Happy Anniversary, my Love!!!

This post is dedicated to my incredible husband, Nate.

Today we are celebrating our first anniversary. Our year has gone faster than I ever expected. We've learned to love, we've fallen farther for each other, and we've shared experiences and have memories from our first year of marriage that can never be taken by anyone. That is something special. No one else in this entire world will have our memories, our inside jokes, and the understanding that we have for one another.

Nate has been a great teacher, a wonderful friend, and the best bed-buddy I could have ever asked for. :) This year I've learned more about myself than I thought possible. We agree that we've learned how selfish we really are, that it's hard to love sometimes, but that at the end of the day, crawling into bed with your best friend by your side is one of the greatest joys in life. We've grown in our culinary expertise (!) and experienced a few flops as well... (*cough*zucchinichips*cough*)

We've had a wonderful weekend with family. My parents came down and Nate's parents came up. We spent the day with my family and met up with Nate's side for a spot of shopping and supper at a Habachi grill. Most of us caught the flying shrimp- although, I did get two chances, and that's my only excuse for catching it. Our parents surprised us with a husker stone for our yard and we took some family photos with it. Charlie is especially fond, as you can see. We ate yummy cake- a replicate of our wedding cake by the same wonderful baker- mmmmm! Emily and Brian came over, and the night was a wonderful reminder of how incredibly blessed we are by our families.

Today was a great day. We started it off with pumpkin spice lattes and the Buffalo Run. (We didn't run, especially not after pumpkin spice lattes!) We watched my best friend run and she did great! You can see her waving in one of the photos- mid race. :)

We then stopped at my brother's house to see his newest basement remodeling project, visited with my parents who were still in town, and found ourselves in the Celebrate section of the newspaper! What a great suprise! Our parents are the best!!!

Breakfast at the golf course was next- and the weather couldn't have been better! The company couldn't have been better!!! We so enjoyed each other today- a pure joy and blessing for our hearts. We went to the movie, The Time Traveler's Wife, which wasn't as good as the book, but still pretty good.

So, we're blessed. We're thankful. And we look forward to the life ahead of us- together!

Still storming.

I'm really not trying to be Debbie Downer. But school is really overwhelming me right now. We have what seems like a MILLION meetings- and no time to catch up on classroom stuff. By the time I've sat through a meeting or two, cleaned up the room, and gathered my ducks to sit down to do some planning, it's 5 o'clock and my carpool is ready to roll. Eeesh...

So I'm bringing things home every night to work on and the frustration continues to build. I've been challenged by the sermon this last week at Berean- BC talked about how our society "lives for 5 o'clock and weekends". I don't want to do that- my calling is a 24 hour deal- at school, at home, in the car, on Monday morning, and on Saturday night. I don't get to decide when I'm going to live for the Kingdom and when I'm going to complain about "only 3 more hours" or "is it Friday yet?".

So, this post is honest. I'm frustrated and overwhelmed. This post is not written in defeat, however. I know this is my mission field and I'm excited about the challenge. I just hope God makes me a little stronger for this next season and gives me wisdom to work smarter not harder. (And a few more hours of planning time would be nice. :)

Take care, friends!

Storms and flowers

I love rain. Physical rain. Loud, fat, storming rain. Rain that invades my lungs and wakes my imagination. I love the inspiration I get from rain to be better; to love better; to create better.

This year I feel like it's raining in 1st grade. Although, not the wonderful, fresh fall or spring rains that I love. Here's an interesting and great metaphor that I received in an email today.

“little flowers never worry when the wind begins to blow…even little flowers know if it never, ever rains then they’d never, ever grow.” Sometimes as educators we may feel like we are facing storm after storm. As I learn and grow in this position, I am acutely aware storms are part of the job. But not the most important part, the rain is needed to harvest the positive outcomes.

It is ringing so true. I feel like this week has been a storm after storm after storm week. And I never open these "Lincoln educators" emails....but for some reason I did today. I'm glad I did. :) Keep growing, little Heather, keep growing!

Haiti

Here's a video my friend, Ben Welstead put together from a recent trip to Haiti. It's incredibly beautiful and should be shared with many hearts. Thank God for willing servants and compassionate hearts.

Projects!!

I never put up photos of our basement bathroom. This little half bath is off of the family room with the fireplace. When we moved in, the countertop was green, the floor was a linoleum white with green diamonds, and she had an angel boarder. NOT. OUR. STYLE. Here you can see some before/after shots. I think we've made a good improvement. :)

Before:

After (Clearly):

 

Here’s the old floor with newly painted walls and countertop:

New laminate wood floor. And a soft fluffy rug…

 

New shelf and things.  :)

 

We also want to give a shout-out to Papa Eigsti for all his help with the floor. And for Mama Eigsti helping me run to Home Depot for all the man needs. :)  We really appreciate your help!!!

And I hear the voice of many angels sing...

This summer has NOT turned out to be what I expected. I've found that too much time by myself is not good for me. I become restless. I fail more. I stop digging deeper. I forget to get together with friends. My soul sort of shrivels...and I become an uglier version of me. This is not a "woe-is-me" post. I'm just saying. Heather + lots of time alone = no good.

I'm not created to be by myself. I'm not created to have loads of time on my hands. When life is busy, I'm incredibly productive, organized, and I feel a heck of a lot better about myself.

This summer I have not run. Well, Charlie and I ran ONCE last week....and he tripped me a handful of times. Perhaps that's why we haven't been back out with the Sauconys. :)

The last few messages at church have really hit home for both Nate and I. They've been on worship, affliction, and the vengeance of God. To write a fraction of the movement of my heart on these topics would take hours. (And Nate's parents are on the way over, so I haven't got the time)- However, I can share a tiny bit. I grew up in a very conservative Jesus-loving church. But worship when I was young consisted of pews, hymnals, a pipe organ and verse after verse after verse. The words to these songs hadn't meant much to me until just recently. The idea that these old hymns could speak so loudly to my heart; to my life AT. THIS. VERY. MOMENT, even though they were written hundreds of years ago; that what I'm going through can be expected; that there will be disappointments; that not everyone will have similar convictions; that friends will disappoint and life will seem lonely at times; people will make bad choices; we WILL be persecuted; "Christian" friends will shock me; "secular" friends will shock me.....all these things, I hadn't really considered.

In short, I've found a new freedom in worship. And I'm pretty stinkin' excited about it! :)

They exist!!!!

Last week Nate heard lots of buzz at work about the "NEW COCONUT M&M'S!!!" For days we were on a search to find them. Hy-Vee, Super Saver, Target, Wal-Mart....nothing.

Then on Saturday, we stopped into a ghetto Walgreens and THERE THEY WERE!!!! They're pretty good. Nate liked them a lot. I liked them. I'd eat them again- but they're not as good as the Dark Chocolate Peanut M&Ms.




We had a really good weekend. Nate and I are finding in our first year of marriage that it's easy to get so wrapped up in home projects that we forget to spend time together- just the two of us- no projects. This weekend we didn't work on anything. We went to our friend, Mike's on Friday night for pizza and the movie, "Grand Torrino", which is a must-see. We shopped leisurely Saturday afternoon, enjoyed a fantastic service at Berean Saturday night, and had our slow Sunday morning with coffee, the newspaper, PJs, and french toast. We ended the weekend with "Big Brother" and the season finale of "America's Next Top Chef", and found ourselves under the moonlit sky on the deck last night with Charlie romping about in the yard. Life is good.