Our firstborn daughter married the man of her dreams 11 years and two fantastic sons ago. They are still acting like newlyweds and spreading the love around! In fact, in two days, they’ll be putting on a concert, Decades, featuring love songs from the 1940s – right on up through the present. Deets can be found at dtp.eventbrite.com. And there will be food.*
A sample…
Happy Anniversary, Dave and Tara. Thank-you for the 2 outrageously cute grand-boys, the love you are living and all the joy yet to be! So lucky God gave you to us! How can we ever thank Him enough?
Hunter and Malakai after the candy store (taken by Aunt Stormie)
Happy 8th Anniversary, Rocky & Jovan!
Almost exactly one year ago, you lost so much in the floods that ravaged Colorado and you have been hard at work, tearing out, throwing away, cleaning up and re-building. And the number 8 in the Bible signifies new life, the old is passed away, new beginnings {all things are made new} and wow – that is SO right on for you two! God is just doing new-wonderful things in your life!
The 3 little women with their beautiful mama
So glad Jovan started crushing on you when she was only 14, Rocky. So glad you fell for the woman she became. Thank-you for the three extraodinarily stunning little grand-girlies you have shared with us. So much life and love yet to experience and you’re doing it well!
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September is such a lovely month, isn’t it? Lovely and love-filled!
A really beautiful, fruitful garden takes time. It can’t happen overnight. It takes planning and planting and sunshine and rain. A fruitful garden must be tended…
33 Years in the Making
A marriage, a life, an enduring friendship, a love that lasts, a love that creates, a love that makes a place, a love that can still be silly, but wildly, seriously passionate, too. It takes 33 years to fall so hard, to break-up and make-up because there simply is no other there there. In good times, in bad…
It takes 33 years to have 5 kids and see them grow into human beings you find to be more fascinating than you can believe and to let them become, watching as bits and pieces of yourselves walk around the planet doing well – doing good, bringing glory to God by being who He made them to be. Thirty-three years.
It’s like a blip on the radar screen of time, but this time, our time, this love, our love, these days, our days – they have taken us 33 years to navigate, to tame, to experience, to taste, to cry over, to hold close, to run from, to do badly and to do well. In times of joy, and in times of sorrow…
It has taken us 33 years to get here. I…take you…to be my…
And oh yes, there have been bouquets of flowers and you’ve heard more of my laughter than anyone on earth ever will. And there have been love songs and passionate kisses and just plain times of sweet satisfaction with the life we have lived as honorably as we could and with the children we have raised and their children, now, too. For better…
But there have been agony and night seasons that sent friends fleeing for the hills and you have caught my tears and moved closer to bear my pain. And we have failed miserably sometimes as lovers, sometimes as parents, and as a family, and we’ve had to labor with intensity through great pain, harder than can be imagined, to repair the breeches, restore the losses. For worse…
It takes 33 years for this to be: for us to be us, for the children we raised to be the people they are, for 9 beautiful grandbebes to reward our fruitfulness with so much joy and delight. To have and to hold…
This blessed life was not built in a day, nor in the heated passion of our fall into deep love. It has taken 33 years of rights and wrongs, and good and not-so-good, but overwhelmingly lovely, oh-so-very lovely, love-filled days to get here, with you. For in the times there was nothing else to do, we have lived on love.
It’s taken 33 years for me to have more than I ever hoped or dreamed and more than I deserved. You are my home. Please keep me. :)For as long as we both shall live…
We are not of the “selfie” generation and it takes us 30 or so tries to get us both in the picture, centered and looking roughly the same direction. This was at Peaceful Valley in the Rocky Mountains last week.
Happy Anniversary to the father of my children, to my life, my love, my home, the man of my dreams, and my most trusted friend {a spot well-earned}. Thank-you for your faithfulness, your steadiness, your commitment to love even when it has been challenged, and for knowing who you are in Christ. You’re the strongest man I know.
“You are so handsome, my love,
pleasing beyond words!
The soft grass is our bed;
fragrant cedar branches are the beams of our house,
and pleasant smelling firs are the rafters.” Ecclesiastes 1.16-17 NLT
It took 33 years to create a home and garden so fine.
July 23, 1981 was a wonderful day to begin the work of love.
PS // Oh, and – I know this is a long, serious blog post. I could just as easily have said:Dear Dave, I love your brown skin and strong arms. Plus your gorgeous hair and incredible lips. I love having your body in the bed next to me night after night and that you and me got to make this sweet family and still get to make out anytime we want. Happy Anniversary, lover. Signed, Me ;)
A sweet, really sweet wedding, so joyous, so full of love.
A wedding I will always recall with great joy. I shared a little about it last week, but my favorite part was when the bride and groom served communion to all their guests. I had never seen that done before or since. The song was, “I Pour My Love on You.” It was amazing.
Like oil upon your feet ~ Like wine for you to drink
Like water from my heart ~ I pour my love on you
If praise is like perfume ~ I’ll lavish mine on you
Till every drop is gone ~ I’ll pour my love on you
I think the fact that you not only speak on dating at youth conferences, but also still {actually date} is a really good thing.
And now your love is displayed in and through your sons.
And oh, how I love those boys, a double scoop of wonder and delight, with kisses sprinkled freely! You’re not only good friends and lovers, but amazing parents, too.
Hunter’s first day of 3rd grade
It’s beautiful~your love and marriage. Many more happy years to come! Love you, my sweets!
Love grows more tremendously full, swift, poignant, as the years multiply. ~Zane Grey
I hope you never forget, Tristan, how pleased we were to get YOU as our first son by marriage. I know it had to be terribly overwhelming to join this humongous, loud bunch, but we loved you instantly and thought you had amazing taste to marry our daughter! I hope I have let you know often enough. We do thank God for you.
And I hope you will never forget, Stephanie, how pleased we are with the choice you made and how you have chosen to love and grow with Tristan. And are making a family of love. We could not be prouder of the woman you are, and our daughter, too! It is all further proof of your keen sensibilities and superior perspicacity in so many many areas, including love and marriage.
You two chose well. You have done well. You are doing so well and we love you.
Congratulations on the 11th anniversary of the day of your marriage. Be blessed with many, many more!
It was crisp black lines and soft, silk blue and monograms and crystally-light drapes. It was bubbles and blue Mustangs and tuxedos and loveliness. Barefoot flowergirls, curled hair cascading down their backs and ring-bearers raced to the finish line. The black, menacing sky broke forth into a yellow blaze of western-sun glory just as the bride, on her father’s arm, entered to be seen by her groom. There was a 5-tier cake, each a unique and specially-chosen flavor with gourmet fillings, embellished with the palest blue and thousands of edible pearls. There was candlelight. Friends and family filled every space, the dancing was exhuberant and chocolate fountains flowed.
My favorite part of Rocky and Jovan’s wedding day? The vows they wrote to each other, so sweet and loving and true. A close second would be that Jovan and I tested at least 17 buttercream recipes and hit upon the perfect one. My favorite part since? Their commitment to passing on family traditions and their gift of time, the time they give us on holidays and holy days, the special events and times that make family and keep the legacy going.
Rocky and Jovan got married three years ago on September 15, 2006. Congratulations and Happy Anniversary you two beautiful people. Life has changed since then. Rocky + Jovan brought us Averi-baby and will bring me another grandbebe in the spring! This is a thrilling and good thing.
Love you so much, my son and his love…mom
pictured: Rocky and Jovan with Averi, taken by Ellie Pickett; The “Rock-vans” at Heaven Fest, taken by Kori Verspohl
