Nearly a decade baby!

It is the night of the 25th of January and that means that tomorrow is our wedding anniversary! Yay us! A whole 9 years  of being married! (cue applause) That means that 9 years ago we were setting up our wedding venue and getting ready to say 'I do'. It was a Sunday night after the evening service at our church and as people left to go home, faithful family and friends stayed behind to help hang fairy lights and decorate with ivy my mum had scavenged from the neighbours while they had slept the night before. The cafe was soon turned into a ceremony venue and that venue, where we had met, sat drinking coffee before services while we dated and where we would soon tie the knot, became the place we would hold our daughters first birthday family celebration and gather to celebrate dedications of our babies and other special events. It was a relaxed, beautiful, special day filled with love-filled touches from family and loved-ones who did things like making the bridesmaids dresses to making our cake to catering on the night. It was definitely a team effort and so much fun!

We will have to postpone any celebrating because Gav is away in San Diego for work for a few days (this is a blog post in itself and in a few days I'll post up the full story of an AWESOME testimony to do with this). The looming 9 year mark of marriage (which seems a big deal, maybe because it's nearly a decade? I'm not sure) but it's got me pondering this marriage thing that totally changes your life in so many ways.

I am completely convinced that marriage is a God idea and an institution that although is ages old, is very relevant to us today. God's ways are great like that - timeless. What a fascinating idea we buy into to take our own self-centered lives, full of ambitions, dreams, likes and dislikes and to willingly join them with another COMPLETELY different person with DIFFERENT desires, ambitions, dreams, likes and dislikes and to work together to forge a life together. O and creating little humans along the way that you have to come to some sort of agreement in raising to be functional and hopefully 'nice' human beings. It just fascinates me when I stop and think about it.

I am absolutely convinced that this God-idea only really works when we do it His way. It is fundamentally based on a concept of surrender and sacrifice (not words you'll hear bandied around in romantic contexts...) Their are so many bad versions of marriage it's getting harder and harder to find role models in this area of people living in a fulfilled, happy, FUN marriage.

If I'm honest, marriage has been a real roller-coaster ride. It's that constant tension of celebrating each other's achievements but also being willing to bare each other's burdens. It's holding the fort while the other person is going through trials. It's tears of frustration as you work out situations and tears of joy at moments you get to share together that make all the hard times seem worth it.

Some of my greatest life lessons have come through being married. Some of my greatest adventures have been being married. Some of my greatest heartache has come through struggles since being married. I've fulfilled dreams of travelling with Gavin. We've had beautiful babies and shared raising them so far which has been my absolute dream come true. I have seen two of our babies go straight to Heaven and journied through loss being married. We have gone through seasons of little and seasons of plenty. We have gone through fun seasons and hard ones of losing loved ones. The roller-coaster never stops but there is a security that you're strapped in next to someone who is committed to the ride with you. Come what may.

I have a dream to write a book about our full story. I know now is not the time because it's early days still. I think we can all tackle life's ups and downs with a bit more certainty remembering that this is just another chapter in the book and that WE have the power of choice and determination to decide when and how our story ends. As long as we keep at this thing, continually enlist God's help to become the best version of ourselves and surround ourselves with all the help we can get, we will have a happier ending than we set out believing was possible.

So here's to all the married people, all the people who CHOOSE to laugh together, who CHOOSE to find the fun in the mundane, who CHOOSE to keep buckled into that roller-coaster next to the one you've embarked on this journey with. All the people who choose to keep choosing.




Happy Anniversary Gavin de Wit!! The best is ALWAYS yet to come xx