The Best Two Years

Happy 2nd Wedding Anniversary to us! Our last anniversary we spent in Hong Kong--and in utter contrast, this year we kept things pretty low key. It felt fitting; we needed some down time. We have enjoyed spending time together this weekend doing things that needed to be done. Yesterday morning I helped sweet Husby teach the primary kids at a church activity. Then we cleaned the church because it was our assignment this week on the ward schedule (every family in the congregation takes turns). Next we got our car repaired...and while we were waiting for the car to get fixed, we spontaneously decided to use a coupon I scrounged up in my purse for a free 10x13 wall portrait at Sears, as the department store was located on the same block of our car repair garage. After driving home in our newly fixed car (yay, it still keeps getting us where we need to go!), we exercised on the treadmill and finished preparing our talks for today's sacrament meeting. Though from a worldly perspective it may seem like this anniversary weekend was rather unromantic, we feel happy to note that the parts of married life we most enjoy are these simple day-to-day times spent together. When we reflect on our activities, themes of our marriage emerge--faith, service, provident living, and personal improvement, to name a few. These are the parts of our marriage that bring us happiness.

After walking in a drizzling rain to our impromptu Sears photo shoot, I felt less than picture-worthy and thus liked this hands shot the best because it showed less of me, and more of "the baby." Cute Little got featured in more than a few photos, of course.
And here we have it: the 31 week belly shot.

We discussed this morning how that phrase, "the best two years" usually refers to how an LDS mission is the best time of a young person's life up to that point--but we agreed these two years of marriage have continued to build on the joys we experienced as full-time missionaries. Part of the reason we are so happy as married people is because of who we became during our missions--the choices and habits we made during our respective times of service have forever changed us for the better.

My little brother Brandon is just hitting his one year mark for time spent in the mission field, and I get a deep satisfaction out of noticing his growth already. The tone that comes through in his letters and emails shows he is becoming a generous, kind, patient young man. These same qualities Jerry refined on his mission, and they continue to grace his everyday actions even now. He is wonderful and I feel blessed to have him. Sorry for waxing mushy, for any of you people out there who roll your eyes at this sort of blog entry--I figure I'm allowed to do it once or twice a year. =)