Love and Laughter

September 1, 1979.
I have been thinking lately about how quickly time is flying by and how blessed I am to have such an amazing man to grow old with. I often ask myself who these little kids were. That may sound strange, but I just can't figure out how we got to the year 2012 so quickly. I look at my picture and try to remember what some of my thoughts were back then. For as long as I can remember I wanted to get married and have lots of kids..at one point I wanted 7!! I never wanted to go to college or travel. I just wanted to live happily ever after with my prince charming! Really!!  Unfortunately I didn't have any idea what that looked like. I wasn't brought up with a stable happy marriage being modeled, so I had little to go by. And this is the part where God shows up. He knew I would meet Richard at McDonalds at 11pm on May 5, 1978, and I believe with everything in me that he arranged the whole thing....and the rest is history.

I brought lots of baggage into our very young marriage. Mostly I didn't know how to trust. But I did know how to laugh. And that is what we have done for almost 33 years....laugh. And we raised 3 children laughing all the way...don't get me wrong, there were some tears, that is just part of life, but there was love, joy and laughter. God is Faithful!!

We haven't done everything perfectly. We have made mistakes and hurt each other. But we have done lots of things right...we have been blessed with the most amazing kids. What an honor that God chose us to raise these incredible children. I can honestly say we don't fight...really!! It has become Richard's mission in life to please me!! Sweet!!! So, I guess serving him all those years has paid off! hahaha!!

I would marry this man all over again! What an incredible life we have had! And it all started with Love and Laughter......

Embracing change

I have been accused of not doing well with change. And that is true with many things in my life..I admit it! I hate that I can't remember every detail of my babies...the smell of their breath and toes, the sound of their little voices, their laugh, their questions...it is too far back. But there are some things that will forever be engraved in my heart and mind...the love that can fill your heart and break it all at the same time, the sound of legos as my two little blonde headed boys played on the living room rug for hours, the theme song of Super Mario playing over and over, watching the boys play with their Tonka trucks in a huge pile of dirt that Richard had brought in for them each summer..brushing off their filthy bottoms and putting them in the tub which always left a nice ring, hearing Amy scream..and finding her in her closet playing with her Barbie dolls with more drama than I ever thought a 4 year old could have, watching her dance around the house all dressed in her princess dress and white gloves.  These are just a few of the things I hold on to, things that fill my heart with such joy and sadness at the same time.

But change is part of life, that is a fact that will never change. We can either embrace it and enjoy all the new chapters of life, or hold to the things that we can never bring back. God planned these seasons for us...he knew what he was doing. He knew that we would be sappy and cry as we looked at old pictures of years gone by, but he also gives us the present and the future to add joy constantly to our lives. I for one don't want to be stuck in the past..I am looking forward to all the new memories ahead of me.

Trust me when I tell you that having those little curly blonde/red heads grow into adults is SWEET! I not only love them, I really really like them! They are amazing people that we have so much fun with...they are our friends!!