Hello again

Hello friends!

I suppose today is as good a time as any to renew my little blog because the past year has been on my mind a lot. Mark and I have now celebrated our first wedding anniversary, and while we filled the past year with loads of happenings it still whirled by faster than I could have ever imagined. I've had the same thought before: that I wish I could have met and married Mark when I was younger so that we would have had so many more years together already... but I met him at the right time in both of our lives, a match made in heaven.

I have kept this relatively private - my organization of the Sunday cards M has been giving me over the past four years... He started giving these to me within the first month we started dating, so I estimate I have over 200. I sometimes open the older cards back up to reread his sweet words and think about where we were in our relationship at that time. There is so much negativity in the world and in the sharing of information on social media, but yet I tend to keep my relationship sacred and close to my heart. I talked with a friend recently about how we want to unabashedly proclaim our happiness to others without it seeming like bragging, so what is the balance to be struck?

Mark spends his Saturdays as of late in a blacksmithing class, bending white hot metal straight out of a 3,000 degree forge. His latest little project was on our anniversary proper, and yielded this perfectly rustic, very 'me' heart. 

My absolute favorite time of year is here... though in this Texas heat, we're ages away from my beloved flannel shirts and tall boots. I'm forcing the season with a pumpkin candle, but even that seems premature when the air conditioning is still blowing.

A snap from a quick little solo trip to the Oregon coast this past summer, just to refuel my soul by the water. I miss being in driving distance to the beach, and blustery gray days like this one above are my favorite. I have nothing but the best of memories on the coast, including my honeymoon with Mark on the Long Beach Peninsula. It's been seven years since I left Oregon for law school, and I think I'm just missing it more and more.