“We Do!” Again!

Our paper work is finished! Now we await our interviews. As exciting as it is to complete this phase, the road to get to this point was long. It was the source of many long days, nights, and days off of work, arguments, and stress. It wasn’t all bad, but this was no small feat. In addition we are planning our family reunion, where over 60 people will descend on our house this Friday. Again, long days, nights, arguments, stress, etc. This has indeed been a long summer, filled with anticipation. But in the midst of us preparing for the day that we receive our precious child, we got so caught up in the process we forgot that we actually have to live and talk about what kind of parents we’re going to be. The foundation of our parenthood of course, is our marriage.

So to make sure that we’re on solid ground, we took part in a marriage seminar (simulcast) this weekend at our church, Lifelong Love Affair (marriagetoday.com). It was awesome! We learned new things and we were reminded of things that we have forgotten or had not considered. We were reminded that we are partners and to do things as such. That while the man is the head, we are equals. We are here to help each other because we can’t accomplish what God designed for us to do alone. We were reminded to serve each other and to treat each other better than we do anyone else. Sometimes we give our best to everyone else and we give our spouse what’s left, if that. But we are to give our best to our spouse. If either one of us is in a foul mood or argumentative, then we fight that “spirit” with love. Fighting fire with fire creates a bigger fire. While this wasn’t necessarily news, the way in which it was presented and was received was new. It was one of the many light bulb moments.

The seminar ended with a renewing of the vows. Not exactly how we pictured renewing our vows in jeans and capris and t-shirts, with thousands of other couples. But the sentiment was there. We removed our rings (well Ted had to pretend to remove my ring. my ring is a little tight ☺) and promised our lifelong love to each other, again. We feel like a brand new couple. We now feel that we can begin our deep discussions of what our lives, as parents will be. Not that we are finished working on us. This will be a continual and necessary process. We have to be committed to each other and take care of our foundation in order to build one for our family. We encourage all of our friends to either formally or informally re-dedicate yourselves to making your marriage all that God intended.