Pop the Champagne!

My sweet husband and I try to dance together every day. One evening last year, I put on a song, one of my favorite, for us to enjoy.

I feel his gentle hands rest upon my waist, his adoring gaze mirrored by my own. The music begins. 

"I don't get many things right the first time" ... his smile widens and his head nods subtly in agreement.

"And where was I before the day that I first saw your lovely face, now I see it everyday, and I know That I am... The luckiest." He takes a deep breath, as if he is feeling the full capacity of his lung for the first time and quietly speaks, "This should be our first dance song. This is us." 

We continue to dance and he continues to listen to the rest of the song, chuckling at the similarities between the 'what if' scenario illustrated in the lyrics and our own conversations. He holds me closer than ever to his body and I can't help but to feel that's reflective of his emotions. He speaks the words "I love you" but before he lets me go he whispers, "I am the luckiest". 

J and I had initially planned a fancy wedding with about a hundred guests for this December, but the pressure and expense of a traditional wedding just didn't appeal to us. We called off the wedding with no intention of setting another date. One evening in late October I was up visiting my family in Washington State when I got a phone call from J. In our conversation he said he wanted to marry me when I came back home, no frills, no expense, just the two of us committing to spend the rest of our lives driving each other crazy. Well, Who could say no to that?

Two days before our ceremony I got an email from the company I ordered my dress from, saying the trucking company that was delivering my dress was involved in an accident and my dress was ruined. With only two days, there was no time to find another dress. I cried. My sweet love tried his best to console me and was finally able to remind me that he was marrying me, not a dress.

I had another dress that I had worn to our ball but I had lost a little weight and it needed to be taken in. I was able to find a seamstress to do the alterations rush but I wouldn't be able to pick it up until 10am on the day of our wedding. Knowing how lucky I was finding someone on such short notice, I didn't feel I had much of a choice. The day of our wedding, J and I went to pick it up and he insisted I try it on before we leave. I am reluctant because we are already cutting it close on time. He persisted and gave me "the look", The look of determination and a spine of steel. I sighed in defeat and stepped into the changing room. I stepped into my gown and tried to zip up the sides only to find, the zipper wouldn't budge! J had them fix it on the spot (which took another twenty minutes). I used the time to do my makeup and try not to cry over the remark that my seamstress made that I "must have eaten too much at Christmas". It's funny now, not too funny in the stress of the moment though.

We said our vows in an intimate ceremony the day after Christmas. I laughed when my husband recanted our first meeting, first date, and inside jokes and I cried when he vowed to pursue me until his dying day.

Photo Credit: Iconic Images

Although I was against it initially, we exchanged rings. My J wanted to have a token of our love to show. I rarely ever wear mine as I work hard with my hands, constantly sanding, painting, or scrubbing something, but the swell of pride I see on my sweet husband when he notices me wearing it is well worth the compromise of buying it.

Talking to our families before the ceremony.

We set up a video conference with our families so they could witness our ceremony.

J's Vows made me cry.

Jumping for Joy: We're married!

Our dear friends and witnesses

                  

We chose not to have our children at our initial ceremony, which we had quite a few remarks about. Although I don't need to explain the reasoning behind our decision, I want to. 

We believe that in a marriage, God comes first, spouse comes second and children come after. The Bible tells us that when we are married we become ONE with our spouse. Children are not to be the center of the home; God is. Children are a gift from God, they are on loan for parents to train up to be responsible, productive, and moral individuals.When children leave the home, many couples feel the sting of the empty nest and a spouse who they have neglected to invest in. 

J and I value our time with our children, and recognize that our marriage joins together two families as one, but inevitably, our marriage, the conception and maintenance of our union, is our responsibility, not theirs. 

J and I were able to spend the the entire week beforehand with all seven of our babies, and since we plan on renewing our vows annually, they will have more than plenty of opportunities to be involved in celebrating our marriage with us.

Our first meal as husband and wife? Sushi (of course)!

Looking forward to a lifetime of wedded bliss. 

For step parents who may be seeking advice, I found this article helpful when searching for my place in my partner and bonus kiddo's lives:

http://www.familylife.com/articles/topics/blended-family/remarriage/staying-married/placing-your-spouse-in-the-front-seat-of-your-heart#.VQhp5o7F98E

The beautiful photos of our ceremony and dinner reception were taken by my dear friend and fellow photographer, Chrissie, of Bella Luce Photography. As a photographer, I place a high value on photos. The very first phone call after booking my venue and date was to book my photographer, and I am so glad I did. We get to savor these precious memories for the rest of our lives. 

Surprise

Last night, the love of my life came home late again. I don't really mind, I've accepted that is just a part of his new job. On his way home, he called to tell me to pack some clothes before going to bed.

What was he up to?

This morning we get up before the crack of dawn and drive down to SD. He tells me he has to work for a little while but we are getting a hotel for a surprise mini vacation. Then he said a bunch of other romantic stuff that gave me butterflies. He showed me around his work area as much as he is allowed and now I wait at Starbucks, coffee in hand, contemplating how much  I have underestimated his ability to be spontaneous.

Dudes, take note. My man is writing the book on how to sweep a lady of her feet. 

Dating Your Best Friend (on a budget)- Making the Ordinary Extraordinary

I've been called a cheap date a time or two and honestly, there was a time when I used to take offense to that. Cheap? It's called frugal! And frugal is an AWESOME thing. I put a high value of my time, which means if I give you my time, I value you. I want to spend my time doing activities that enrich my life. 

My first time around I married an introvert, indoor and movie lover, I'm not saying that's a bad thing, it's just I needed him to come do things that I wanted to do as much as I compromised and did things he enjoyed... and , well... that just didn't happen. The thing I enjoyed most about our dates was the detailed, post movie conversation we had afterward.

With J, it's different. He's my intellectual equal. He's social, constantly seeking new ways to improve himself and has a love for frugality as much as I do. J and I have an unspoken challenge to find ways to make our ordinary, everyday tasks extraordinary. 

EVERYDAY BEHAVIOR ADDS UP (choose to make your mate a priority)

J reading to me. 

I am usually home when J gets home from work. It doesn't take much of an effort to greet your mate, but I'm a firm believer that taking the time to warmly welcome someone home sets a positive tone. I welcome J home with a warm smile and a passionate kiss. Sometimes I run and jump into his arms which makes him laugh. I adore his laugh. I'm a business owner, photographer, designer and student, so when J gets home, there's a good chance I'm working at the computer. When I'm not at the computer, I'm usually in the kitchen cooking dinner. J and I are parents, we have ambition and so many things we have on our to-do lists every day. We are able to keep the spark in our relationship by completing the tasks we have to do as a team. We tell stupid jokes, we have pun competitions, we do the dishes together, we blog together, we Pinterest together...Yes, my manly man is on Pinterest, pinning home improvement, art, and wedding stuff. We take long soaks in our bath tub, take long walks at under the stars, get up and jog in the mornings, take our kids hiking, fishing, camping, do yoga, read books to each other, work on our business together, meet up for lunch and thrift store dates and spend every night we're together wrapped up in a tight cuddly embrace. 

What you do with your time is a choice. When you prioritize your mate, you have a better chance for a happy and successful relationship. 

MIXTAPE CHALLENGE

One of my favorite things to do with J is our "Mixtape Challenge". We choose a theme, a song limit and put together a mix cd that adheres to our rules by a set day. We take turns listening to each other's cd's, explain our thoughts behind our selections and then choosing the winner. 

COMMUNITY EVENTS

We live in and near awesome communities. There are weekly Farmer's markets, every couple months there are street and vendor fairs and the best part? They're all free and full of educational information (and samples). Just last night we went to the Sunset Farmer's Market in our neighboring city. We enjoy all the live bands, street food (did I mention the free samples?), unique art and products, and meeting new people. We followed it up with a walk on the pier. It's tradition, We've been enjoying this event since we met. Usually we'd include sushi, but since we're pinching pennies we ate a bacon wrapped street dog instead. We also used to spend more time just walking on the beach, but we had the kids with us and they were getting tired so we came home a little earlier than normal. 

SHOPPING CHALLENGE

We are bargain hunters. We make lists of the things we want, budget an allotment, and compete to see who can get the most for our money. We hit up thrift stores, consignment stores, garage sales and internet resale sites.

DANCING

We dance.. ALL THE TIME. Every day we take time to dance to at least one song together. Usually it's while we're waiting on dinner to finish cooking, or while the kids have their free time before bed. Man, dancing together really helps keep the romance in our crazy relationship. 

SEXY TIME

We take advantage of the time we spend without the kiddos. Sweet romance is nice, but sometimes, I just want to feel that burning passion and sexual desire that comes with activities that are a little more naughtier than our norm. Sometimes, we pretend that we just met and flirt with each other. We whisper sexy things to each other (we tend to do that all the time) and sometimes, we are a bit more daring. Keeping a healthy sexual appetite with your mate is important. Sexual intimacy, making love, doesn't have to mean "vanilla sex". If that's what you and your partner are into, go for it. I'm certainly not criticizing it, it's just not always what works for my partner and I. 

NOTES

My love and I hide love notes for each other. It's so fun to find an unexpected note carved into a banana, in the fridge, on an unplugged curling iron, in a wallet, written on the car windshield, in a journal, on the car dash, in the books we're reading.  A few times, my sweetheart hid things for me along my jogging route, or set up a scavenger hunt. Thinking up creative places to hide these notes (where they'll be found) takes insight into the other person's life. It shows you pay attention to their habits and took the time to make them feel special; and that often means more than what's written on the note itself.

J and I work very hard, we are very ambitious, goal oriented people with a bunch of kids (his four and my three) that take up a most of our weekends. We fought hard to find a happy balance between our relationship and his limited schedule with the first loves of his life (his children). 

We believe that we're soul mates, but here's a secret. Even people who are meant to be together still must choose to make things work. Love that was meant to be can still be ruined if not handled with care. J and I don't ever want our love to wither away which is why we put so much time and effort into each other. 

Relationships take a lot of effort, relationships with people who have children takes even more effort. Our relationship isn't perfect, but we work hard to smooth out all the kinks and keep the passion. I am fortunate enough to love a man who is romantic in unusual ways. He plays close attention to me, he honors me in all ways, even publicly adoring me. He shouts out his love for me from the proverbial rooftops, aka: social media and I love every minute of it.

Finding a lifetime best friend is uncommon. Finding true love is rare. When you find both a best friend a true love  in the same package, it's rare and precious and should be treated as such. 

The Worst Date of My Life!

Friday, I had the worst date I've ever had in my life. Our first stop was fine/ We went to Hennessey's Tavern in the Gas Lamp District and listened to a funk band. They were good and groovy. Here's a clip of one of their sets that night.

I thought we may have been on our way to getting over our grumpy moods but it just went downhill from there. Even while J and I were fighting, he still opened my doors, we still shared a hot cocoa and he still took my hand and danced in the middle of a Starbucks to slow jazz. We even had a gentleman interrupt us to tell us how refreshing it is to see two people so openly passionate. At this point the thought kept popping up that crimes of passion are technically still passion.

Saturday morning we were still at odds. I considered sending him up to his boys opening baseball ceremonies by himself, but I promised the boys I'd be there and I didn't want to hurt them. Besides, I probably would've only stewed, and I didn't want to be even more upset.

 J and I had a heated discussion about our roles, flexibility and willingness to compromise in our relationship. I feel that I work extremely hard and am doing great balancing all my priorities. Justin agrees, but has two triggers, one is making sure he has adequate time with his kiddos and the other is his need for the house to be clean all the time. When he comes home and the house is messy (which happens from time to time, with my schedule and two young mess makers in the house) Justin starts acting grumpy, giving me the cold shoulder or shutting himself in our room until he can deal with it. I feel, after everything I do all day, he should try to have a little more understanding and he feels that since it's the ONLY thing he asks of me, that I should make more of an effort. We were stuck in the car, discussion going in circles, I was feeling completely unappreciated when his pride got the best of my temper and I said,

 "Why don't you just go find someone better then!" I immediately regretted it but I wanted him to say that he didn't want someone better, he wanted me... Only those words were never spoken. He turned up the radio and I sat holding back my tears.  I asked him to stop at the store so I could buy a bouquet of flowers for his ex-wife to show our appreciation of all the hard work that went into their kiddos' baseball season (that has only just begun). He got even more upset. He said I do so much for everyone and asked when I planned to take time just for me.

I didn't see how that affected him at all and informed him that I am able to spend a lot of time reflecting and recharging throughout the week, but that I'm a woman and have different ways I am able to relax. He dropped me off at the store but refused to come in. I was completely turned off by his behavior, but not ready to throw in the towel.

We arrived at our destination and I asked him if he was ready to give up on us. I told him that the decision was his. He looked over at me, clearly hurt with a bit of anger and confusion and said it sounded like I made the decision for him. I assured him that I was close to that point, but didn't want pride to get in the way of a relationship that we have worked so hard for. Before he answered, his kiddos had pulled up beside us and we exited the car to greet them and their mama. Our giant group started walking to the opening ceremony but I held J behind  for a moment. "If you want to give up on us, I get it." I continued, "But if you want to work it out, you better kiss me right now and we'll figure things out later."

He kissed me, and I smiled and pressed my lips up for another kiss. The nukes were put away and our personal cold war was put on a temporary hold.  A moment later we were back with all the kids, ready to focus on celebrating their spring baseball season.

Now, I know guys *usually* need space when they're upset, but I have this flaw, where it's hard for me to let other's be when we have issues between us that need to be resolved. However, I can give others their needed space if I can be reassured of our relationship. When I asked Justin to kiss me, I was asking for reassurance. He loves me enough to meet me halfway, even after I acted like a hormonal teenager. We are both imperfect humans with so much left to learn about communication. These little arguments are NOT enjoyable, but I do enjoy the growth and humility that comes from them.

Changes

With seven children in our home, my partner J and I decided to celebrate the New Year with the East Coasters. I finished up my nightly portion of homework with four minutes to spare and we ran downstairs to join our wonderful neighbor’s celebration. Casually ringing in the New Year with my sweetheart’s lips on mine, toasting with dear friends and laughing with our children was honestly one of the best holidays I've ever had. 

J and I are absolutely GIDDY about our future together. We've started merging more of our life together and preparing for a life of debt free living, investing and travel. I’m over the moon to have found a man who is everything I could ever ask for.  Instead of aimlessly spending all of our income, J and I came up with a plan to give us direction.  We started by laying our all of our debt, smallest to largest; by using an Excel spreadsheet that shows us how long it will take us to be debt free. Along with our financial goals, J and I came up with a year full of monthly progressive goals to accomplish. J will be sharing our financial goals on his blog, http://cswsiggy.blogspot.com/ and I’ll be updating on the progress of our other monthly goals here!

Here’s the layout of our monthly progressive goals we designed to enrich our lives as a couple.

I hope you had a fabulous New Year. I'm wishing you and yours a peaceful and prosperous 2014!

One Love,
Heathery

Last night, my sweet, loving partner J turned into a zombie

Granted, he didn't resemble the lifeless mass of human flesh, void of emotion that one sees in their nightmares (No, I’m not talking about my ex husband), but it was dang close.

A little background: I wasn't raised watching horror movies, in fact, I was completely sheltered child. I am, however, naturally brave, surviving the pranks one endures being raised as the youngest child in a household that at any given time sheltered up to 16 children. The ONE paranormal thing that utterly horrifies me is ZOMBIES. Now, I was married to one of the biggest Walking Dead fans, and begrudgingly, started watching it myself. I grew to love that damn show and soon built up a tolerance to the graphic zombie content under specific conditions. The lights had to be on and I had to watch it during the day so I had time to purge my mind of the horror. Simple rules.

Before my partner and I started dating, we’d hang out as friends. THE VERY FIRST TIME we hung out, was late at night, downtown area of a little surf town in SoCal. The night was coming to a close and in the middle of our conversation about bands we liked; I caught the glimpse of a silhouetted, “dread-head’ figure, about 15 feet from us, limping closer and closer. The blood drained from my face and I froze in a panic. I was able to gather my wits and explained to my very confused friend, that I was deathly afraid of zombies. Fast Forward, we start dating and I have among my top rules are; don’t cheat on me, don’t act like a zombie, and no zombie movies before bed. Fast forward again; I’ll give you one guess as to what J thought would be a great idea to do last night.

I walked into our room to see my sweet partner looking through our movie selection. I wasn't really in the mood to watch a movie; I wanted… a completely different activity. But I figured I wouldn't say anything since I had already gotten what I wanted just an hour prior. So I settled under my comforter, ready for J to hop into bed and snuggle up. It wasn't so bad realizing that the movie he selected was World War Z, I wasn't scared when we had watched it before, but then J thought it would be super funny to start mimicking the biting zombie actions. *Real Funny J*

I don’t know what possessed him to get up, but his movements and my heightened state of panic set in resulting in him receiving several swift kicks to his stomach. He quickly excused himself to the bathroom... Leaving me alone… in bed, with a scary ****ing zombie on the screen and I couldn't get up to turn it off because I just KNEW that now there was probably a zombie in my room and, logically, I was safer in bed.

WTF did you Eat J!

I don’t know if you've ever been in a heightened alert state, but when I am, I become aware of every noise, and slight movements that surround me. Due to that fact, I was all too aware of the horrors happening to J in the next room. Oh, the sound of his agonizing moans. Ooooh… the sound of his vital organs dropping out of his body, like machine gun rounds dropping in a war zone. There was nothing I could do, after all, I had to stay alive for my helpless children peacefully sleeping down the hall.

The entire Zombie transformation took a total of about 15 minutes. Then my zombified partner reentered our bedroom, walking a little funny and trailing the smell of death behind him. Being a thoughtful (still living) girlfriend, I thought I'd test to see if a part of my sweet boyfriend was still alive. I pointed out his obvious oversight (oversmell?). He responded by attempting to place the blame on my sweet little girls by saying that aerosol room deodorant was gone and nothing could be done. That was all the proof I needed. My J would have turned on the fan and closed the door to trap the foul, death stench.  That's when I realized that I dealing with a clever new breed of zombie that kills its prey, not by biting, but by suffocation. 

The good news is that the zombie effects have since worn off and from what I can tell, J is back to his wonderful self. Even Better news, I finally know what to get him for Christmas this year! 

Cheers!

Man, I wish I could say, "The dog ate it."

A couple weeks ago I made a post, then, in true, "oh shit... Did I just put that on the internet" form, I deleted it. I wanted to repost sooner, but my schedule hasn't permitted the time. While my post may have been completely true, I find ranting a wee bit distasteful. I probably should have just edited it. I live, I learn, I'm sorry for committing an apparent blogger sin, it won't happen again.

Anyway, to summarize in a more professional manner, J and I have had some relationship hiccups lately in the romance department. I am hoping he steps up his game, but in the mean time, I have decided to step back and view things from an alternative perspective. I have since seen the little... Yes, less romantic, but none-the-less sweet ways J displays his love.

No relationship is perfect, I am not one to expect perfection either. We are human. We err. Sometimes in our quest for what we think we want, we find what we need. I am grateful for J. For the time being, he is what I need. Can I see this lasting long term? You betcha. As long as he continues accepting my numerous flaws, I'll keep accepting his.

Anyway, "Anonymous", I read your feedback. I appreciate your honesty. I hope one day you choose to be less sarcastic and rude in your approach, but even if you don't... Meh... It is what it is (As stated frequently by a friend of mine, sounds like you may know him).