Mother Love

If you don’t know, the kitchen is what I call my happy place.

Not that I’m not happy elsewhere, but the kitchen is just where I love to be…making food for those around me. I always think it sounds a little odd when I say it, but it’s just how I feel: I love to love people through food. I love cooking for our little family, and actually look forward to having a larger family one day that will keep me even busier in the kitchen. Cozy breakfasts, packed lunches, after school snacks, and a hearty dinner to round out the day for my husband and kids is my idea of a perfectly great day.

As much as I love to cook, it’s sometimes so challenging to actually decide what to make. I can get lost in the cook books and Pinterest feeds and food blogs for hours trying to decide our menus…and still more often than not, I revert back to our good ‘ole classic favorites several times a week. Burrito bowls, soups, and large dinner salads are some of the meals we have on repeat around here!

But here are four recipes that I’m gearing up to try:
Cranberry Pot Roast
Brussels Sprout Hash
Blistered Green Beans with Tomato-Almond Pesto
Spiced Apple Chutney

What about you: do you find it easy to decide on a food menu and what do you use for ideas/inspiration?

I’d love to hear your thoughts!

I love being married.

I’ve been a wife for two and a half years now, and it has literally been the best two and a half years of my life. Ben and I don’t have a perfect marriage, but we have a good one. We are friends and we enjoy being together and we laugh together and make spending time together a priority. Honestly, my husband is the main reason that “the honeymoon hasn’t ended” for us…he hasn’t stopped pursuing me and dating me and loving me from the first day of our marriage. He has practiced such intentionality in keeping our relationship alive and connected, and for that, I am extremely thankful.

During the past two+ years of being married, I’ve learned much, changed much, grown much. If you don’t change, learn, and grow after getting married, you’ll have problems. It’s just the nature of marriage and it’s how you take two lives and meld them together as one. You have to be willing to change if you want to have a great marriage. We are both passionate about marriage, and not just our own, but other marriages as well. We want to thrive in our relationship and we love to see other marriages thrive as well! We always notice when older couples still hold hands and enjoy each other after years of being together, and it inspires us to do all that we can today to make the rest of our life together a joyful experience.

No one really asked for it, but if you did want to know my best marriage advice, it would be this: repent.

Repent.

Say you are sorry. And mean it!

Beyond the date nights and conversations over coffee and quiet evenings sitting on the couch together, the thing that has kept our relationship thriving is repentance. We’ve asked for forgiveness from each other for some of the littlest things. And sometimes it’s even things that the other person didn’t even think about or didn’t even feel hurt by….a harsh tone of voice, little nuances, sarcasm with a message behind me.

A few months ago, Ben offered to help load the dishwasher one evening after supper and I guess I wasn’t in the mood for help or something because I snappily told him “I got it!” It was a small thing, but it kept bugging me as the night went on. I’ve learned that if I feel that gentle conviction in my heart to repent and make something right with Ben, I need to just do it. No matter how small or inconsequential the issue might have been…no matter if he even felt hurt or not…just do it! I went to him later that evening and apologized for the way I responded…he hadn’t even thought about it! But I knew my own heart and I knew that I was wrong for treating him like I did. I apologized, he forgave me, we kissed (best part of making up, right?!), and it was all made right.

So there you have it…my best marriage advice.
Repent to each other.
Say you are sorry.
Forgive.

What about you: what would you say is the most important thing in your own marriage relationship to staying connected and thriving?

I’d love to hear your thoughts!