Yeah baby yeah...

I am sharing the story of how we met with a Mom's club that I'm in so thought I would post it to the blog too. Here it is...how we became John & Julie Mitchell.


Austin Powers John Mitchell

Yeah baby, Yeah….

So, this is what John looked like when I first met him. (Not joking) Fake Billy bob teeth and all! We met at my brother and cousin’s get together up in Akron, which to John’s defense was a 70’s dress up party. He thought it would be a clever way to impress the females, and somehow it got my attention! My brother’s girlfriend, Heather and my husband John had been close friends for a long time before. I remember Heather talking to me about meeting John but there was NO way I was going to be “set up”. In fact I didn’t even WANT to go to this get together but my Dad was absolutely insisting that I go, which is weird since he never would normally press me to do something like that. Little did he know, he was pushing me to my future husband! (Now, I realize God may have had a hand in that) So, we all went out dressed up in 70’s gear to the local Border’s and then over to Steak & Shake to eat. I had been following John and his friends at the Borders because he was getting the most reaction from people (one older lady even asked him for his autograph because he looked like “Austin Powers”). When we drove over to the Steak & Shake our car was over crowded and somehow I had to sit on John’s lap! Once we arrived at the Steak & Shake I went over and sat with my brother and cousins at the opposite end of the table since I didn’t really know John or his friends. After eating (which John could hardly do since he had silly putty stuck all over his teeth) he came over and asked me if everything was alright- I guess he was afraid I had gotten offended since I had to sit on his lap in the car, I wasn’t at all, I just didn’t know him so didn’t think about sitting by him at the restaurant! After a weekend of what John believed I was thoroughly impressed and into him, and I not even knowing he was interested in me, he asked me for my email address.

Then the emails began….first several times a week, to every day, then to several times a day. My Dad had to go to Champagne, IL for a business trip and my Mom Penny and I planned to go along. I emailed John and told him my Dad was going to be traveling out there so maybe we could meet up. He called me that night before he read my email and we hardly spoke at all. He was thinking “we” were hopeless at this point if we couldn’t even keep a conversation going on the phone. I told him if he would just go check his email we might have something to talk about. Little did I know his computer was broke and so he had to drive all the way across town to check his email at his sister Amy’s, then drive back to call me! We decided to meet halfway between Champagne & Chicago and then he would take me back to Chicago with him and my Dad would pick me up later on. Back in Chicago John wow’d me with Chicago downtown, the Hancock Center tour, eating at Heaven on Seven, toy stores on Michigan Ave, then as we were walking to Navy Pier he grabbed my hand….10 month’s later, on Sept. 23, 2000 we said, “I do”.