Fifteen years ago today, I walked down the aisle and pledged always and forever to the man God intended me to spend the rest of my life with.  My love.  My best friend.  My team mate.

We said no matter what we would stay together.  We were young, indeed.  And yes, very naive (just drive by our first home together…It’s amazing we came out of there alive).  I wouldn’t trade those young naive years for anything in the world.  We learned so much those first few years.

And each year has brought different challenges.  Different ways that the Lord has brought us closer to Him and to each other.

This year has not been an exception.  We have learned to lean on each other in ways I would never imagine we could or have.  We are learning more and more how to better communicate in hard situations.  And the joyous situations have brought us more joy than I could ever imagine.

We have definitely learned, this year, how precious each and every sweet laughter and deep exhale is.

I could not imagine walking this special needs journey without Mark.

I could not imagine walking these past fifteen years without his caring, compassionate and patient (long suffering comes to mind when we think about my crazy emotional self) love.  He reminds me so much of the Lord’s agape love for us.

So, Happy Anniversary to my knight!  I am so blessed to have you!

 Working on the stone.  This was lightweight stone facade called Air Stone.  It was easy (don’t ask Mark…he was the cutter), to cut and went on with their adhesive glue gloop.  Once we got in to a groove, it got easier and went faster.  I placed, marked and handed off.  Mark cut and sometimes installed or would hand back to me to put the glue on and stick up.

 I really do love it! It makes the room so much more inviting  It wasn’t expensive either.  We paid around $75 for the whole facade and had plenty leftover.

He did quite a bit of planning and consulting with our pastor who is a carpenter.  We were very grateful to have his input because these shelves could be hung on by our monkeys and they are not going anywhere!  Each kid has two large white baskets (1.5 bushels) and then two sets of smaller drawers for personables (also called “unmentionables”).  Emmie’s clothes are still in the sitting room which is now the nursery.  They’ll move when she moves.  I have a shelf above Zoe and Ace’s clothes that still holds the clothes we are sorting through (as well as the space on the floor).  My shoe storage is now in the boys’ walk-in closet and their coats are hanging up in their rooms.

I’m thrilled with the result and the kids absolutely love it.  We’re still teaching them to NOT get dressed in the closet but it’s a process and they are learning.

The verse is from 1 Peter 3:18, “But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” I used vinyl lettering to get it on there, pretty like.

And now, we have a board that will follow us wherever we go…marking heights and making memories.  Mark and I have a bit of a fear though.  Josiah seems to be passing up his older (more competitive) brother in height.

I added blogging to the end.  While we’re not quite completely done with it, we are very close.

Since we’re almost through with Autumn, I thought I would show our front door decor.

 For my birthday, my parents brought me two gorgeous rustic bird houses.  I may move one to the back at some point but for now they are on the stoop.  The bench is an old piano bench that I painted cream color and I made up the pillows really quickly.

 This was pinterest inspired: 

I was too impatient to find a basket holder or figure out how to do a wooden letter, so a metal flower holder and vinyl letter were my compromise.  I love it because I can change out the flowers with each season like this:

I think it’s simply beautiful!  I’ll take the peppermints and presents off after Chirstmas for my winter decor.

Here’s the stoop all decorated for Christmas!

Sadly, the plants in the tricycle are dead.  Raise your hand if you’re surprised.  Anyone?  Yeah, me neither.

I’m slowly catching up to what we’re organizing.  This week I’m showcasing our mudroom.  One of the things on my list that was what I considered a “luxury” was a mudroom.  A place to drop our things and was out of the way.  Well, imagine my delight when we looked at this house and saw a nook right beside the garage door!  From the moment the contract was signed I started plotting what I was going to do with the space.  And I’ve done it.

But first, we had to get our ducks in a row.  I decided this space would be our big paint project for the month.  And picking out colors is now starting to drive me bonkers a bit!  But I did it.

Here’s the befores:

 The bench was a coffee table and something else I can’t remember.  I used an old crib mattress that was falling apart to provide cushion and then we added baskets underneath for storage.  At our old house it was the shoe cubby and worked great (when the kids put their shoes up).  We purchased the cheaper cubby type shelves from Lowe’s for shoe storage at our new house.  I had thought about putting in baskets but then remembered that the kids typically may pull the baskets out and put the shoes in but then they would forget to put the baskets up.  I don’t want more stuff to step around.

This is the message center.  It holds our jurisdiction list, chore list and buddy responsiblities (I’ll share more on those later if ya’ll want…just let me know).  We also have a place for prayer cards for missionaries.  And there are hooks for keys, dog leashes etc.  Hopefully, by next year I’ll have something more like this:

And all my organized friends just drooled. Me too. I hear ya.

Anyway, back to the mudroom.  Here are the afters:

 Crimson and gray!  Roll Tide!  I had my eye on some pretty Alabama fabric for the bench but when we got to the store it was $10 a yard.  I quickly realized that spending $20 on recovering a bench was not worth it and this fabric at under $4 would work just fine (it was 60% off).  I’m thrilled with how it all came together.  It helps that I took the fabric and matched it to the paint!  This is coming out of the half bath.

 My beautiful bench.  That sucker is over ten years old.  We got it from Big Lots when we first moved to this area.