopped. I was so excited and nervous. This was not only a chance to talk to Burgess but also to see if heavenly Father was really hearing my prayers. After some lecture about respect Ms. Wolfe-Rocca asked us all to get our stuff and go the front of the class. She said that we would all be seated in alphabetical order. This made me a little nervous because out names don’t match up that way. I just waited….it seemed like forever for her to get to me. Finally she announced, “Edwards, Coffield….” I was shocked. I couldn’t believe it. As she finished with everyone I realized that our of the whole class Burgess and I were the only two out of alphabetical order. I knew instantly that heavenly Father had heard my prayers and approved of my desires to share the gospel with Burgess.

Burgess and I became friends almost instantly. We talked through the whole class every time (didn’t really help Ms. Wolfe’s problem…). But outside of class we just stuck with our own friends and schedules until one February afternoon. I was taking my regular after school nap and randomly Burgess called and woke me up. He told me he wanted to go to Dairy Queen and wanted to know if I wanted to go with him. I of course said sure and he came and picked me up. (I didn’t ever give him my phone number or address…he tracked them down himself…he wanted me…) When we got in the car I told him to tell me his life story…and he did. He talked for 4 hours telling me all about his life. We had a great time and from that point on we were pretty much inseparable. We were together every minute we weren’t in school or working. We would talk about everything and anything.

After a while Burgess decided to start taking the missionary lessons again. This time he was a little more serious about it. He prayed and he read the Book of Mormon and came to know for himself that it was true. I never pushed him to read and followed up to see if he was praying or anything. If he had questions he knew he could ask and he knew I would give him my true feelings. He came to church for the first time which made me really nervous. It was testimony meeting. Afterwards I asked him what he thought and he said he loved it!!! Then my young women’s leader made us both come to young women’s, I thought we lost him during class when we were talking about the traits that we wanted in our eternal companions. But he really enjoyed young women’s too…mostly because he could write his girlfriend in Thailand and tell her he went to young women’s. I don’t think she believed him at first.

Burgess and I were just friends. He was determined to marry his girlfriend in Thailand and I was not interested in him at all in that way. The only problem was that our friendship grew deeper and deeper every single day. We were falling in love we just didn’t know it.

We didn’t realize it until after we graduated, Burgess was baptized and it was summer. Burgess was leaving to go on a mountain climbing trip with his dad and I did not know how to handle it. I just couldn’t imagine us not being together. Him being gone was really hard. I was starting to realize that my feelings for him were deeper than just friendship but I wasn’t ready for anything else. I didn’t want anything more. I just wanted us to be best friends forever and grow old together as best friends and die that way. At this time I was not attracted to him at all. I didn’t want him to be my boyfriend, but I didn’t want him to be anyone else’s boyfriend. I didn’t want to marry him, but I didn’t want to marry anyone else. I was all so strange. When he came back from his trip I felt like myself again and he told me that he had been feeling some of the same things.

I told Burgess that I didn’t think we should be afraid dating SOMEDAY, but that it wouldn’t be any time soon. He just said, “I’m ready when you are….”, that really freaked me out and I told him to take me home. Later on that night we got together with some friends to watch a movie and during the movie Burgess took my hand and held it. It felt completely normal, natural, OK. That really scared me! But Burgess has a way of calming me down. From that point on we both knew that we would be together forever.

We recognized that the Lord had brought us together and that our love and friendship was a gift from God. We knew we owed everything to the Lord and we promised each other that we would serve the Lord first and we trusted that the Lord would bring us together at the right time. Burgess left for the Missouri Independence Mission summer of 2004 and I came home from the Nebraska Omaha Mission summer of 2007.

I am so excited that Burgess and I are back together again and soon, we’ll never have to be apart ever again! I just love him more and more every single day! He is the best thing that has ever happened to me. He is my Christ-like example. I look up to him so much. I am so grateful everyday that he is willing to marry me. I love him so much, I can’t wait for him to be my husband!!!!

HIS SIDE:

Heavenly Father led me to Oregon before I even really knew who He was. I knew i had to move there my junior year, but by senior year i was doubting my decsion. Psychology class changed all that. I sat on the other side of the room from Amy and hadn’t noticed her much in the class. I had noticed she gave very insightful comments. Then one random day she stops me as we were leaving class and says, “You lived in the Phillipines right?” Which took me by surpirse since I had never been there in my life. I figured she meant Thailand, corrected her, and asked how she knew. I had been taking the discussions for a couple months and the missionaries had been looking for some fellowship and told Amy about me.

Amy told me she had always wanted to travel, and from then on we were the best of friends. I would talk to anyone about traveling. It didn’t hurt that this attractive girl wanted to talk to me either. I had been looking for any opportunity to try and hang out with Amy. So on February 11th, 2003, I invited her to Dairy Queen. She asked me all about my life, and we officially became friends on that day.

Our friendship grew leaps and bounds from there. Our Psychology teacher got upset at our class one day and gave us assigned seats. She must have been inspired because Amy sat right in front of me. We would talk and talk all through class. By this time i had also been taking the discussions at her house as well, so we saw each other all the time, we hung out everywhere. My highlights of our friendship was our trip at night into central Oregon to see the stars, our spontaneous drive to the beach, and our trip to see Alpacas so she could prove to me that they were real. And of course the highlight of them all, my baptism on June 29th, 2003.

Our relationship took the next step following a hiking trip my dad and took up Mt. Adams. The Hike was 2 days long, Amy and i hadn’t been apart for that long since we started being friends. On that trip we both had a lot of thinking to do. From our camp on Mt. Adams I could see where we looked at stars that one night. I realized how much i missed her. When I got back all i wanted to do was see her. Amy sat me down a couple days later and told me how she felt about the relationship I was in, and i said I felt the same way, that it was time to move on. We decided that me may start dating but we weren’t ready right then. That night… we were watching a movie and Amy came over to my couch, as we were snuggling I reached over and I touched her hand. I can’t tell you how long I had wanted to do that.

I was in Love with her from the beginning. She had a slight commitment problem that we had to over come, but we did and we grew so much through our relationship. Some highlights of our pre-mission relationship were our horse drawn carriage ride through the streets of Portland, our wonderful Labor day trip to Seattle, and a very Special New Years Day.

There was a Valentines Day weekend that was the ultimate highlight. Amy had been in Rexburg at BYU-Idaho. But she made the trip so Portland for the weekend. That Friday, we had dinner at a small Thai restaurant called Thai Kitchen in Beaverton. It was so romantic and the food was awesome. Next, we went to see the “Book of Mormon Movie” which was an embarrassing movie, but we snuggled. As we were leaving someone backed into our car. Which was typical, something crazy always happens to us. Our final event was seeing the movie “Big Fish” that was a great movie and I don’t know what it was about it but the spirit between Amy and I was very strong. We held hands through the whole thing, and when our eyes met we fell in Love again. I knew then Amy and I were meant for each other.

A few months past and it was time for our Missions. Me to Missouri and Amy to Nebraska. Close geographically, but our time was for the Lord for these three years, not for ourselves. A mission was important to both of us. I was so proud of Amy for serving. I knew it meant waiting another year after mine for her to come home, but she was born to spread the gospel, I wouldn’t have had it any other way. The waiting was painful at times. There were some days that all I wanted was her to be home.

All that waiting ended up being worth it. Amy came home on June 29th, 2007, four years to the date after I was baptized. She was so beautiful as a missionary, and I could never have been more proud of her, but at first it wasn’t the same between us. I’ll be honest I was a little worried. Patience seems to be the theme of our relationship, after Love and snuggling of course, after a date to see Oceans 13, a walk around the aviary in Kaysville, and a trip to strawberry reservoir where we had our second first kiss, we were us again. We were in Love, but still far apart. I was in Pittsburgh, she was in Kaysville.

Amy came to visit and we fell in love more. We knew after that visit we wanted to get married, but we had to fix the distance thing. We hadn’t lived in the same time zone since January of 2004, except the missions but that doesn’t count. So I made a hard and emotional decision to leave Pittsburgh right away and move to Utah. I packed up my car to the brim and drove the 28 or so hours so we could get married on December 29th, 2007.

I am in Love with Amy. I can say that our time together is most precious to me. She helped me gain a stronger testimony of the Savior. It is because of Him that we are together, He lead us here and keeps us together. She is the most beautiful woman in the whole world. I will always Love her and do what’s best for her and our family. By grace we found each other. By grace we will be together forever.

NOW:

We now live in Pennsylvania.  Burgess is pursuing his dream of becoming a filmmaker.  He is in film school at Temple University in Philadelphia.  He is also working very hard to support our growing family working full time in sales.  Speaking of a growing family, on March 7, 2009 we welcomed our first child into our family.  I am now at home full time running the home and taking care of Freddy.  I also plan on completely my degree in English/Writing while staying at home.  Fredrick Burgess Coffield is the greatest blessing of our marriage and we just can’t get enough of him.  We have been so blessed and know that the Lord is watching over our little family and taking care of us…..He always has and we know He always will.

More about the gospel of Jesus Christ……..

The gospel of Jesus Christ is what brought us together and it fills our lives with happiness and love. To learn more about the gospel of Jesus Christ simply post a comment and we will be happy to answer any questions you may have.  We can even introduce you to representatives from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who teach the gospel full time to anyone who is at all interested in learning. Another great way to learn is to visit www.mormon.org