A Quarter Century

We had a blast celebrating Joshua's 25th birthday yesterday! He got a new Samsung Galaxy S III that he is loving! I gave him a new toolbox for him to begin building his collection. He's already proved how handy he is by hanging everything up in our apartment and now he's tackling a new project: refinishing our dining room table and chairs! I'll post some pictures of his endeavors soon (along with some pictures of our apartment). I also followed my usual tradition of delivering a birthday cake to him, complete with 25 candles (no hair was burnt this year!). I am incredibly proud of my groom and excited to celebrate another year of his life because he is the most special person that I know!

"Go...to the land I will show you."

After a blissful week of honeymooning, Erin and I returned to Gwinnett and moved into our temporary home: her family's houseboat. Yes. Another boat. We were only there for two days, but there was plenty to do. Aside from the crazy issues our home church was dealing with, we had to find time to see our families, move my things over to her house, tally up wedding presents, work on getting her name changed... At this point it's really all a blur! It felt like we never stopped to breathe. Quite different from the honeymoon!

Now, we had set aside the coming week to find a home. The journey out to Baton Rouge isn't short, we had more than enough on our plates before the wedding, and we weren't keen on paying for two hotel rooms. That gave us one week after the honeymoon to find a place (the movers were scheduled to come take our stuff that Friday) and then another week to move in and get settled before Erin started work.

But Erin and I like to live life on the edge. Remember how the weather was starting to get gloomy and rainy at the end of our cruise? That's because our ship was outrunning hurricane Isaac. I think maybe the hurricane was after us because the night before our planned trip to Baton Rouge, Isaac changed directions and headed straight for Louisiana. So after an early trip to the Social Security office (to get Erin a new card) we spent a few hours trying to decide if we were foolish, desperate, or making a big deal out of nothing. We thought. We prayed. We made some phone calls. Erin got us a hotel reservation (which was tricky, most hotels had switched to a first-come-first-served basis for the sake of people leaving New Orleans and the coast). And we decided to go for it.

 

 

 

On the way there I started compiling a list of apartment complexes and making phone calls. Half of the places we were interested in were going to be closed until Thursday at least and many of the rest planned to close early on Tuesday in order to make storm preparations. As far as we could tell, the storm was supposed to reach Baton Rouge on Tuesday afternoon then be really crazy all of Wednesday before hopefully calming down on Thursday. I made a few appointments for Tuesday and talked to a few people who said to come by on Thursday if the weather would allow it. We just figured we'd spend Wednesday staring at each other in our hotel room.

 

After a long drive (though not the longest we've ever made), including a Mississippi pit stop for groceries (just in case) and gasoline (apparently there was none left in Baton Rouge), we arrived at our hotel. Only thing on the schedule for that night was coffee with an old STP friend, Tyler. We had a great time catching up and learning a little about the area from him, and then went to bed early.
We made our first stop the next morning at 8. Unfortunately they ended up being closed for the day.

We looked around... nothing fancy... then decided to go to the next place early. The Park on Bluebonnet looked fantastic from the outside! Erin compared it to a college campus- pretty buildings and grounds you can actually see yourself using. When they opened up at 9 we got to hear all the details and see an empty unit. It was one level up from the one we were considering, but it gave us an idea of what the place would be like. We were both impressed, I think. It was definitely on the high end of our budget, but we got some sweet discounts because Erin worked for BASF and because our apartment would be on the 3rd floor. And rent included a lot of other things (like a washer and dryer) that many other places didn't. Erin actually had a friend who lived there as well, so we stopped by her place before leaving.

 

 

It was going to be hard to beat. In fact, for a brief second we were tempted to sign the paperwork then and there. But we decided to at least see the rest of the places we had appointments for... The next place was also very nice. But it didn't come out on top. Only notable thing there was that they forgot to give me back my drivers' license, and I forgot they took it, until we were halfway through Alabama on our way home! Oops. We saw one other place. It was cheaper, but not by much. And it wasn't half as nice.

 

 

So by this point it was about noon. The few prospects that we had left (including Thursday appointments that may or may not ever happen) didn't look super promising. We stopped at our hotel and prayed. Then packed up. I called The Park, which was apparently closing up early for the storm. They said they would email us whatever we needed. And that was that! We checked out of the hotel and aimed the car for Georgia, skies still blue.

After a very long drive we made it home. It's not SUCH a long drive. But 20 hours of traveling out of 36 is rough.

Yet we were so thankful. I don't think God could have proven himself more faithful. What kind of crazy person goes apartment hunting when a hurricane is on its way? When we left Gwinnett on Monday, Erin said she had Abram's calling from Genesis 12 in her mind. Turns out God had some promises and blessings for us as well! Surely there are things we would have liked to go differently. For example, it definitely may have been nice if the apartment was open for us to move in sooner than the very day Erin was supposed to start her new job!

But we have been so thankful to start off our marriage living in God's hands and not our own. When he calls, we will follow- into a new life, a new home, new friends, new jobs... and even towards a hurricane.

Freedom

For our honeymoon, Joshua and I decided to go a Caribbean cruise with carnival. We had an absolute blast! Being on a cruise was a wonderful way to unwind from all the stress of planning a wedding (which we thought was absolutely perfect) and to begin a marriage! There was plenty of sunshine and lots of time to rest by the pool and to eat really delicious food. One acronym that we adopted on our trip was YOHO, meaning 'You Only Honeymoon Once'. So every time we struggled to resist the chocolate melting cake that they served every night for dessert we would simply smile and declare YOHO.

 

On our ship, Carnival Freedom, there was always so much going on. We had delicious food every single night, went to a swing dancing show, had a couples' massage, attended an art show, ordered room service, sat and read together on the balcony of our room, watched the sunset, dressed up fancy for two elegant nights aboard the ship, danced a little bit, played mini golf, and lazed by the pool. It was such a blast and the views from our room where so spectacular!

 

 

Our first stop was Key West. They had lots of planned excursions that you could sign up for via the cruise line but my groom is so creative and savvy that he planned his own excursion for us to do! We walked to Ft. Zachary Taylor state park to lounge on the beautiful beach and snorkel together. I love to dive so it was really exciting to share my love of the ocean with Joshua in a small way. I hope tht we can plan a diving trip sometime soon! After a delicious lunch and shower Joshua surprised me with a trip to this beautiful butterfly conservatory. The butterflies were so beautiful but I think my favorite part was the little baby quails that were running around everywhere! I was chasing them around the conservatory while Joshua sat there shaking his head!

 

 

The second port we stopped at was Grand Cayman Island. Grand Cayman was probably my favorite place that we went on our honeymoon. Josh had arranged for us to take a boat out to a sandbar in the ocean that they had dubbed 'Stingray City'. It was so fun! We got to swim with stingrays and feed them little pieces of squid. It was so strange because you would stick the piece of skin under the stingray and it would suck it right out of your hand! I'm pretty sure that I screamed the first time it happened and Josh almost lost a finger when he tried. We got to hold a stingray and experience being 'kissed' by a stingray (which apparently brings good fortune) and swim around in the gorgeous, corona-commercial-esque ocean. On the way back from Stingray City we got dropped off on 7 mile beach where we spent the rest of the afternoon swimming and soaking up the sun!

 

 

Our final port was Ocho Rios, Jamaica. We taxied over to Dunn's River Falls to take on the death-defying climb to the top! Okay, so it wasn't that dangerous but it was slippery and cold. In fact, my mother broke her toe there a few years back so there have definitely casualties in the past. Joshua and I had a blast working as a team to climb the falls and felt so accomplished when we conquered the river and made it to the top! To celebrate our victory we decided to do a little bit of shopping. Now, if you have ever been to Jamaica, you know how chaotic this can be. The vendors and shop owners are ruthless in their sales tactics to tourists passing through. We were taught secret hand shakes, promised good prices, assured that we were practically Jamaican (they called it 'jamerican'), introduced to family members, anything they could possibly think of to get our money. But my brave husband protected me from most of the harassment with a polite but firm answer to anyone hounding me. Joshua told me that India had prepared him well to handle the Jamaican street vendors.

 

 

As we sailed away from Jamaica we knew that we were beginning our return back to the mainland and back to reality (not to mention outrunning hurricane Isaac). It was a bittersweet thought. On the one hand we were having the time of our lives on our vacation and never wanted it to end and on the other hand we were excited to come home and to find a home and to begin our lives together.
Our honeymoon had been everything it was supposed to be fun, sweet, relaxing, and a tone-setter for our marriage. A recurring theme that kept coming up in our conversations was the word 'freedom' (which is ironic because the name of our ship was Freedom). On our trip Joshua and I began to discover the freedom of marriage. So often when you are dating there are so many boundaries and constraints on your relationship. Physical boundaries, logistical limitations, topics of conversation to avoid, etc. But within the sacredness of marriage all of these things dissolve and all that's left is the joy experienced from total openness with another person. To be known by another to know him. My prayer is that we will always sail on Freedom in our marriage and and that we would continue to grow in joy as we discover even more of each other for the rest of our lives.