Celebrating one year since he and Joy-Anna Duggar first got together, Austin Forsyth is counting the many blessings in his life.
Courting, getting engaged, getting married and putting a baby inside her, to name a few. In a 12-month span! Putting in work!
In a sweet Instagram post on Thursday, the Counting On star, 23, shared a throwback photo of his wife to commemorate this anniversary.
Smiling with a bouquet of gorgeous orange flowers that he sent her a year ago, Joy could only imagine what the next year would hold.
“One year and a day ago I sent Joy these flowers while I was at flight school,” Austin said (in related news, he went to flight school).
“It’s amazing how life can change in just one year,” he added. “I am so blessed to have a wife that loves Jesus and me. #Godisgood.”
While the past 12 months have undoubtedly been a whirlwind, the twosome were friends for 15 years prior to entering into a courtship.
Joy-Anna, 19, first met Austin when his family moved to Arkansas and started attending the Duggars’ church when he was four!
Last fall, they confirmed their relationship was now courtship-level on a very special episode of Counting On: Jinger’s Wedding.
After a few months, the pair got engaged earlier this year and tied the knot in front of a church full of family and friends in May.
At the end of August, the excitement continued as Joy-Anna and Austin announced they are expecting their first child! Already!
“We’re so happy and thankful to announce that we’re expecting a baby!” Joy-Anna said. “Every child is such a precious gift from God.”
“I’m most looking forward to watching Austin as a dad and raising children together with him,” the mother-to-be said of Forsyth.
This joyous occasion has been marked by some controversy, however, thanks to photos of Joy-Anna Duggar’s baby bump …
More than few Duggar fans are convinced she got pregnant before marriage, given the fact that she got married 15 weeks ago tomorrow.
The image above, and the photo below, show a bump that some feel is unusually large for a girl barely out of her first trimester.
(That assumes the baby’s conception happened on the wedding night itself, too … not that this is out of the realm of possibility.)
All women “show” differently of course, and this wouldn’t typically be subject to intense debate, but these are the Duggars here.
Pre-wedding HUGS are frowned upon. Hugs.
Premarital sex, obviously, simply doesn’t happen, so the idea that Joy and Austin would partake in that is … well, it’s interesting.
Combined with recurring rumors about how Anna Duggar hates Austin, who she considers to be a bad influence of questionable character?
One can see how talk of Austin’s rebellious streak – and a possible shotgun wedding – got started after these pictures came out.
We don’t know that it happened and likely never will, but their history of breaking courtship rules is well documented as well.
Just saying. Food for thought.