Archive - Love Love Love & Marriage RSS Feed

Free, Free, Free Valentines!

Posted in: Love Love Love & Marriage, Susan Holiday Solutions
February 10, 2012 with 0 Comments

Can you tell with the house remodel that I am on a budget?!

Did you know that if you have 5 children and 1 husband and you have an affinity for really cute Valentines you can spend $30 just on cards!  And then when you have girls who, because of your dark addiction, have been introduced to the finest of chocolates – WELL…. the expense goes up, up, up!

So I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE all these free printables!

THESE are free classmates cards, of course you’ll have to buy lollipops or something to go with them.

THESE are free lunchbox notes to put in lunches, hide in every crevice of your child’s room or, like me, you can tape them all over the goodies you send to your college kids.

THESE are free cards for your sweet little loves and your big, romantic love.

So PRINT, PRINT, PRINT and be happy.

And then, with the money you saved, go out and buy yourself some extra rich, dark, and delicious chocolate – from ME  ; )

I can feel the sugar buzz coming on already.

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!

30 Day Photo Challenge: YOUR SKY

Posted in: Just for Fun, Love Love Love & Marriage
January 26, 2012 with 0 Comments

Such a sweet sky.  I wonder who it was for.

Do you ever pine for that kind of impulsive, extravagant, sold-out kind of love?  The kind that spills over you with such emotion you want to scream it from a mountain top or write in the sky – so the whole world will know.

I LOVE this sky.  I wonder who wrote it.

And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
                                                                                                                                       Ephesians 3:17-19

30 Day Photo Challenge: MAKES YOU SMILE

Posted in: Just for Fun, Love Love Love & Marriage
January 15, 2012 with 0 Comments

Day 6: Makes You Smile

This is my husband on the right.  With his friend, Jay, on the left.  Wearing the same shirt.  At Disney World.  Dancing.  In the street.

Note:  The children are no where to be found – hiding in embarrassment.

My friend, Beth and I, we loved it.  It still makes me smile… and tear up.

Shortly after this visit, Jay discovered he had an aggressive, B-cell lymphoma.  His treatment is equally aggressive chemo – 6 rounds followed by a bone marrow transplant.

Mark took a trip to visit Jay and encourage him in between treatments.  I sent him with specific instructions to be a help and do some chores around the house for Beth.

This is definitely a posed shot.  My guess is they were just goofing around as usual but trying to prove to me that Mark was helping out around the house.

It makes me smile to know my husband can be “a friend who loves at all times, and a brother in times of adversity.”

And it makes Jay smile, too.


Confessions: I Am Not The Adoring Type

Posted in: Confessions, Love Love Love & Marriage
January 3, 2012 with 11 Comments

And I am not stupid.  So when I am hit with the same pang of conviction twice in one week I am smart enough to know God is trying to show me something.

Pang #1 hit me during a casual conversation with a friend at the football field.  My friend was sharing with me about her husband.  She was gushing about him, she said that he amazed her and on and on and on.  Hmm, I couldn’t remember the last time I gushed about my husband to anyone.

Pang #2 hit at the Family First Annual Dinner.  The speaker, Dr. Ben Carson, and his wife sat across from me.  They have been married for decades but were adorable together.  The entire time he was speaking, his wife, Candy, would smile at him and give a pre-emptory chuckle seconds before every joke.  She obviously knew every line well but she still thought he was hysterical.  She adored him and every word he spoke as if they had been dating for three months instead of married for thirty years.

I’ve got to work on that.  Is it my “type” that makes me less enamored, fanciful, adoring?  Or is it a lack of appreciation for him – a cynicism that I somehow have outgrown immature infatuation?

So my hubby  put on some new glasses the other night at dinner.  And I looked at him anew because he looked anew.  He smiled and laughed – he is so cute!  I think I need to put on some new glasses – some rose colored glasses so that I can see him adoringly every day.

Alright, don’t laugh.  How about at least once every week.

Temptation: What I Want

Posted in: Lessons I Learned, Love Love Love & Marriage, Susan Holiday Solutions
November 30, 2011 with 8 Comments

 

What is it with me and white lately?!   I am tempted by all things white:

the white fire place and my wedding dress

the white cabinets I want for my kitchen

the silver tub with the white porcelain lining

And now the white Nikon J1.

I want it.

And I am rather attached to it.

If I had a J1 my pictures might look like more Ree Drumond’s or Ann Voskamp’s.  If I had it I would take more pictures of my family that were worth keeping.  If I had the Nikon J1 this blog would be visually inspired by pictures of food and children more beautiful than all the visions of sugar plums that ever dance  in my head put together (do you think there is a chance my husband might read this – hint, wink, hint)!

I have a million excuses to get it…and just as many not to get it.  It is new on the market so there are no deals to be had; I have a looming house renovation (not my choice – the flood, remember) threatening to exceed its budget at every moment; not to mention the three school tuitions I am paying and the 10 year old Ford Explorer I am driving till death do us part (it’s not white, by the way, which is why it has to go).

Do you want?

Do you get attached to things, like me?


This is my new friend, Doris.

She wants more than me, she wants… deeply.

My wants are fluffy and white, hers are heavy and daunting.

I met Doris through Compassion International.  I was asked to sponsor a child twice in one week – at a Michael W. Smith concert and in an Ann Voskamp blog – double inspirations are impossible to ignore.

The cost to meet Doris’s wants, for a whole year, is less than the cost of the Nikon J1.  Just $38 a month.

She is so cute, don’t you think?  Even cuter than the J1.

I have a visions of her – growing, laughing, learning, eating… visiting with me… one day.

I am getting rather attached to her.

Her birthday is in February.  I have an idea for a present…

a flowy, snowy, white dress.

Page 1 of 612345»...Last »