One Year

Erick surprised me with a weekend away for our first anniversary. Unbeknownst to me, he had already packed my bags (with all details down to the very last toiletry necessity) and cancelled all weekend events I had made for us by the time he picked me up from work two Fridays ago. My sweet husband whisked me away one weekend early to Springfield, Kentucky, where we spent a night at the lovely Maple Hill Manor bed and breakfast and played with alpacas, picked apples, and watched the sun set over deep green hills.

Needless to say, it was the perfect way to celebrate our one year landmark. The next weekend we visited a new cafe we discovered and spent the quiet afternoon reflecting on the Lord's goodness to us and all the things we learned and desire to grow in for our marriage. The reflection will continue, we concluded, as we want to constantly be thinking about what the Lord is/has been showing us, but we are thankful for this one year mark to pause and intentionally praise Him for His faithfulness in our life together. What an adventure it has been! A year marked with joy, challenge, forgiveness, grace and dependence on the Lord as we are continually being knit together as one.

All the little things about a coffee shop

When I choose a cafe to reflect and write in, I am committing to staying 3+ hours in a cafe abiding, writing and thinking about the most personal things. As a result, there are a lot of little factors about a cafe's environment that are important to me and that I notice. Things like lighting, design, table size, temperature, and little trinkets on the counters or on tables.. they all add up to an environment that can contribute to and nurture what I want to do there. An especially well-designed and inviting interior spurs on lots of creativity and excites me to stay and work longer.

Erick helped me decide which coffee shop to go to this week and his simple suggestion took me to one of my new favorite places! I wanted to go somewhere close by and somewhere new but it was hard to think of what would fall into these criteria since all the cute little coffee shops I looked up were all in downtown. We have a Heine Brothers coffee shop very close by (having a coffee shop in walking distance to your home is a beautiful thing), but we've frequented it so much that I wanted to try something new. Turns out, just a wee bit farther is another Heine Brothers with texture, design and open and airy space that resembles nothing like the one near our apartment. It has a personality of its own and I love it! There's something about interiors with light wood that gets me every time...

I spent a good 4 hours at this coffee shop, at a long wooden table near the front counter, looking out into the rest of the open cafe. The light, the colors, the cute clay mugs and pots of succulents near me, the whirr of the espresso machines, the light chatter- it was all so perfect. I left satisfied, humbled and convicted by the Word and with a few more pages of my journal filled with verses and reflections.

I'm not saying I need places like these for my devotional time or to write, but I am thankful for the way they give me joy and remind me to rejoice in Him for all the little things. :)

A little walk before dinner

Come, Spring

The weather here has been fairly all over the place and the only thing predictable about it is that it is unpredictable! Last Tuesday we had another surprise day of snow fall, which interrupted our continuous streak of 30 degree+ days the week prior. This snow quickly melted away by the late afternoon of the same day and the temperature has been slowly climbing back up again.Today the temperature hit the 60's, which is  so wonderfully warm and inviting after so many months of cold. There is a large group of daffodils planted near the entrance to our apartment complex that I have been watching every morning as I drive by on the way to work. They started to bloom early last weekend, drooped and shriveled the day it snowed, and today are in full, glorious bloom. I'm quite impressed by the little guys, their resistance to the cold and persistence in blooming despite the freezing temperatures makes me relieved and happy. I was so sad to see them start to wilt last Tuesday and so happy to see them pop right back up again today. Perhaps a small reflection of the life and hope in our Risen King, putting Death in its grave? :) I've heard so much talk about the gorgeous Spring season here that I'm rooting for the weather to finally settle down and the little flowers to come out. Come, Spring!

Erick and I decided to take a lovely 2.5 mile walk around Cherokee Park today! The park was highly recommended by friends and one even mentioned how beautiful the park looks in the Spring when the daffodils bloom. (Yes! I can't believe it either! It seems that daffodils grow in the wild here!) So we set off this afternoon looking for daffodils and other wildflowers, which, to our delight, were starting to cover the hills and creek beds! Pops of yellow everywhere in the midst of the dead leaves that hint at more life to come!

Lessons on Expectations

Sadly, Google Reader is on its way out, but Feedly has been my new blog feed organizer and I love it! It's visual, clean, and so fun to use. I do admit, having my reading organized in this new way does make me want to read more! :) This week I was so encouraged by a woman who wrote about her realization of the selfish expectations she had in her marriage. (Click here to read her post!)I was humbled as I realized that I also fall so perfectly into this same weakness and have had a blind eye to it for so long. It wasn't until marriage that I realized that I had so many expectations! My heart was deeply convicted and when I shared my new findings about my heart to Erick over dinner last night, a wide grin spread across his face. Erick has actually been trying to explain to me how difficult it can be when he feels like I have expectations he can't fulfill.Often times these expectations are not premeditated or even realized, but are exposed in our marriage when they aren't met. My sin creeps in when I allow disappointment to fester into bitterness. We both have expectations and we are learning that having them isn't necessarily wrong. Two different people with two different backgrounds, personalities, and ways of thinking are bound to run into many unmet expectations and misunderstandings. It is, however, wrong to let my disappointment set the standard of what is supposed to be objectively right and wrong in our relationship, and to set my husband up for failure when I have expectations that I never communicated or that end up being self-centered. We are learning that navigating through these different expectations requires much patience and grace. 

To take the woman's conclusion a little bit further, Erick and I came up with some additional conclusions of our own: I/we need to first examine to see if my/our expectations are good, neutral or selfish. If they are selfish or neutral, they may not be worth sharing at all and we need to repent. I/we also need to prepare my/our heart's response for when my/our expectations aren't met. In the emotion of disappointment, my natural and first desire is to have the expectation fulfilled for my own sake. Instead, I can seek to understand how Erick is expressing his love and service to me in his way, and be thankful. We can then decide together and communicate what serves one another. Erick lovingly shared that he really appreciates it when I tell him how I want to be served. In fact, it serves him greatly when I tell him, instead of having him having to play a game of "guess what Amy wants" because I want to be surprised. This also gives me opportunity to examine my expectations, share the ones that are good, and seek to set him up for success, and not for failure. Erick's job is not to fulfill my sinful desires and wants and he also can't read my mind! By God's grace we will grow in knowing each other and serving one another, fulfilling the right expectations, tossing out the bad ones and putting each other above ourselves, with God over all.

I'm so thankful for the blog posts I have been able to read from godly women who are daily relying on God's grace in the midst of their honest struggles! What a great demonstration of the body of Christ at work and the beauty of being encouraged by older women. There is such freedom in acknowledging weakness! Such freedom when  there is a God who saves.