On Husbands

Mine has been working third shift for the past two weeks. 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. and its the opposite of fun. He volunteered for this shift and is happy to be there for the men that work that shift for their livelihood, not as a 2 week project.

He's a man's man and a woman's man. He's an everyone's man. Today he washed dishes (by hand because our dishwasher's broken), vacuumed, and scrubbed our shower cleaner than it's ever been. After having breakfast with and playing frisbee golf with his newest guy pal.

He has become the definition of husband in less than 2 years and I'm left wondering if I've grown into half the wife equivalent. I never love him more than when I go to him and say "we are out of bird seed again." for the third time this month Just knowing the response will be "They're eating better than we are" or "They can go hungry for a while" but no, he says "We'll have to get them some more then won't we?" That's all it takes to make me weak at the knees.

While considering going on a mission trip together we got the news today that it's too long of a trip for him to take off work. But he didn't flinch when telling me that he thinks I'm supposed to go and that we will raise the money no problem. When I say "What if I bring back a baby?" He replies "We would figure it out, it would be fun." And he means it. He wouldn't be surprised or even flinch. He knows how to deal with me better than I know how to deal with myself.

I couldn't come up with an idea to pitch to him that he would dismiss. It's much more likely that I would talk myself out of something I want than to think that he would. He builds me up and keeps me grounded at the same time.

I hope yours lifts you up, hears you out and loves you unconditionally. I hope he loves the things you love and makes your days brighter. I hope he enjoys your company and is content in your presence. If you have it, you are blessed. We are a lucky bunch!

And they'll know we are Christians by our love

Remember that song? My husband claims to have never heard it. And I had forgotten it until I read it as a bit of a sarcastic comment regarding a judgemental post by an evangelist recently.

This week my husband described a sin he struggles with as a bear on the other side of the fence at all times. You have to make sure that you keep the gate of the fence locked and secured. Always. My struggle throughout my Christian walk has been gossip and passing judgement. It is the bear on the other side of my fence.

For years people knew I was a Christian because I said so if they knew at all or because I had a poor opinion of you if you weren't. Did anyone know I was a Christian because of the love I showed them? Prolly not.

 When asked to answer what God had delivered me from this week at small group I'm hesitant to say I've been delivered from this bear.

Overall, God has brought me leaps and bounds in how I treat and love new people I meet. I've become great at finding the good in people But it's those people in my past, people who the old me judged and talked about for years. The ones whose dirty laundry I knew and the ones who know mine. It was my defense mechanism I suppose.

And if I'm honest, the bear on the other side of my fence isn't a little cub. He's a big ass grizzly. He knows how to have sweet eyes to entice me over and look all cute. He knows the names of the people who, when brought up I'm likely to tense up and have a snappy comment about.

So I'm working on it. God is helping me build a higher fence and a more secure gate. But I know this bear will be there as long as I am here. He will not go away and just when I get comfortable enough to let my guard down he will show up, hungry.

I'm working on finding the good in those people that I think may not have much. Because God found it in me when there was next to none. I hope He's helping people to know I am His by the love I show.

A Grocery Tale

Yesterday was one of those imperfectly perfect evenings. Drew and I were both home before 5. We took our little lion man and went for a walk down the middle of our curvy country road and would step into the grass when cars whizzed past.

We talked about the future and turned around when the sunshine ran out. We went to the grocery store in our sweats and I'm embarrassed to say how much we spent.

While we do love fruit, this is a more accurate portrayal of what we buy at the grocery:

We are always pooped by the time we finish at the store (we only shop once a month) so we grabbed some sushi and headed home. On the car-ride home Drew's face lit up "We can eat our sushi in the bathtub." And so sushi in the bathtub it was. Sometimes our life makes me giggle...

We also decided while at the store that we want to become tea drinkers neither of us have had tea before so we bought 2 kinds of tea  After our sushi bath, we fixed our tea and "steeped" it as best we knew how.

We were both feeling fancy and British as we sat down in our jammers to sip tea before bed.

Then as we sipped it, we realized it just tastes like warm water. And we were sad.

Dear tea-drinkers, please tell us what we did wrong because we desperately want to share 'spots of tea' before bed but if it's just gonna be like hot water then I'd rather have a nice stout cup o' joe.

We dumped the tea and went to bed at 9:30. A perfect evening.

I could never have planned this date but it has been my very favorite so far.

Valentimes

Isn't that the best way to mispronounce the holiday? Our second year as Mr. and Mrs. And we have already turned into old duds. We were very tired come Thursday evening so I asked for a night in.

Drew picked up our favorite pastas from the Cellar and 2 amazing cupcakes from Gobble Cakes. If ever you come here the cupcake boutique is a must!

We ate in the bed upstairs in our guest bedroom and watched Must Love Dogs and When Harry Met Sally. It was perfect.

Thank goodness for a husband who is okay to be low key with me on the most loving day of the year.

Low key is in folks. No need for big expectations, just appreciate time with your sweetie. That's all it's about. Not whether or not to suffer through the same Nicholas Sparks plot line for the 3rd year in a row or going in debt for a piece of jewelry you won't wear again until next Valentimes. Love your sweetheart. It's what St. Valentine and the retiring Pope would want.

A Love Story pt. 2

 I'm so happy I got to share my parents' sweet love story with you. However what awaits you on the rest of this page is nothing like that. aka the Meg and Drew saga

I wish blogger allowed me to set up a timeline but maybe that's the historian in me. I'll try to manage without one.

5 years old: James Andrew Hubbard and Meghan Elyse Moore started kindergarten at J.W. Adams Elementary. Different classrooms. Different teachers. It's likely I still was not aware of his existence, nevertheless we were sharing the same general space.

6th Grade: Meghan sits behind Drew in literature he has since gotten contacts, she unfortunately has not. And for that reason alone (that's what I tell myself) Drew is in love with Meghan's still very best friend in the whole world. While the poor Meghan, braces and glasses has developed quite the crush on him. why am I referring to us by our proper names??? it's getting annoying, changing it up. Husband will kill me for telling this but I remember him putting Hershey kisses around Kristan's desk to say "now that I've kissed the ground you walked on will you go to the dance with me." Thank God Kristan had the foresight to say no or I would be writing their love story right now.

7th Grade: My friend Sarah and I decided to write letter confessing our love to our crushes. Let's just say her letter to James was well received while Drew had to break the news to me how awkward I still was and why it was best for us to remain "just friends."

8th Grade: Role Reversal. Must have been me finally getting contacts and an older boyfriend. Suddenly pretty blue eyes was interested. Me, I was kinda over it. He called me 'beautiful' not like saying "you're beautiful" but like as if it were my name, which was a little much from a 13 year old. Tone it down a notch babe. I was in a bad boy stage, a serious one. But I agreed and we gave it a shot. 2 weeks. 1 of which Drew was on a hunting trip with no communication. He came back to the news that I had cheated with aforementioned bad boy for the record totally not true and it ended. is this getting boring? or is this middle school drama as exciting now as it was then?

High School: Drew says we were best friends but in all reality we were both dating older people who ran in different crowds. I remember sitting in the gym during lunch reading why was I reading, that's weird, I was not at all studious and suddenly Mr. Creepy's hand is on my leg. Bless his heart, he had no clue what he was doing.

Summer 2007: Camping trip, with about 10 other people sleeping around us he decides to tell me he loves me. Nevermind that he's leaving soon for college, just that he loves me. NBD.

Fall 2007-Fall 2010: I'll make these 3 years brief and let you use your imagination to fill in the blanks. Engagement. 1 wedding, planned and canceled. Drama. Break-up. Independent. Talk every day. More drama. Surgery. Date. Date someone else. Move to Salem. Drama. Fight. Love. Cry. Hate. Slap the shit out of him. Feel better. Love again. Engaged again.

What a fun 3 years. Oddly, I have no pictures that survived this time period. Probably because I was hoping to forget it.

Fall 2010-May 2011: Wedding planning. Seeing little of each other but making plans to move me to the 'Burg and start our life together.

May 2011-Present: Marital bliss.

Okay, not really but I'll save our married life story for another long, boring, uninteresting to anyone but me and Drew post. We aren't perfect and we love hard and fight hard. But love conquers all. And God allows us to forget the worst parts of each other (or at least see past them). I can say with absolute certainty neither of us could deal with what we've put the other through without God's help. Forgiveness is the key. We have mastered dealing with our issues and moving on.  Keep moving forward, that's what I always say. Not really but I'm gonna start because that's darn good advice.

And if you're wondering, yes, I realize this is lame but I had to improvise. I asked Drew weeks ago to write our love story to put on my blog and he said he'd love to. As of today, he still hasn't. Part of that whole marital bliss thing. If ever he does write I'll post it and maybe it won't bore you as much as mine. Or maybe you'll have stopped reading my blog by then because of the lameness that is our love story.

Where is there a safe place?

As I sit here unable to breath through my nose with a randomly swollen right eye that won't fully open I'm thinking deep. Deep and a little fuzzy from a Nyquil hangover.

I just read this post over at my very very favorite blog; Flower Patch Farmgirl. It's an old post but I just stumbled upon it today and it made me think of some recent conversations. One with a friend and one with a sister.

Where is the place you feel comfortable sharing your struggles and asking for prayers and good thoughts? The place you know you can do that without judgement or fear of gossip? Is it a church? A small group? Your family?

I think I am more honest than most about struggles I've had or that Drew and I have had but even I find myself not blogging about things that we have faced and God brought us through for fear that it will spark some sort of discussion among people about our wrongdoings. I fear that rather than celebrating with us and being thankful, judgement will be passed and inevitably our faith/marriage/sanity questioned.

I worry that certain addictions/struggles/issues are often kept under wraps in the church for fear of judgement. I understand there is a fine line between asking for prayers and airing dirty laundry but there should be a place, a people or at the very least a person to go to with heavy hearts.

Where that person/people will talk to God about it rather than others. Our biggest misconception as Christians, in my opinion, is that we must struggle alone. Especially about certain hang-ups. I think most of us agree we're willing to ask for prayers for medical issues or for searching for a job.

But what about the Christian struggling with an eating disorder? Alcoholism? Depression? How do we, as Christians view those particular struggles? Am I the kind of person someone would feel comfortable asking to pray for them or support them or would they fear I would use such information to gossip or simply use it to feel a bit better about myself because I don't struggle with that particular issue?

This post is for me probably more than anyone. But I want to be that person and I'm trying to be. It takes a lot of re-working of my brain. I loved what flower patch farmgirl said about 'when the dirt flies in the middle, people get uncomfortable. no one knows how to deal.'

Sometimes dirt flies in the middle of our Christian walk. We aren't always the result of some great conversion story, never to be tempted again. Dirt flies forever. As long as we are on this earth.

But, I vow to try and be a safe place.

Day 6: Heart Stones

I apologize for the late(r) hour of my post today. I spent my morning at the doctor's office being prescribed steroids for an allergic reaction to something....the big what still remains a mystery. No biggie, just a few itchy bumps on my stomach and arm. The doctor told me one of the side effects of the steroid was being unable to sleep (which I struggle with anyway) so you may get tomorrows diy around 2 or 3 in the morning simply out of insomnia.

Today I chose to stick with my originally scheduled project and do the heart stones. I saw the link on pinterest of another blogger doing this (http://colormekatie.blogspot.com/2011/11/mrblue.html) and thought it was too darn cute and a great way to spread a little joy. I know if I found one of these little pretties it would make me smile.

Here's what I used. I cheated and bought the rocks at the dollar tree rather than finding them. I don't think you can find rocks that smooth unless they are in the river. We live very close to the New River however every time we planned to go the weather had other plans. Ergo, dollar tree stones.

I painted both sides which proved to be messy and completely unnecessary. Tip, paint only one side.

I love painting, even though I am terrible at it. One of my favorite parts is seeing my palette (paper plate) after it's all said and done, lovely colors.

After they dried Drew and I placed them all around our apartment complex. I hope this will help to spread the love and brighten someone's day. A simple and sweet gesture. I thought at one point about painting a scripture reference on the back of each one about God's love....but let's be honest I was lucky to make shapes that could be identified as hearts. Therefore I pray that when people find these they think of God's love for them, that's the best I can do.

Hope you all find a way to spread a little love today too!

As far as the music is concerned, I watched Sleepless in Seattle while painting so that's how I ended up with this choice. Not the most upbeat but beautiful still.



The Cleverness of Terms like Singles Awareness Day....

Although I have spent few Valentine's Days as a single girl I have never particularly cared for the holiday. This is my first year as a married woman on Valentine's Day but I find it hard to be giddy for this heart-filled day. Drew and I have never done holiday gifts not even for Christmas. The extent of the holiday shopping I did today at Wal-Mart included Tide and Milk-Bones. I will stop short of going to the cliche' of "use all 365 days of the year to tell your significant other you love them, not just Valentine's day." Because I kind of think that's a cop out too. While Drew and I will not do gifts or anything terribly romantic we will go out for Indian food and probably catch a movie (but avoid The Vow and  see Safe House instead). I do love an excuse to go to a nice dinner and get dressed up but past that Valentine's Day means little to me.

I'm finding it even harder this year to enjoy this holiday that so many singles dread all year. There are just so many people hurting today that I can't get off of my mind. I feel as though there is a better way to spend a day that so many people place such an emphasis on. I wonder if Drew and I couldn't better spend our time with single friends who have been dreading this day or with friends who are suffering through long distance relationships (which we did for 4 years), or friends who are struggling in their relationships or whose relationships have recently ended. While I hate the term "singles awareness day" I suppose it is quite fitting. There are few things I hate more than feeling left out and I can imagine how people who are struggling today must feel when it seems that everyone around them is in a perfect relationship.

No relationship is perfect, mine included. Drew and I have been through more than I ever care to admit but as I will preach to the day that I die: You must be happy with yourself before you can be happy in a relationship. Drew and I could fall apart tomorrow (I am not one of these people who think it will never happen to me) and if we do I still have to live with myself. All that I can do in my relationship is work on me, if the other person chooses not to, I can't help that. So on Valentine's Day I encourage everyone to love yourself. You are important and you matter.

I realize I run the risk of sounding like an inspirational speaker but so many people, including myself, need to be reminded of this and what better day than today? May all of you have a day filled with love from God because His love will be a constant when other's love may fail.

 

Jesus Never Fails.