Having recently celebratedtheir one-year wedding anniversaryon May 12,Bringing Up BatesstarLawson Batesand actress Tiffany Espensen currently find themselves enjoying the bliss that comes with being a newlywed.
There has just been one problem.
“Don’t ever put together furniture … together,” confesses Bates, 30, with a laugh during an interview with PEOPLE. “That was probably our biggest back-and-forth sort of thing so far.”
Certainly, it’s a snag in an otherwise sweet first year of marriage that had the couple traveling the world while also renovating a home in Nashville.
“The Lord opened up a great opportunity for us to buy a fixer-upper,” Bates explains. “We dideverything. We pretty much ripped it down to the studs and added new floors, new roof, new siding, new windows, new kitchen, new master bedroom — all of that. We wouldn’t have been able to do it without a lot of help from my brothers and a lot of my family.”
Tiffany Espensen Bates and Lawson Bates.Isaiah Garrido
Isaiah Garrido
Indeed, Bates originally made a name for himself on the reality showBringing Up Bates, which followed the lives of him, his parents and Bates’ 18 siblings. But since the show wrapped in 2021, Bates has put all his attention onhis music careerand his relationship with Tiffany.
And with everything that these two have had going on as of late, it’s no surprise that neither of them can truly believe they have been married for one full year already.
“Marriage is one of those things you never can fully plan for,” says Bates, who first began dating Tiffany back in February 2021. “It’s been a rollercoaster. We feel like we’re still on our honeymoon to a degree. We have traveled so much in this first year, and that was one of our priorities. You’re only in that first year once.”
And since Bates says they “don’t have any kids yet,” they are taking advantage of the time they have together just the two of them. “We are getting to know each other more personally every day,” Bates explains. “I feel like there’s always new layers in marriage to discover. And in 40 years, hopefully it’s still as beautiful.”
It’s these ideals that Bates says he was reflecting on a little over a year ago, when he sat down to write his current single “Vows.”
“Writing ‘Vows’ meant so much more to me than just another country love song,” says Bates of the song he co-wrote alongside Adam Wheeler and performed a stripped-down version of during their ceremony last spring. “When I sat down to pen the perfect song for my wedding day, I wanted to truly encapsulate how I felt about committing to the love of my life and how I’d feel in that special moment as she walked down the aisle into our forever.”
Premiering exclusively on PEOPLE, the music video for “Vows” shows Tiffany walking through a multitude of doors, symbolizing the various moments that made up their wedding day.
“There was a very good chance we could have gotten stuck in the sand, but luckily we didn’t,” Bates says. “You’re going to have those life hiccups, but as long as you remember what your foundation is on, then I really believe that’s the key.”
source: people.com
