A Season Full of New Beginnings...

If you are anything like me, you are SO SUPER thankful for new beginnings! Taking with you what you've learned through experiences in life so far, and a chance to start fresh. New beginnings can be refreshing, challenging, exciting, scary...a whole range of emotions all wrapped up in one. This has definitely been a season of new beginnings for us.

New Beginning #1: As you all well know by now, Dan and I were married on December 6th, 2008. I have felt the need to blog about that experience, but find it so overwhelming to think about actually capturing it in the confines of text in this blogosphere. I don't want to do it any injustice or leave ANYTHING out. So in effort to preserve it, all I can say is it was THE most perfect day in my life...more than I ever dreamed it would be. I married the man of my dreams who is perfect in EVERY way for just me. It brings me more joy than anything I have ever experienced to say that we did things "right," according to what we believe God intended for our dating relationship and marriage to look like. With no guilt or shame, only joy and excitement bubbling over, that day was the greatest day of my life. We are loving learning each other, growing together and being full-time roomies! I love waking up every morning and thinking, "I have the best husband ever." Here are some pics of our day....courtesy of the one, the only, Brooke Robinson

As much as I love new beginnings, they often require a goodbye. This brings me to my second "new beginning".

New Beginning #2: Because of the life I led in my past, I have often cycled friends in and out of my life. It was only when I started walking with the Lord that I realized what true friendship was and what it was always intended to be. With that realization, I have been blessed over the past four years with life-long friends...girls I know deeply, make every attempt to invest in, and know they truly care for me. One of those friends is my friend Jenny Robertson (now Shelby...YAY!). I met Jenny through a random series of events about 5 years ago when she was living in Little Rock working for the American Heart Association, and I participated in an event in Conway with my mom, who had recently had open heart surgery. It wasn't until two years later, when Jenny moved back to Fayetteville, that our path's crossed again on a mission trip to Gulfport to do hurricane relief work. That was the beginning of one of my most treasured friendships...one that makes life so much sweeter. Jenny understands me like very few do. I can tell her ANYTHING...and I mean ANYTHING...and she will love me unconditionally. We laugh harder together than I laugh with just about anyone. We have cried pretty hard together too. Jenny holds a precious place in my heart for showing me what real friendship looks like. Jenny was married last month to Matt Shelby, the PERFECT man for her, and they moved to Green Bay, WI. Though it's so hard to be away from her, and I miss her terribly, our friendship is one that spans miles and miles. I love you, Jenny, and miss your face!

New Beginning #3: This past week has been the most recent series of goodbye's, but also some hello's! We said goodbye to Transfer and CLC last week. It was hard....really hard...but we know the Lord has called us to Victory Church, so there is MUCH peace in that! CLC has been Dan's family for the past five years, and they are so wonderful. We have felt so loved by the kids at Transfer and the congregation at CLC, and feel blessed to have been part of that ministry. Dan spoke in both services on Sunday morning, and as his wife, I feel the liberty to say, HE BROUGHT IT! He was amazing. He shared is heart, and I think his heart is beautiful. You can watch or listen to his talk here. Dan will transition to OKC on Saturday of this week, with his first youth service there being next Wednesday! We went over last Saturday for a little party with the youth leaders, and had a BLAST! We are SOOO excited to be a part of this new ministry, and can't wait to see what God has in store. We know it's going to be HUGE! We are so hungry to be used, and KNOW this is just the place. We have been so welcomed and accomodated, and already love the heart of this church and the people there. Please continue to pray for us as we make this big step!

Last little new beginning tid-bit, and this is funny...as you know, we are trying to sell/rent/barter/trade for gummy bears...whatever we can get...our house here right now. We are working with an agent who is a dear friend of ours, and he found a renter! For some reason, I was wanting to meet this person...not sure why...just did. Apparently, this is not the norm in the renting process, so I was told by my husband who knows all. ; ) But, I still wanted to meet the potential renter. When our agent told the person about this request, they were frustrated because we had strung them out for a week, and were now wanting to meet them and they needed to make a decision...understandable. When Dan was telling me all of this, I said in all of my girliness and glory, "Dan! This is OUR house! I LOVE this house! We watched our first movie together in this house! We fell in love in this house! We had our first kiss in this house! We came home to this house after we got married!!!" I didn't have to add anything else to my list because he was looking at me like I was NUTS! Finally, I said, "I think I'm too emotionally attached...you just handle this." And so he is, and I believe we have it rented!! GIRLS!!!!!!!!!!