Thankful Thanksgiving Weekend Recap

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! I must say that with the help from a few wonderful people in our family assisting us, we successfully hosted our first Thanksgiving! My husband cooked the most amazing Turkey I’ve ever had!  We bought a frozen turkey, thawed it, brined it, stuffed it, and roasted it in the bag. It was delicious. This brings me to my #18 item of thankfulness: my husband’s cooking skills! For those of you who don’t know this, Bryan is an amazing cook! I’m so blessed! When he was choosing what he wanted to do as a career, he was actually torn between nursing and culinary school. He chose nursing, which he is also very good at. His compassion for people makes him one of those nurses that you always hope you get when you go to the hospital. Nevertheless, his love for cooking and creating delicious concoctions still remains. In addition to the perfect turkey, he also made Pistachio Marzipans. Holy moly were they delicious!! Being the perfectionist he is, he said, “I think I can make those better next time…” I thought they were fantastic, but I heard “next time…” and so I figure it’s a win-win for me!

#19: Thanksgiving goodies. Does Thanksgiving not have the best foods or what? Thanksgiving is the one holiday feast that I don’t mind eating days after for leftover. Oh and I have eaten leftovers for days; this is no exaggeration.

#20: My personal favorite: sweet potatoes/ Yams. Any way shape or form, I just love this nutrient-packed super food! This year, we had two side dishes including these wonderful vegetables: sweet potato casserole and Yams with marshmallows and pineapple. Perhaps I love them so much because they are a side dish that taste like dessert!

#21: As you can probably tell our kitchen was busy and our oven full with preparation and cooking of dishes. I sure am thankful for the Market Day fundraiser that I purchased some pies from, because I was able to bake those in advanced! To my pleasant surprise, they were SO GOOD! I purchased an apple and a pumpkin pie. The apple pie, in particular, was the best I’ve ever had—no joke!

#22: After eating as much as I did, I am thankful for my Xbox Kinect because we had some fun burning some calories while playing Just Dance 3. Don’t knock it until you rock it, because it is harder than it looks! You don’t think it will be that difficult, but then a couple songs in you definitely start to break a sweat! Just Dance 4 just came out, anyone get it yet?

#23: After all the hype in prepping for the holiday and then the excitement /exhaustion of the day, some nice R&R was definitely deserved and needed. I am thankful for those much needed days of resting and relaxing with Bryan & Tiger watching episodes of Parenthood.

#24: In addition to the holiday weekend, we also attended my 10 year high school reunion. I must admit…I was nervous. I was nervous all day in fact. I didn’t know what it would be like. Would people be off in their cliques and ignore everyone else there? Would it feel like high school all over again, and not in a good way? I knew most of the people that I was really close to weren’t going to be there, so that high school fear of “not knowing anyone” came rushing back. The only difference is that I had my best friend by my side, my hubby. So despite my reservations, I put on my big girl pants and went. I am happy to say that I actually had a really great time! I got to see people I haven’t seen in forever, laugh with old friends about random silliness, and even talk to people that I was just acquaintances with. Either way I’m thankful that I had the opportunity to go. I’m thankful for the people you are able to pick up where you left off when you do see them. Lastly, I'm thankful that mostly everyone, whether we were great friends or merely acquaintances, was really nice and as excited as I was to see everyone!

#25: I’m thankful for the advent tree at church. Bryan and I have always wanted to give to kids for Christmas that wouldn’t otherwise have one. My church, like most churches, has an advent tree with hundreds of opportunities to give gifts to those in need. We are so grateful to be in the position to do this and for the opportunity!

#26: We are so thankful for our home! For all of the obvious reasons, we are blessed to have a home that is safe and warm. We are also so blessed to have a home where we can host family and friends! I thought of this as I was finding layers of clothes to wear to work because the heat never seems to work in my classroom. I have to layer up my sweaters and sometimes wear gloves, boots, and my coat while I teach, or sit with a blanket while at my desk. It is THAT cold. This makes me soooo thankful to have a warm roof over my head!

Love Dare

Bryan and I have started a new couples’ devotional to help focus our bible study time together. It’s titled Love Dare and it actually stems from the movie Fireproof, which we used to watch often during our courtship. For one of our past Valentine’s Days, two years ago I believe, he bought me this devotional and said this is for when we’re married. :) I just loved it. It made my heart fill with joy to know that I had a man that loved God, wanted Him to be the foundation of our marriage relationship & our future family and also that he was going to be my spiritual leader. To now see it in action is truly a blessing. I feel God’s love and guidance through my marriage and it’s such a wonderful, exciting, joyful, and inspiring feeling. 

This theme of God’s love never failing has been on repeat in my life. It has been resurfacing itself everywhere I turn. In bible study a couple weeks ago, we were discussing 1 Corinthians 13: 4-7. 

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

In that discussion my friend mentioned that a good way to look at 1 Corinthians 13 is to replace “Love” or “it” with your name. I didn’t do it in that moment, but it stuck with me. 

As I was driving to church the other week the song “Your Love Never Fails” sung by Jesus Culture came on the radio and literally brought tears to my eyes. The lyrics talk about how God is always there, He always loves, always doing everything to the good of those who love Him! I have been relentlessly praying for God to bless us with a child. We’ve had our share of peaks and valleys when it comes to this and it turns out that getting pregnant is not as easy as they make it sound on TV/movies. In the midst of feeling that despair, I hear that song on the radio. Then I get to church and I heard it again! Then I decided to go to a prayer night at my aunt’s church to receive prayer and that song came on as background music just before I was going to receive prayer! Wow, I heard God in that moment. He was reminding me that His love never fails and that all things will work together for my good. One of the lyrics to the song says, “There may be pain in the night, but joy comes in the morning…” This reminded me that this time isn’t going to last forever. I may feel anguish for the struggles we’ve had in conceiving, but in God’s timing joy will come in the morning. We will conceive and this struggle will be something of the past; we will experience the joy after the pain.  

Isn’t God’s love amazing?!

Now this brings me back to Love Dare. This past week’s study, challenge, and prayer that the book has us doing together is asking God to teach us what real love is and help us to love each other in that way. Then, get this, the book instructed us to read 1 Corinthians 13: 4-7 and replace the words “love” and “it”. This time I was hearing God loud and clear. We went ahead and did it and Bryan just said “wow”. My thoughts were saying the same thing. How perfect is God’s love and imperfect is ours, but yet we’re perfected through God’s love. Wow.

You’re probably seeing my theme, but not really understanding what it all means. What is God trying to show me? I wondered the same thing for a while and I’m not sure I could even vocalize it until now. God wants me to know that He loves me and He hears my prayers. He has it all figured out and it will all come together in His perfect timing. Until then, I need to focus on what I can focus on. I think he’s trying to have me focus on loving like He does. Certainly this is a characteristic that is mandatory of parents and I’m sure is challenging in parenthood. Not that parents don’t always love their kids, because they certainly do, but 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 goes further than that! Like the parts about patience, not being easily angered, keeping no record of wrongs, not be self-seeking, not be envious, or boastful---Wow! I don’t know about you all, but I am certainly not a pro at all of this! However, I can see that all of these characteristics are so important to have as a husband/wife and a parent. 

Well God, I hear you. Not in an audible voice booming down from the heavens, but in my heart and my life I just feel you moving. Thank you for revealing yourself to me. I see the areas where you desire for me to grow, so that Bryan and I can be the best parents we can be. More importantly, so that we can show Christ-like love to our children and disciple them to love you like we do.

If you feel compelled, feel free to pray for us. If anyone desires prayer in return, please let me know. I would love to pray for you too!

Check out this song! It has been such an inspiration to me lately.

Man of a Thousand Hobbies

My husband is a man of at least one thousand hobbies. Whenever I turn around, I think he acquires another hobby. He has more energy than any person I know and somehow finds time to participate in each hobby he has. As much as I tease him about this characteristic, it is also a characteristic that I know will make him an amazing dad one day. He is the epitome of  a "jack of all trades". Bryan's hobbies range on quite a broad spectrum: exercising, running, bicycling, motorcycles, guns, hunting, fishing, golf, cooking, computers, gaming, making wine, guitar, making music, and his latest...home brewing. Here's Bryan enjoying a few of his many hobbies.

Bryan after getting 2nd place in a 5k

Bryan on his Suzuki

Shooting at the Cabin

Enjoying one of his many tech gadgets

Bicycling

and Cooking one of his many delicious recipes

Keeping up with all of these hobbies can sometimes make my head spin! I do my best to keep up and to encourage his endeavors, which brings me to what I came home to today...home brewing in action.

I couldn't even begin to describe to you the process of what the heck he was doing, but he was pretty excited about it and whenever he tells another guy about it, a very enthralled discussion is sure to follow. The talk of hops, cascades, fermenting, and siphoning is far over my head.

I suppose a part of me is a little jealous of his many hobbies and all that he's really good at! I mean I have SOME hobbies like reading, shopping, taking pictures (even though I don't know how to be artistic with it, I just like to), decorating, and now blogging! And as far as his one thousand, I do try to participate in most of Bryan's hobbies which is fun for us both.

Do any of you ladies out there have any fun hobbies that you recommend? Or does anyone have husbands/boyfriends that are men of a thousand hobbies like mine?

I know one thing for sure, Bryan has opened my eyes to so many wonderful and exciting things. Life with my hubby is never a dull one! Just one of the thousands of reasons I love him so much! :)

Us after running a 5k together :)