Marriage Vows

Do you remember your marriage vows? They went something like this:

I, ____, take you, ____, for my lawful husband, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part. 

"Until death do us part." Do you remember that line? Statistics say that in America, over 50% of marriages do not make it "Until death do us part."  (and it's even higher for couples who married young like we did)

Do you take your vows seriously? God does.

1. Matthew 19:6 says "what God has joined together, let man not separate." (exception: look at Matthew 19:9)
2. Malachi 2:14 says God is a witness to our marriage covenant.
3. Ephesians 5:22-33 says marriage is a picture of Christ and the church.

This weeks challenge is simply to Remember. Remember the day you entered your sacred vows. If you are a blogger, please post pictures from that day and share your story. Then link up below and link your post to this post.


The above text (in brown) is from Women Living Well and the Completing Him Challenge.


I think you should read my post about my husband first ... this post will probably make more sense.


Andrew and I got married on July 7, 2007.  The date happened on accident.  We didn't really plan our wedding.  


See ... we kinda put the carriage before the horse ... or the pregnancy before the marriage.  It was really important to us to be married before Leah was born, but we didn't want to have a shot gun wedding.  We took our time, looked at all of the options, and chose to start a family.


...i bet the divorce rate is even higher for that...

Our wedding was very small.  We are planning on having a vow renewal in 2012 ... with a large party and all that fun stuff!

We didn't have a honeymoon budget ... and well ... I was 8 months pregnant, so my dad got us a room at the Embassy in downtown Birmingham.  We went out for dinner and went to a movie.  It was fun :-)

You Complete Me pt.1

I could have taken the easy way out ... with the 'easy' relationship.  You see ... I'm a selfish person.  gasp...did she really just say that   I want everything to go my way, and I want it to go my way right now, and why can't the whole freaking world just figure it out ... my way ... let's get it right ... MY WAY ... right now!!!!!!

I could have married a guy who would cave in to my every demand and wish.  I dated a few.  No, let me change that ... every guy I dated before Andrew was that kind of guy.  Sweet ... but I could step right over them, and they would smile and let me do it.

Ever since we started dating, I always said Andrew was different...even when I couldn't put my finger on it.  Now I know.  He challenges me not to be selfish.  He will not let me be a selfish brat.  and even though I kick, scream, whine and yell ... deep down I know he is making me a better person.  He is completing me ... and I want to complete him.  I want to be better for him.

and that's why I find this challenge so interesting and intriguing and I'm excited to participate!

June 14 – Post Pictures from your dating days (or tell us all about it!). Think about one thing you used to do or have as a couple that you have lost in the shuffle of life. How can you regain it?

We met early one winter morning.  He knew who I was ... I was clueless.  He sent me a facebook message with his AIM screen name, and two normally shy people developed a wonderful relationship online.  Every time I was on the computer, I was checking my AIM to see if billytheeuph13 was on.  Our friendship was the deepest friendship I have ever built with someone in the shortest amount of time.  I think within a few weeks, he was just as good of a friend as a best friend I had known for years.

I talked to him about this guy I was totally crushing on.  Later in life he told me it killed him to give me advice, but he stood there and backed me up when I asked this other dude to go to formal with me.  He smiled, and told me congratulations.

And then, we went on a pep band trip.  I can't really explain, but on that trip something just triggered.  I didn't want to leave his side.  We explored the hotel together.  We watched tv in the lobby, and I gave him my gum.  For real, just put my chewed up used gum in his hand.  We played elbows in the hotel room until his roommates kicked me out so they could get some sleep.  I believe we feel in love that weekend.

But wait ... the Thursday before this trip, I had asked this other dude to formal, and here I am falling for my best friend.  Well guess what ... this other dude calls me on Sunday saying he would like to meet with me.  To make a long story short he pretty much tells me "God has told me that I'm not dating anyone until I meet the girl that I'm going to marry."  In a way I was crushed.  The first person I called was Andrew ... who was away on an Auburn Singers trip (yes, the day we got home he left again).  

He was sad for me (well, that's what he told me).  Before their performance I got an instant message asking me to that same formal.  I said "yes!" and it's happily ever after from there.

Well, mostly happily ever after ...

You know, we had our ups and downs while dating

and we have already had some ups and downs in our young marriage

but you know what

I believe in our relationship

because true love always works out

especially when you work to keep the true love strong!

These are my two favorite dating pictures ... I think they are both from 2005:

This post was so much fun ... ahhhh ... the memories!  I highly recommended this challenge to anyone, even if it's just to take a trip down memory lane

You know what I'm going to do to bring this feeling back -- I'm going to flirt more with my husband.  Back in the day ... someone once called me a flirt.  I'm sure it was meant to be a bit of an insult, but I just smiled.  I liked to flirt and I liked the attention.  So, I'm going to flirt more with my hubby to bring back those fun smiles and times!

...and he reads this :-)

Thought for this week:

How much time do you spend on a daily/weekly basis cultivating your marriage now? In what ways can you regain some of what has been lost in the daily shuffle of life?

  

Marriage Challenge

ok .. so I know I'm like super blog poster today, but I'm really excited about joining in with Women Living Well Blog for their Completing Him Challenge.

I tried the Love Dare ... and really wanted to do it, but failed with trying to do everything everyday.  This challenge sounds perfect for us!  It's a once a week (monday) post ... click the button to find out more!

07/07/07

That's our wedding date. Cute huh? We totally didn't plan it that way. While people were getting engaged and planning their weddings for this "lucky" date years in advance, we just happened upon it. If you read my last post about the engagment, everything happened rather quickly. We knew we wanted to be married before the baby was born in August. We orignally tried May (labor day), but we didn't have enough money or a place to live. We couldn't do it in June because the one weekend we had open, hubby's family was traveling to Texas for a cousin's baptism. We also were planning around our best friend's depature to basic training for the Air Force. We ended up with 07-07-07.

I have a love/hate relationship with our wedding.

I hate:

• that it rained so we couldn't have it in the beautiful church courtyard
• that I didn't wear a white dress
• that I don't have pictures of me getting ready
• that we didn't invite that many people
• that I didn't want that many people to come
• that some important people couldn't make it

I love:

• that we got married at the church I grew up in
• that we were married before Leah was born
• that best friends and close family could attend
• that I married my best friend ever

But mainly, my favorite part of the entire day was seeing my hubby cry as he repeated his vows. I love that he is emotional, and that he cares that much for me.

And I especially love that I am planning a HUGE vow renewal/party for all our friends on our 5 year anniversary in 2012!!!

Its a Love thing

So, I've been a bit under the weather these past few days and I didn't feel like thinking enough to type, lol. I wanted to participate in Mama M's valentine's link love, so here it goes. I am meshing Day 1, Day 2 and Day 3 together (eat it...its a long post, I don't care)

Day 1: How you meet

subtitle...7am classes suck!

Sophmore year I took genetics, which met at 7. Yes, that is 7am. Rumor was the prof liked to golf so he held class as early as he could...or he was just an ass. So, usually between my hour break from 7am to 9am classes I would go to a local coffee store and wake myself up with caffiene, but one day I went to breakfast at the student center with a friend. That day Andrew (who CAN NOT wake up in the mornings, for real) had actually woken up for his 8am rehersal, but it was cancelled. He headed over to the student center for a new ID where he saw he friend I was eating with (a mutual friend). He came over...we chatted about how we dislike the NBA (although he claims that is false...its not, I remember), and then we went about our marry ways. Oh yeah, we Dan introduced us I said "Hi! I'm Christy." Andrew said "I know." (sidenote - we were both in marching band...he had noticed me, I hadn't noticed him) What a stalker. That night I got this message on facebook (back when facebook was tiny and only for college students)

"It was nice meeting you today! I can't believe we haven't talked before that, cause I see you around ALL the time. I just get so busy, that i don't get to talk to everyone. I really enjoyed talking with you today though! You seem to be pretty cool ;) I hope we get tohave some more conversations in the future. :) ~ AndrewP.S. my screenname is billytheeuph on aim, if you ever want to chat."

we did talk on aim, no he wasn't a stalker, and yes we did fall in love :-)

Day 2: A favorite date

subtitle...Ballet in Atlanta

Yeah, that pretty much sums it up. He took me to see Madame Butterfly performed by the Atlanta Ballet and we ate at this super cool resturant that didn't check my id when I ordered a martini (because I was 20...shhhhh don't tell).

Day 3 (today): The Proposal

subtitle...a good talk

When I found out I was pregnant our relationship was on the fritz. And by that I mean we were broken up, together again, I hate you break up, I love you why did you leave, and so on and so forth. I wasn't ready to be a mommy...Andrew (and his family) wanted the baby. I meet with an adoption attorney ... they didn't like that. Life was confusing, frustrating and stressful. Suggestions (some nice and friendly, most forced and judgmental) were coming in from every angle. I went to a doc appointment and had an ultrasound. While I was in there looking at this baby growing in my tummy, the nurse asked if I wanted to know the sex of the baby. On the spot I said, sure..why not. (I promise, this has to do with the proposal) a girl :-). Andrew picked me up later that day. We went to lunch (at Chick-fil-A) and I showed him the pictures. That was the day we decieded we were going to be a family and raise this precious baby together.

A couple of weeks later, he presented me with a diamond necklace...the diamond was the one his dad had given his mom when they got engaged. We set it to a ring and I love that I have my MIL's diamond. I used to be jealous that it wasn't all romantic and unexpected, but I'm getting over it, lol!

She was more important to the proposal than the ring :-)