May 2, 2011

• A Time For Smiles

  I can’t believe it is May already!!  Where did April go?  I blinked and suddenly there are only 11 days til the wedding.  Now if I could only blink again and it BE the wedding… *blink*…*blink*…*blinkblink*…  No such luck.  Last week the students at work and I were talking about how my name will change in two weeks and the teacher stopped suddenly and said, “TWO WEEKS?? When did THAT happen?!”  It’s certainly an exciting time.

  This weekend was a busy one for us.  On Saturday we were able to start moving in to the new apartment.  Because May 1st was a Sunday, the apartment complex let us get our keys on Saturday, and because Andrew needed to be out of his place by May 1st, it was such a blessing to have that extra day.
  Andrew had to work until 3pm, so I got started bright and early and did as much as I could alone.  I set up the kitchen, the bathroom, part of the living room, and built a piece of furniture for our TV to sit on.  When Andrew got off work, we borrowed a friend’s truck and moved all the big furniture and heavy things.

  Sunday we kept right at it after church and were able to get all of Andrew’s stuff and probably 50% of my stuff.  Fortunately I can leave a lot of things at my current place and slowly move them over throughout June.  I keep panicking that I’m going to forget something majorly important and then I remember that I have until June to get it all, and it’s only 10 minutes away if there is something I desperately need after we’re married.
  It has been so much fun to set stuff up and figure out where we wanted everything.  We kept reminding ourselves to really enjoy it because it will probably never again be this much fun to move.    The place is a perfect cute little size and is really starting to look like “us” (for example, Andrew’s big screen TV complete with Play Station and Xbox, right across the room from a cute little reading nook for me!)  We’ve agreed so well on colors, placement of things, and even air freshener scents, which was a nice surprise because I’ve heard a lot about how new couples often have a hard time finding compromises for things like that.
  And interspersed throughout the day we read this week’s chapter for our Marriage Mentoring book (Saving Your Marriage Before It Starts by Les and Leslie Parrott) about Cultivating the Habit of Happiness, which was nice too.

  The church Andrew and I have been attending has a Marriage Mentoring program, rather than typical Marriage Counseling by a pastor.  After we filled out a series of questionnaires, the program leaders paired us with a couple.  The couples have all been married at least 10 years and only work with one new couple at a time.  Our couple (Rachel and Bart) has been married for about 15 years and they have 2 kids.  We meet with them about 7 times total and go through the book together, one chapter a meeting.  It has been really wonderful to go through to the book with them and have very real, open, and practical talks.  Because our wedding is so soon, we will continue to meet with them 3 or so times after we’re married, which I expect will be very beneficial.  The book and accompanying workbooks have been very good for us, bring up things we never would have thought to talk about.

  Pictures of the apartment will come soon (I know my mom is eager!), but we bought a fantastic over-sized loveseat for an amazing price at Goodwill, and it is currently sitting in a friend’s garage about an hour and a half away.  Andrew’s brother and his wife will bring it to us this weekend (they are coming to join us for this fun event!!) and once that is in place I’ll take pictures .  Right now it looks a little odd with just pillows on the floor.  Once we get it all set up cute, I’ll be proud to show it off!

  So that’s all my big news for right now!  More to come soon!

  And just to close with something cute:

  

  

   

  • 6:19 pm
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