Wednesday, June 9, 2010

8 Years and Counting... (Or should I say 16 years?)

Daisypath Anniversary tickers

My wonderful hubby and I celebrated 8 great years of marriage yesterday. We're working on a much longer history than that and, on August 23 this year, we will celebrate knowing each other for seventeen years. That means that I will have known my hubby for half of my life! Quite a landmark, isn't it?

I've been thinking about the unique little world that marriage creates. There are things that my husband and I enjoy, find amusing, think alike on, know about, have experienced, and so forth that no other 2 people in the world can share. Pretty neat, isn't it, when you think about your unique life as a couple? In honor of our 8 years of married life, here's a list of 8 things we have in common--when you take the list as a whole, you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone else who shares all 8. I'm writing this off the top of my head--I'm sure I've left things out! I need hardly state, I hope, that we love each other and share that!

(In no particular order)
1. Our faith

2. Our families and our children: the 3 musketeers (and our first "children"--2 large, lovable labs)

3. Our friends: Too many to list! But they range from folks we've known most of our lives and their spouses (Ken and Melanie, Kevin and Betsy, Leah and Norman, and so on) to folks we met in college (like Todd and Liz, Andy and Lynn, Dave and Meadow, Sarah, Kathy and Brian, Heather and Mark, Heather, and so on) to new friends (Todd and Karen, Philip and Bridgette, Curt and Sara, Lief and Stephanie, Lisa and Jonathan, and so on)

4. Our quirky TV interests: Monarch of the Glen, Corner Gas, Ballykissangel, Hamish Macbeth, the new Doctor Who, Big Bang Theory, Chuck, Hidden Hills (a nice little sitcom that aired the first year we were married), Psych, The Office, and so on.

5. Our varied musical loves: everything from Rachmaninoff, Bach, Joplin, Gershwin, Dvorak, Debussy to U2, Eddie from Ohio, Alison Krauss, Wynton Marsalis, etc. (too many to list, really)

6. Our trips: Outer Banks, Grand Canyon and related parks, San Francisco, Biltmore/Asheville, Charleston, Greenville, Memphis, Delaware, and others.

7. Our trials: (these really bring you together, don't they?!) Things like grad school, tough jobs, sickness, multiples (as in twins), budgeting, moving, deaths in our families, etc.

8. Our joys: (so many common interests) Hiking, gardening, culinary experiences (especially ethnic and/or regionally interesting), discussing religious/ethical/intellectual issues, good music, cooking, education, Scotland and all things related, Hobnobs, travel, being out in nature, museums, games (board- and card-), homemade blackberry jam, .... this list could go on and on and on.




What is unique about your little world of marriage?

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

Screen-Free Summer!

We're off to a great start for our screen-free summer: my kids are watching Super Why on the TV while I type up a blog post. So much for TV- and Computer-free summer starting June 1st, right?

I was without phone/internet for a few days last week and didn't have a chance to finish this over the weekend. So, I opted for one more morning in front of media screens. But this is it! Our rules for this summer ("our" being the kids and me during the day):
  • email checking in the morning only
  • no blog surfing, recipe surfing, blog reading, blog posting, web surfing,....
  • business transactions allowed (we bank online, do library stuff online, etc.)
  • TV will be an event in which all will participate, not an activity to keep kids occupied while Mommy cleans up the kitchen, types a blog post (ahem...), or other worthwhile pursuits
  • some blog maintenance will be done (indexes updated and so forth; if you subscribe, you may receive these updated indexes.... I don't know).
I hope everyone who reads this little blog of ours has a wonderful summer. Carrie may post some things (and there are a few posts of mine still in draft form that I may get around to), but it will most likely be pretty "quiet" on the teapot. Check back once a month or so. Maybe we'll get enough free time come August (ha ha ha ha ha... nearly spit my tea out on that one) to post on a more regular basis.

In the meantime, I encourage everyone to get back to the basics this summer with your family. A friend of mine and I are studying the Westminster Confession of Faith together (we're such nerds, aren't we!?), and it's been a rich, rich study of the fundamentals of the Reformed faith I claim to believe. I'm enjoying working through the Children's Catechism with my children. We've been learning the great memory verses on Steve Green's Hide 'Em in Your Heart CD's and learning some of the older Bible songs that I learned as a kid ("Joy, Joy, Joy Down in my Heart" anyone? How about "I am a C-" or "Deep and Wide" or "The B-I-B-L-E"?). We've also been spending some great family time eating ice cream (in a cone!) on the back porch, singing while my husband plays the piano (in the midst of his vast, beautiful repertoire of Rachmaninoff, Debussy, Gershwin, Joplin, Bach, Beethoven, etc., he plays a great "Jesus Loves Me"), and going on walks/hikes together (sometimes we even take our 100-pound laboradors!).