What happend to Tabitha Brown

Tabitha Brown on Her ‘Fairytale’ 20-Year Celebration with Husband Chance: ‘I Got the Happy Ending’

On March 11, the Fridays with Tab and Chance hosts marked 20 years of marriage with a photoshoot in their Los Angeles home

Tabitha Brown and her husband Chance are celebrating a marriage milestone their way.

On March 11, the Fridays with Tab and Chance hosts ditched the pressure of a vow renewal ceremony and instead celebrated 20 years of marriage with an intimate photo shoot in their Los Angeles home, PEOPLE can exclusively reveal.

“My husband said, ‘Honey, it started getting a little stressful trying to figure it out,’ and we realized, ‘Wait, we’re doing this for everyone else and not for us,'” Tabitha, 44, tells PEOPLE. “And us, we want simple things, [it] make us happy being together, traveling together, going somewhere we both enjoy, but also celebrating our love in a beautiful photo shoot and having that memory.”

Chance adds, “We realize that we have something special. It needs to be celebrated.”

For the actress and content creator, her favorite moment from that day was walking out in her wedding gown and seeing the look on her husband’s face: “It was almost like we were about to get married. We both kind of got emotional,” says Tabitha.

Adds Chance: “It was one of those where I did get emotional because of the couple of things going through my head. It was like, ‘Man, we made it this far.'”

The day of the shoot, the couple — whose anniversary is on April 19 — woke up early to get glammed for their big day, which included three extravagant wedding looks. They also recorded a podcast episode where they reflected on their original wedding day. Despite bad weather, the couple still had a wonderful time doing the shoot.

“It was better than what was planned and what we imagined, in my opinion, to know how far God has brought us. I mean, when we got married, we were not in a house like this. Let me just tell you, it was a very small home in Greensboro, North Carolina,” she says. “In our wildest dreams, we couldn’t have imagined 20 years later living the life we lived together. Not just madly in love, but we madly like each other too. And my husband is still my best friend. I texted him the other day , I was like, ‘I’m so happy to be doing this life with you.’ It’s such a blessing.”

Before choosing her gowns, Tabitha spoke to her stylist J. Bolin and said she knew she wanted a (vegan) feathered look. Before she knew it, what was originally supposed to be one gown turned into three.

“It was like a dream. I could have never afforded any of those dresses 20 years ago. When we got married 20 years ago, I was going to borrow a friend’s dress, but then me and my mama, we went shopping and we went to David’s Bridal. They had an outlet shop in Burlington, North Carolina, and they had this rack of dresses that were $99.

“Now to be able to have not one, but three to choose from and take these beautiful pictures, I was like, ‘Oh, wow, what a journey it has been for something like this.’ It was almost like a fairytale. I got the happy ending. I got the prince, I got the dress,” she says. Looking back on their marriage and the seasons that led them here, the couple has grown to appreciate new things about one another like never before. For Tabitha, it’s considering Chance turns his love for basketball into a non-profit to help children. For Chance, it was understanding her need to communicate: “I want to talk about everything now. Now it’s me,” he says with a laugh.