365:220 - silhouette

365:220

My husband's silhouette.

{iPhone photo}

(8.8.14)

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365:215 - my love and promises.

365:215

This is my husband and I love him. He's mine and God brought us together for amazing things! 

This night, the boys had gone to bed and we were admiring the dark blue sky painted with a beautiful promise from God. The rainbow was bold and  bright and I stood in amazement! "God's promise," I kept saying out loud. 

As I reflected on God's promise to never again cut off all flesh by the waters of the flood, I began to think of all the other promises that He has given to us in His Word. Promises like, 

“I will never leave you nor forsake you.” Hebrews 13:5

and

"No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it." 1 Corinthians 10:13

and

"Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God." Romans 5:9

I could go on and on. The Bible is so rich and deep and full of God's promises to those who love Him. 

Ok, back to my love. God has brought us together and has promised to continue working in us for His good pleasure and to complete the work that He has begun in us (Phil. 1:6). Marriage is not always a walk in the park, but I am thankful that God gave Joshua to me and me to Joshua to walk through this life together. I'm thankful for Joshua's heart to serve and love others. I'm thankful for his strong leadership and sense of conviction. I'm thankful for his tender-heartedness and his boldness for truth. I'm thankful for his love for family and raising strong men. I'm thankful that he is handy and that he is kind. I'm thankful that he is thoughtful. I'm thankful that he is a hard worker and that he provides well. I'm thankful for his promise to me to love me through thick and thin, sickness and health, submission and strong willededness (not a word, but it's obvious what I mean), happy times and stressful times. This guy really is the real deal. I'm blessed.

(8.03.14)

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365:89 - husband

365:89

Caught the perfect shot of my husband enjoying a bowl of cereal and the beautiful weather :) Here's also a picture of Joshua sharing his tea with Benjamin!

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365:45 - Valentine's Day

365:45

Last night, we celebrated our 6th Valentine's Day together, the 5th one celebrated at P.F. Chang's! It has become our Valentine's Day tradition and we look forward to it every year! 

Joshua surprised me after work with a dozen roses :)

On the way to our dinner, we listened to the Wicked soundtrack! One of our first dates was to go see the Broadway musical and we have always loved listening to the music in the car. It brought back lots of fun memories :)

We got the 4 course meal for two! So much food that we both brought half of our meal home!

We enjoyed dinner and then headed to IKEA to pick up some things for our little home! We had a great time walking around without the pressure of our kiddos ;) We are SO grateful for the generosity of the Lotz family, Tammy Adrian, and Becky Buck for watching all our kids while we enjoyed a great night out!

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Fourth Anniversary!

WOWZAS! It's been 2 months since I posted!! However our lives have been jam-packed with great blessings! 

The biggest blessing that we've celebrated was our FOURTH ANNIVERSARY! We didn't have anything extravagant planned, especially because Samuel became sick a couple days before our anniversary. Knowing that we really wanted to celebrate, we enlisted a couple sweet friends to come over and hang out at our house while the boys slept so that we could go out for a little celebrating!

So Jessica and Mark Stucky gladly came over for pizza and alone time while we ventured to my very favorite restaurant of all time: STONEFIRE GRILL!!!!

We didn't actually get a picture together, but we took some of each other :) Love him.

This is to represent our child-free anniversary date ;) What's funny is that by the end of the date, we were both missing our awesome boys! We truly are so blessed by God.

Again, my FAVORITE! We both weren't STARVING so we just got a small salad and breadsticks to share! We left stuffed and satisfied. 

One of the best things about Stonefire is their BBQ sauce! We love it on everything :) This picture was Joshua's idea! I LOVE IT. I love the food, I love the sauce, I love the # of years God has faithfully blessed us, and I LOVE the hands and wedding band :)

After dinner, we were going to go to BJ's for a Pazookie but we just got so tired after roaming the mall a bit and decided to go home. It was great because then we got to fellowship with our dear friends for a while!

Thankful for four years married to the best husband in the world!

Here's the song that I walked down the aisle to. We still listen to it and marvel at God's faithfulness to us! 

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Think and Pray

Shalom!

What a good weekend! It started off with some good ol' Chick-fil-a on Friday with our "Buy a drink and fries, get a free sandwich" coupon, continued with some productivity towards school, followed by a great sermon at church about the story of Joseph and how his life points to the life of Jesus... All of this after a big ol' healthy helping of humble pie! {{sigh}} 

Humble pie.

No, but really. God has been doing some major renovations in this heart of mine! I am beyond thankful, though, for my wonderful husband who loves me enough to let me relax while he prepares a big slice of my favorite (well...) dessert. Joshua has been used numerous times to point out areas in my life that do not reflect biblical womanhood, let alone Christ-likeness, very well.

Well, this week's humble pie flavor was (drum roll, please)........... self-control, the tongue, and thoughtfulness! Yum!

After a series of events and responses, we pin-pointed something in my heart that needs some serious heart-makeover! Many places in Scripture, God exhorts believers to guard their tongues, hearts, and minds. In essence, He calls them to exercise self-control in all areas of life. Here are a few general examples of this command:

"...train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled." Titus 2:4-5

"...for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control." 2 Timothy 1:7

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law." Galatians 5:22-23

"A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls." Proverbs 25:28

There are others that I could mention, but these get the idea across that God wants us to be self-controlled. Period.

God has told us to be self-controlled, but He has also been pretty specific about a few areas that He desires us to have self-control in. Two areas in particular are our tongues and our emotions.

Here is where God is making it very clear that I'm not nearly as sanctified as I ought to be. But praise be to Him that He is a God who works in the hearts of those He loves. {{sigh}} 

I'm pretty quick to say what I'm thinking. I'm also pretty opinionated. Oh and I often wear my heart on my sleeve. All things that can get me into some serious trouble. After realizing that these are not fitting for a 26 year old wife and momma seeking to reflect redemption and biblical womanhood, I said, "well, how in the world am I supposed to change??" (So much for getting an MABC, huh? ;)) 

My precious husband is pretty much the greatest biblical counselor I know, just sayin'. He lead me straight to Scripture to help me better understand God's heart in this matter and how I can change for His glory. Here are some of the passages Joshua brought to my attention:

"When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly..." 1 Peter 2:23


"...let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious." 1 Peter 3:4

"The heart of the righteous ponders how to answer, but the mouth of the wicked pours out evil things." Proverbs 15:28


"But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh...If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit." Galatians 5:16, 25

What God taught me (and is still teaching me) is that I need to do a lot more thinking and a TON more praying before I open this trap of mine! When I am walking in the Spirit, I am better able to ponder how to respond to the circumstances I face and am better able to cultivate a spirit of kindness and gentleness to those God places in my life. If I am Spirit-filled and not walking in the flesh, my responses should begin to look more like Christ's than my old self. Jesus, my perfect example of self-control and Spirit-filled living, died a sinner's death for ME, never once shouting His opinion, arguing for His rights, or responding in foolishness. I really, really, really want to be more like my Lord! I want my responses to all things to be an outflow of my thankfulness for all that God is and all that He has done!

May God make me this kind of woman: She opens her mouth with wisdom, and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. Proverbs 31:26

Here's a picture of my precious family:

My loves.

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