Eight Years of Wed // Anniversary Album

Mark and I are celebrating our eighth wedding anniversary. Well, it was actually on the 4th but due to life's current floor-ripping-up chaos, we are celebrating today with a lovely dinner out tonight. Woohoo!

Eight years of marriage - wowzers! In some ways, it feels like decades (what was life like without this guy by my side? Can barely remember!)... and yet it has also flown by. Though when I stop and think about everything we have crammed in over eight years it suddenly seems rather busy! In very short summary - we got married just as I finished uni and started my career in communications and fundraising, we rented one house then saved like crazy and bought our very first home (a little townhouse), we went on a 'trip of a lifetime' to South Africa, South America and Malaysia, we had one kid, then another one, privately sold our first home (sniff), bought a family-sized home (backyard, yay!), did renovations, got pregnant with #3.... phew!

So... anyhoo, being the sentimental gal I am, after we got hitched (like, a year or so later when I remembered to do it) I started a photo album (one of those 'antique' ones, you know where you actually printed photos then stuck them in a real live book thing?!) called our Anniversary Album... with the aim of putting in a photo each year from around the time of our Anniversary, so we could track our little family as we grew old and grey (I pray!) together. 

Now finding ourselves in this fandangled internet age, I thought I would show a little online version of where we are up to eight years in....

So here 'tis!

2004-2012
Eight years of marriage and adventure with my best friend!

Now, as above, we all know how sentimental I can be. I could gush for paragraphs or (let's be honest) pages about this lovely man of mine, but I don't think that everyone needs to read all that! Suffice to say this... you know that question you sometimes hear asked of married couples... 'If you could do it all over again, would you still marry this person?'. Well, if you were to happen to ask me that, here is what I would say...

If I knew then what I knew now? I would only run all the faster towards this man. Oh yes, I knew God had brought a good guy into my life but I had no idea how good. How loving, faithful, dedicated, godly, fun, caring and selfless he would be. No matter what challenges we came  up against. What a quietly adventurous life we would lead, what a family we would be blessed with, what growth we would both be challenged to embrace. I know God had His hand in bringing us together, cos I sure was not smart enough to truly recognise what a good thing I was onto when I accepted Mark's 'at dawn by the lake' proposal, though of course I had a fairly good inkling! But, oh, how grateful I am that, not even knowing how good it could be, we decided to leap into life together. Never even one second of regret... only gratitude.

Love you, Markinhos!

Ok, ok, enough gushing, right?! ;) 

christmas creeping in // ornament painting

Oh, Christmas - it is a truly wonderful time of the year! 

Especially when you have little kids through which to capture and see a-new the magic and wonder of the season. 

To say I am itching to get our tree out and house decorated would be an understatement. However, renovations, dining tables in the lounge room and dust and relocated house-hold items everywhere means we cannot for another week or two. Not the end of the world, especially when we are really grateful to finally get these floors done. So I will attempt to be slightly more mature than my children and wait patiently. **Note, I did say 'attempt'**

Ahem.

Well, though the house is in chaos and life can be too, we can slowly start to introduce some Christmassey goodness anyway! We started last night with gathering around the computer and singing Christmas carols along with our new Christmas CD. It was simply precious family time. Then continued today with painting some ornaments. Oh, I have so many Christmas thoughts, plans, ponderings and family traditions to do and share but just like the Christmas decor set up, this year they must unfold slowly... a little late... but definitely still coming and better than never. I cannot wait!!!

A most wonderful time of the year....

A fairly aggressive painting technique!

Taking her task so very, very seriously!

Um.... I could take photos of little paint splattered hands all day. Actually, I think I will!!! :)

Oooh, ahh, he is signing the American Sign Language gesture for 'I love you'. Clever boy or unintentional!? I will let you decide...

beautiful boy

Thanks so much to Amber of We Stood Together for these stunning photos of my adorable-but-possibly-due-for-a-hair-cut little man!

dusty

The worst of the drilling up of the old flooring (and inch of cement-sub-floor) is finally over. Not before it almost broke me, I must admit... and I wasn't even doing the drilling!!! Mark did an amaaaaaaazing job - four days of back breaking work. Finally, we can clean up some of the dust as Mark just does a bit more smoothing out before the new flooring is laid. The dust is so thick throughout our entire house, on every surface and in every drawer.... ugh! At least we can commence clean up now!!

However, the kids are fascinated and intrigued by the whole process. When they saw mounds of dust and rubble, they eagerly got amongst it and vigorously swept up piles of dust. Bless their enthusiastic and helpful little hearts - every aspect of life is an adventure to them! 

'More dere, Lily' Eli points out helpfully!

an early morning bounce

Once again the kids and I had to escape the house early so Daddy could drill up more of the floors. 

Hanging out in the backyard, Lily asked for her photo to be taken standing on the edge of the trampoline. This is a rare offer so was of course seized immediately.

Of course, Little E is always happy to be part of the picture too!

Starting off with the goofball faces...

the look of love...

A cuddle worth almost falling off the trampoline for...

What little brothers are for.... getting crazy!

a long list of thankfulness

About a year ago, we started a family list of things to be thankful for. A long strip of paper hung on our wall and we would add to it regularly over a month or so... the kids coming up with all kinds of gorgeous things to be grateful for. It was lovely to have it hanging near our dining table, a constant reminder of the many many things we could be thankful for and always found something new to add! I had intended to wrap it up with a family reading of the list and some kind of act of recognition of all those things, but then we had a kitchen reno start, the paper list got rolled up and put in a cupboard and...

Um...

Yeah, I totally forgot about it! But I discovered it again recently so in the spirit of seizing the moment and keeping things simple (see?! I am slowly learning, lol...), I decided to just pull it out after dinner. We read through the Very.Long.List together and then the kids added some new things - Lily then drew pictures on the paper of things she was thankful for, and so did Eli (well, he scrawled!).

We spent some time in prayer, thanking God as a family for the many blessings He rains down on us so richly. For the month of December, I really want us to focus on giving back to others, serving, doing acts of kindness, etc so this turned out to be a nice kick off. We have been richly blessed and we are even more blessed when we focus on giving rather than receiving. Something I deeply desire to impart to my children and something I constantly want and need to remind myself of too.

Disclaimer: These photos were actually taken last week but I didn't post them on that day as something else came up that I posted about. Today was actually a mad crazy day with our flooring getting drilled up, and I didn't take any photos, as I decided to make this my post for today. This is called making my Project 366 work for me and not the other way around! ;) 

a fairy tea party

The day started with me dragging the kids outside at 7am so Daddy could start drilling up the cement subfloor. It was
soooo loud, outside was the only option - with YouTube videos of Mickey Mouse to keep them occupied while I
scrambled for breakfast stuff inside. They are wearing thick coats on a super hot morning because I was wearing a dressing gown, so Lily wanted to wear hers too then so did Eli but I could only find his jacket. Ha! 

Off to celebrate the 3rd birthday of adorable little Harper. Her clever Mama Amber of WeStoodTogether put together an enchanting fairy tea party, with no detail left undone. So pretty, so fun, so wonderful - we had a blast. Such a lovely day for a lovely little girl... a labour of love from her amazing Mama!

FInn, Harper, Lily and Eli - who has time to pose when there is party food to eat?!

Gift opening!

Lily was only toooo happy to assist Harper in opening her present!

Bunting made from Little Golden Book Cinderella story... charming or what?!

Fabulous hand-made felt crowns for the kids and books to take home... perfection!

The little Prince/Wizard happily chowing down on a fruit kebab!

Harper in shock and awe over her beautiful fairy princess cake!