Four years ago today, I walked down the aisle of a chapel. I said, “I do.” I exchanged rings with my fiance. I posed for wedding photos. I had a big celebration.

But I didn’t get married.

And yet, I consider December 4 my wedding anniversary.

Confused? Let me explain!

This is my real marriage story… one that (until now!) only some family and close friends know.

Steve and I, as I have discussed before, have known each other for a long time. He and my oldest brother were childhood friends. Here’s Steve, me and my brother in 1993, on my 13th birthday:

But we didn’t start dating until 2002, when I was 22.

When Steve asked me on our first date 6 years ago this month, he had been separated from his first wife for over a year. I knew, of course, about his first marriage. My brother had been his best man! But it didn’t work out, they had separated amicably, and that was that. They lived thousands of miles from each other, and had minimal contact.

But they were still married (technically).

Now, one thing I have learned about Steve in these past 6 years is that he’s a procrastinator. (It’s OK, I am, too.) So, we dated - and talked marriage - and time went by.

But he was still married (technically).

Maybe a year after we were dating, he finally started to put the formal divorce wheels in motion. Living in a different state from his ex-wife made things a little difficult and time-consuming, but at least things were moving forward.

And then on July 1, 2004, Steve proposed to me.

But he was still married (technically).

Both of us wanted a winter wedding. We love the holiday season, so we decided on a December wedding. We didn’t, however, want to wait a year and a half to get married. So we planned the wedding for that December - 4 months from our engagement.

Surely, Steve would be able to finalize his divorce in that time, right? Well… keep reading. I think you know where this is going.

Anyway, we started planning the wedding, which was kind of a whirlwind because we only had a short time period. Picking a date (December 4), then securing a chapel, a venue, a reverend, a caterer, a photographer, a trolley… Finding a wedding dress, picking bridesmaids’ dresses and a mother-of-the-bride dress for my mom… Getting tuxedos for Steve and the groomsmen… Ordering flowers, a wedding cake, favors… Sending out invitations, planning seating arrangements… Not to mention all of the last-minute details… As anyone who has planned a wedding knows, it’s quite a task.

Luckily, I had my mom to help me with it all. We covered everything “wedding.” Steve’s task? Get a divorce.

Around the middle of November, everything was set for the divorce - all the papers needed was a judge’s signature. Everything was falling into place! And then… we learned that getting that signature would take a few weeks. That’s right, a few weeks. In other words, mid-December. AFTER our wedding.

Good times.

Instead of calling off everything we’d planned so meticulously, we approached our reverend with an idea: What if we went through with the ceremony and the reception on December 4 as the “symbolic” celebration of our marriage, but “legally” got married after Steve’s divorce was final?

Fortunately, he was cool with that. We kept it between ourselves and our families, though, because we didn’t see the point in being, like, “Hey, 150 people who came to see us get married! This is all smoke and mirrors! Joke’s on you!”

Steve and I had our beautiful, symbolic wedding ceremony - and it was just a wonderful, wonderful day.

But he was still married to someone else (technically).

On December 16, Steve called me from school (he’s a teacher). His lawyer had called him - the divorce papers had been signed by the judge. He was free to marry me!

On December 27, we were about to head out of town for our honeymoon. We decided that it would probably make sense to get legally married before we went on honeymoon. (Well, that and Steve wanted to get married before the New Year so that we could file our taxes for 2004 as a married couple - he’s such a romantic!).

We headed down to City Hall that morning to apply for our marriage license - and find a Justice of the Peace who would marry us that day. While I filled out all the paperwork, Steve called down the list that City Hall had on file.

Finally, he found someone who was in the office that day (we had had a big snowstorm the night before, so many people weren’t at work) and agreed to marry us on the spot. We drove down to his office with my parents, and my brother and his wife met us there to act as our witnesses.

There was no big wedding dress. No wedding cake. No photographer. No music. No trolley. There weren’t 150 guests.

I was wearing a winter jacket, brown pants, Uggs - and a tiara. My flowers? A poinsettia from the Justice of the Peace’s office.

It was perfect.

And Steve was finally married to me.

Guess who else came to celebrate?

Yup, Ryder and Bismarck were in the car, ready to congratulate Daddy and Mommy when we came out as husband and wife.

And that’s why I celebrate my anniversary on December 4, but with an asterisk. How many people can say they got married twice in one month to the same man?