as the music at the banquet, so are you to me

Our 6 year wedding anniversary has come and gone. 

We celebrated early with a little 24 hour getaway to Tulsa.  We were already hanging out in Stillwater because of Colt's high school reunion, which he helped organized.  (We couldn't have had more opposite high school experiences.) 

After all of the reunion festivities, we headed to Tulsa.  Colt's parents watched the kids overnight - first overnight away since Nova's been born!  We had such a great time.  There was thrift store shopping, eating, sleeping, room service, and lots of good talking.  It's pretty tricky to find time to really talk these days.  Look each other in the eye and really ask how the other person is kind of talking.  This weekend allowed us to regroup and hit the restart button. 

On the actual day of our anniversary, we attended one of our precious friend's weddings.  I had the honor of doing a song for the ceremony that Karlie (my sister) actually sang in our ceremony - "So Are You To Me."  It was a full circle kind of moment.

A sweet mentor in our church said (wrote) some sweet words to me the other day.  Our conversation wasn't technically about marriage, but at the end, she added that Colt is such a good protector for me and that he always has my back.  I couldn't agree more.  One of the best things about being married is that someone is always on your team no matter what.  

Right now, we're in a season of life where we're finding our new normal with 2 kids.  You know how it goes - a quick "Bye, I love you" whispered to me in the morning, a fast dinner as he rushes in the door at 6 p.m. because we have somewhere to be (soccer practice, church, etc.), the default chaos of doing anything with a 3 year old and a 4 month old, the quick drive home to get everyone in bed at a decent hour, tidying up the house, putting dishes away ... and that's that.  Sometimes we squeeze in an episode of a show or some hot tea or whatever, but sometimes we can't.  It's just the season we're in.  I'd say that we're pretty adjusted, but there are some legitimately tough days here and there.

But I told Colt in the car that weekend in Tulsa that I don't think the little-kid-raising phase has to equal a semi-crappy marriage.  Well, it's just the season we're in is true, but I want to fight against it.  We still want to be married well.

Every year of marriage that goes by, a little layer of ourselves gets peeled away.  Every year we learn just a bit more about how we can be better to one another and how we can love better.  We aren't perfect to each other all the time, but we chose each other 6 years ago, so we'll keep working at it.

Thanks, Colt, for holding my heart so well.  I wouldn't want to be doing this life thing, marriage thing, or parenting thing with anyone else but you.