Affirmation

I remember when I was pregnant with Maisie (4 years ago! What!?) reading in the small section about "pregnancy number two concerns" in my What to Expect book (to this day I don't know why I was reading that section) I just remember the Q&A page that voiced the concern of a mother of a toddler who was pregnant with another baby and she asked: "Will I love this child as much as my first?" I remember scoffing and thinking that despite what my teachers had taught me about "there is no such thing as a dumb question" I read that question and instantly thought that those teachers were quite mistaken. Anyway, it wasn't until Maisie turned two when we were in the talks of growing our family, when I started to experience anxiety about that very subject. I would think it's impossible for me to love more. And it's true, I love my husband and daughter with every ounce of my being and the idea of trying to divide that love? Well, it terrified me.

It wasn't until my wise husband said these words to me that it finally clicked...

"Your love won't divide, it will only grow."

For two years I had told myself those words over and over and now that we are in the throes of growing our family (almost half way there!) I truly and completely believe them. My love for this little one growing within me is already fierce and I have never doubted my connection to it or it's purpose in our lives.

Birthday Getaway

Last weekend, for my 25th birthday my in-laws put Austin and I up in a room at the Oregon coast for a mini getaway while they babysat Maisie. We left after Austin got off work on Friday and then we made our way to Pacific City to stay at the Inn at Cape Kiwanda. We had a nice dinner at The Pelican Pub and then called it a night. 

After we woke up, we made our way down to the cafe below the hotel and ordered oatmeal, bagels and orange/mango juice and ate in our room while watching Moonrise Kingdom before making our way to Tillamook. On our way out we picked up some fish tacos from BJ's and weren't disappointed with our friends' recommendation. After Tillamook (and tons of yummy cheese curds) we drove to Lincoln City to do some shopping. We were planning on some beach time, but it was drizzling and cold, so we kept warm in antique stores and the outlets instead.

It was a lot of fun to get quality husband and wife time together and a perfect way to celebrate turning a quarter of a century old.

p.s oh, and we had Mo's too. Haha as you can tell there was a lot of eating involved 

Our room is on the top left.

We're classy, we know. Yes. That's gatorade in wine glasses. Haha

View from our room.

Haystack Rock

On marriage...

I remember a conversation that Austin and I had a couple years back talking about how we are partnered together to weather the storm. An inevitable storm that lies before us full of loss, sickness, missed opportunities, regrets and brokenness. And to me that means love more than anything. It's too easy to love in the good times, but loving when it's difficult? Yes, it requires a lot of work and conditioning, but creating a system of strength, assuredly knowing it can and will withstand the storm no matter the severity, no matter the damage. 

To me, that's true love. 

For better or for worse right? (Notice the vows don't follow that up with a quick under the breath "...only when its convenient.") I've been thinking a lot about that line for better OR for worse lately and I'm thinking it should be tweaked to: for better AND for worse because honestly, there's no "or" about it. You will feel immense love and great disappointment albeit, not at the same time. Marriage isn't necessarily designed to be difficult per say, but it does mean you will experience the polar ends of each emotion of "better" and "worse" and sometimes by default that becomes rather difficult. One moment euphoria and the other debilitating pain. 

Had you asked me 4 years ago what I thought marriage was about:

 I would have said it's about choosing somebody that you want to experience all of life's joys with.

I still stand by that statement, but as I've grown older and have first hand experience to the many ups and down of marriage. I would now change my answer to: 

Choosing somebody who plans to endure to the end beside me. Somebody who is ever present in every facet of joy and sorrow and everything in-between.  Confidently knowing full well that in the moments I feel broken, I won't feel lonely.

I know whole heartily that I married the perfect person for me. That while, marriage is a whole lot more difficult than previously thought, I know that the blessings that come from it outweigh the hurt feelings and trials. I know through thick or thin he's there and always will be and that makes me so very happy.

Moving forward...

We are moving back to Oregon later this month. Yes, Austin is quitting (he put his two weeks in today). We are going back to school (BYU Idaho) aiming for a start date of January if we can get our application in on time, but if not, we will for sure start in April. Yes, we are crazy nervous/excited/disappointed/relieved but we know without a shadow of a doubt that we are doing the right thing.

Late one night after Maisie was asleep and the house was quiet, Austin and I were sitting across from each other at the dining room table. I was drinking some tea as Austin started to talk about work. Things he was excited about, things that needed to change, just talking candidly about how work was going. I tried to stay quiet to just listen, but when he paused I felt compeled to ask "Even if you had your dream position within the company and money wasn't something we had to worry about anymore, is this something you would want to do for the long haul?" Austin thought about it for a few seconds before he answered "No." We looked at each other and asked
"so, what do we do now?"

So we talked about what our dreams are. Where we saw ourselves, where we wanted to be and instead of saying that it was unrealistic, difficult or even crazy, we, for the first time ever said, 

let's make it happen.

We always seemed to have some sort of an excuse to not follow our original plan because of that little surprise of getting pregnant two months after getting married. I am ashamed that we even used that as an excuse because really, now that we have a kid, its only more of a reason to follow our dreams. We are her examples and greatest influence, so how are we to ever hope that Maisie follow her dreams if we never followed ours?  Regardless of age, economical status, amount of children we can always start over and try again. Not that it won't be without struggle or difficulties because we obviously know the path we have chosen will be an uphill hike and if after reevaluating, we decide to step off that path and take another one, then so be it. We just know we will always be moving forward. No more getting "stuck" and wishing for a different outcome.

We don't regret moving to California whatsoever. This has been such a fun, challenging yet rewarding year for us and there's a big part of me thats terribly sad to leave (mainly because of friendships, sunshine and all the fun things to do here). But now that we have had our wake up call and are getting our priorities in line, we are ready to take a huge leap of faith and seek the achievements that will bring us long term happiness.

Heres to making life altering decisions and making them sooner than later. Cheers to a few more weeks in sunny California that we plan on filling with fun activities with our friends. Oh.. and a few more French cooking classes from our neighbor/friend/chef/personal trainer
(yes, he really does it all).