Our Anniversary Gifts

 I have to tell you all about our anniversary gifts for this year! No, our anniversary hasn't rolled around yet, but we exchanged gifts early. I was SO EXCITED about Ryan's that I just couldn't wait to give it to him!

Typically, Ryan and I do the traditional anniversary themes for our gifts, and I believe the theme for ten years is a tin gift, but we both deviated this year. (Rebels.) The gift I wanted to give him this year represents the memories we've made over a decade together and shows the room ahead for many memories to come!

I got the idea from our friends Jonathan and Julie, who have one of these in their home. (And I think Natasha may have this also - or something similar.) Julie and I got together a few times for her to teach me all the tips and tricks of assembly, and then it was time for the big reveal to Ryan. I'll show you the pictures and then explain the gift.

I just LOVE IT!

This is a map from Thunder Bunny Labs. They make several maps, so if the 50 states aren't your goal, you can also choose from Europe, islands of the Caribbean, seven continents, Canadian provinces, ballparks, National parks, football stadiums, hockey arenas, basketball arenas, and individual states.

Their website allows you to add pictures for each state and resize/reorient the pictures to fill in the shape of the state. When they print, the outline of the state is on the picture, so you can cut it to fit right in the space! 

We have been to 17 states in 10 years. (We have actually been IN four more states than that, but we just drove through, so we don't have anything to show for it.) And amazingly, even though I didn't know I was going to need such a thing, I was able to find pictures that fit each state's shape! 

* Dancing on the beach at our wedding in Florida

* Visiting downtown Atlanta in Georgia

* Kissing in the mountains of Tennessee

* Standing in front of a snow-covered Biltmore estate in North Carolina

* Visiting the beach in Virginia

* Touring a coffee roaster in Maryland

* Hiking Letchworth State Park in New York

* Ice skating in Ohio

* Touring an old mansion in Kentucky

* Attending a Colts game in Indiana

* Kissing on the shores of Lake Michigan in Michigan

* Touring a dairy farm in Wisconsin

* Visiting a zoo in Illinois

* Seeing a Little House site in Missouri

* RVing in Iowa

* Amazed by Little Jerusalem Badlands State Park in Kansas

* Meeting Oxen in Colorado

I am SO EXCITED to see how many more states we can fill in over the next decade together.

Ryan loved the gift and he is already excited about filling in more states. He was also excited to give me the gift he picked out for me. Spoiler alert: it's perfect, and I love it!

For the last decade, he has watched me swoon over every card catalog we've seen in any store. We don't have room in our home for a giant, antique card catalog, but he found me a smaller version that is absolutely perfect in every way. All the little drawers open, and I can use them to store office supplies that look unsightly when out in plain view.

I didn't even know a thing like this existed. It is perfect, and I love it so much! He said he was sorry it didn't have ten drawers, but I suppose that would make for an awkward layout. I love it just the way it is. 

I call this year a smashing success on gifts!!

Sunday Sentiments

 

Ever have a day when everything goes so wrong that eventually you just have to laugh? Ever had about three of those days right in a row? 

That's been our weekend, and it occurred to me last night that perhaps the Lord is trying to teach me something meaningful. Tucked in all the "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?" have been sweet nods and reminders that He is here, offering good in the messes. 

He has answered prayers, reminding me that He has everything under control, even when I don't. He has given good gifts when my own plans didn't work out. (And those gifts were better than my plans anyway.)

This week of Thanksgiving has heightened my own sense of gratitude, but in ways that are different from what I normally see. I'm learning to see the Lord even in times of personal disappointment. I'm learning to trust Him even when things aren't what I expected.

Please don't misunderstand: I'm not doing this perfectly. Ryan has had to remind me that things are okay in my moments of frustration. He rolls with life so much more naturally than I do. But he's been a great teammate and has helped me press the reset button more than once in just the past few days.

Maybe this week has gone absolutely according to plan for you. Maybe it hasn't at all. But either way, the same God is still always good. He is still always in control. He is still always caring for us and protecting us from more than we know. 

Today is the first Sunday of Advent, but I think it's a good thing to let a heart of thanksgiving stay active even while we move into Advent!

Much love to you, friends!

The Saturday Six

 

This week's list is Advent-themed. As we gear up to approach the Christmas season, here are some ideas for being intentional, whether on your own or with friends and family!

One.

Anyone else grow up enjoying the chocolate filled Advent calendars? Anyone else blow through that whole calendar on a December 1 chocolate binge? ;) I still love Advent calendars and love this idea for a version that can be used year after year. There are several DIY versions in that post...or if you like a small classy looking purchased calendar, check out this one that I have absolutely fallen in love with! 

Two.

I still think it's important to have an Advent reading book to help you keep your focus in the season. There are SO MANY good ones out there right now, with new ones appearing on the scene every year. My version of an Advent devotional is now twelve years old, if you can believe it! It hits teenagerhood next year! Many of you have read it, I know, but if you haven't and you're looking for a new-to-you book to read, I invite you to give it a try! It takes a little different spin than most, but I still love and appreciate its message!

Three.

If you have kids at home (or in your life, even if they don't live with you), here is an idea for a nativity countdown. I particularly love it, because my parents have this actual nativity set, and I remember it fondly from my childhood! This post also has great ideas for helping your children think outward during the season! 

Four.

This post gives ideas for making an Advent box for all the families in your church. If you attend a fairly large church, that may not be feasible, or it might be an idea to tuck away for next year when you have more lead time. But if you're part of a small group, Bible study, neighborhood, or any other smaller, more manageable group of people, this could still happen for this year! You wouldn't have to do it exactly like this, but it can be a great guide to get the juices flowing! 

Five.

I absolutely love this idea of a Bethlehem dinner. Whether you are on your own, part of a couple, or have a household bursting with people, this is a great tradition to start in order to quiet your heart and help you focus on Christ's birth!

Six.

If you have a baby or toddler in your home, check out this fun-for-parents-and-babies list of things to do throughout the Christmas season! 

My Thoughts on Being a Wife

 

Before we were married, we had some (well-meaning, I'm sure) people insinuate that my ambitions for marriage were too lofty. It wasn't as great as I imagined it would be. They didn't indicate it was awful, but it wasn't as amazing as I thought it was going to be. 

Encouraging, right?

Last week, I found a couple of posts I wrote back when we were engaged, in which I wrote about some of the things I was looking forward to most about married life. I thought today would be the perfect day to weigh in about how our reality has looked in comparison to my dreams! Below are the things I wrote about looking forward to and beside them are my decade-of-marriage thoughts.

* Morning coffee. This was a huge dream of mine before marriage - having someone to drink coffee with in the mornings. Over the ten years we have been married, our mornings have had many different looks, depending on where we lived and worked at the time. Some seasons have more easily lent themselves to leisurely times of morning coffee, but I can happily report that I have not been disappointed in this department. Whether we have had time to sit together and drink coffee or we have to drink it as we move about the house getting ready, I have loved sharing the idea of morning coffee with Ryan. And even more than that, I enjoy having coffee with him in the evenings, after our day is done and we get to finally sit and relax a little bit. (Yes, we can drink coffee at night and still sleep.) 

* Being a car passenger on a snowy day. YESSSSSSSSS! I still hate driving in snow and still adore being able to just crawl into the passenger seat and let him take the wheel. I actually don't enjoy driving at all, so I have found much joy in being a passenger at all times, regardless of the weather. Ryan enjoys driving and I enjoy navigating! :) 

* Someone to pray with. This is such a joy! I love it that we can pray with and for each other at any given time. I know some couples struggle to pray out loud in front of each other, and for some reason, this has always come easily to us. I am grateful for it and recognize it as a gift. Thank you, Ryan, for sharing the gift of prayer with me! I also love knowing I can call on him when we are not together, and he will stop wherever he is and pray for whatever is hurting my heart!

* Cooking dinner for Ryan. In all my single years, I grew to love cooking, and I did it fairly faithfully, but I was sad to always just cook for myself. I really looked forward to cooking for Ryan, and it has been SO MUCH FUN to do just that. I love planning meals for him and making them happen. I appreciate that he recognizes the work I put into all that and makes mention of it. And a bonus? He also really enjoys cooking and is very good at it. So it's been fun to enjoy his Saturday morning breakfasts, and the meals he makes on other random occasions just to give me a break!

* Decorating the Christmas tree together. SO FUN! I do the bulk of the Christmas decorating on the whole, because it zings me more than it does him, but when it comes to our family tree - with all the souvenir ornaments - he jumps right in and helps, and he actually enjoys it. It has been a sweet joy for me. I also appreciate the way he lugs the tubs in and out of the attic! It goes way better than if I had to do it, for sure.

* Not walking into places alone anymore. It is a joy. A couple of weeks ago, when I went to his Grandma's birthday party by myself (since he was at work), I realized just how strange that feels now. It had been a long time since I went to something alone! Early on in our marriage, we made a commitment that we (for the most part) would not play a divide-and-conquer game. We're in this together, whatever it is. So he goes with me when I speak, and I go with him when he speaks. We go to dinners, events, weddings, funerals, parties, and everything else...together. It may not be the best fit for everyone, but it works for us, and it is a comfort to my heart.

* Someone to plan for. I do love it. I love planning our trips and planning special dates and gifts just for him. And I recognize the gift it is that he does the same for me. I appreciate the time he has put into planning special dates and surprises just for me. I know that isn't a typical trait in all husbands, but Ryan sure is great at it!

* Not falling asleep by myself and not waking up alone. THE BEST. We so very rarely are apart - and that is by design. I actually can't sleep when I'm not with him, so on the super rare occasions that he's gone, I just nap on the couch, because I know going to bed is pointless. This is absolutely one of my favorite things about marriage.

* Someone to laugh with. Oh my word. We still have the best time laughing! Ryan has the greatest belly laugh on earth, and despite all the hard seasons we've walked through, laughing together is still one of our favorite things. 

* Weekend road trips. I think you know how much we love those! Traveling with Ryan is so much fun. I remember something Lynne Ford told me back before I was married - or even dating Ryan, I think. She and I went on a road trip, and she told me how much she loves traveling with her husband, because he's the best travel companion. He makes everything comfortable and easy and fun. I have to say that Ryan does the same. He enjoys seeing things, he helps with the trip preparation, he's present for all the pictures and memory-making, and he looks at the scrapbooks when they're done! We love travel more than we ever thought possible, and this has been a delight. 

* A new last name. I still love it! Shaffer is a fun name to have. And the S monogram sits so nicely in our home. F tends to tip over. :) 

Things I didn't know I would love...

As you can see, my dreams did not disappoint. Not a single one. Ryan has made it possible for us to craft a beautiful life together, and I am so grateful. But there are also some things about marriage that I didn't know I would love so much! They include...

* A companion for the hardest days. The last ten years have brought about a lot of unexpected hard times. Loss, death, hurt, decisions, confusion, and more. I love it that he lets me feel whatever I'm feeling and supports me in it. I love it that we have leaned on each other in these hard times, and we've figured out how to navigate it. I love it that even when I feel alone in life, I know I'm not truly alone, because I have him.

* Traditions. We have so many traditions, and I love them all. I appreciate being able to look back over a decade of those traditions and see the fun we've had with them. I love it that we've made traditions a priority even though we don't have children!

* "Parenting" together. We don't have children of our own, but we have Braeya and Lexi. We have our little godson. And they've all required a measure of parenting. I appreciate how hard Ryan works, how present he is, and how intentional he is in participating in each of those relationships. I've enjoyed the conversations we've had to decide how to even navigate those roles. He's a great dad. Really, really great.

* Talking together. We are both motor mouths, so it shouldn't have surprised me that we have great conversations, but we do. I love talking with Ryan, hearing his heart, his ideas, and his dreams. And I love sharing the same from my own mind. If I have ten minutes to talk to anyone on earth, I'm going to pick him every single time. 

Thankful Indeed!

 

I feel like the last few weeks on this space have been one giant Thanksgiving post. You have seen the many things I'm so grateful for, including this decade of marriage, our sweet fur babies, new jobs, a new church family, and so much more. 

What can I possibly say today that I haven't said in recent days?

Today I want to say a few words of gratitude for the things that might not be so neatly tied with a bow. 

* As we approach this tenth anniversary and we look back over our wedding pictures, we see those who were part of that day but won't be part of the one to come. Four of our thirty-one wedding guests have passed away in the last ten years, and two of those were Ryan's mom and Allen. This time of year always brings sadness when we think about the holidays that won't include them, but I want to say that I'm thankful for the years we did enjoy with them and the investment they made in each of us. I'm thankful that Ryan and I were together when those losses came so he didn't have to walk the road by himself. I'm thankful for all the valuable lessons we learned about supporting one another through the hardest times. I'm thankful we were married while they were here to enjoy that day with us. 

* When I think back over holidays of years gone by, I sometimes am a bit saddened by relationships that have changed and the people I'm not as close to as I once was. For many years, I struggled with feelings of failure when friendships grew more distant. The Lord has helped me to better understand that some friendships are very much focused on a season of life. He has brought people to me for our mutual benefit in specific times, and then sometimes our lives go in different directions. That doesn't mean it was all for nothing. I am thankful for the many people who have been part of my life at any given time. I am thankful for the ways I was able to bless them and the ways they were able to speak truth into my life. That is worth celebrating, even if it looks different today!

* I am thankful for the parts of our year that have not gone as smoothly and neatly as we imagined or hoped they would. We've had a fair amount of frustration in this year, but I know that even in that, we have grown, stretched, learned, and deepened our faith. That is worth so much! Some of the waiting and frustration are still here, but we're still learning, and for that, I'm grateful.

* God has shown us in fresh ways this year how He is using so much of our pasts to prepare us for our present and future. I am grateful for the experiences we've had in days gone by (some of which felt a bit futile at the time) that prepared us for a future we couldn't even see. I'm sure some of what we're living through today is preparing us for a tomorrow we can't see, and I'm thankful for that, too! 

Today I am so thankful for the good and the hard - and I'm thankful for each of you who come here daily to share life with us. Happy Thanksgiving to each of you from Shafferland!

Love,

Ryan, Bekah, Braeya, and Lexi

Christmas in Shafferland

The year Ryan and I were married, all of our pre-wedding time was consumed with wedding details, and we had no time to even think about decorating for Christmas. When we came home from our honeymoon, we had something like 17 days to decorate, shop, and send cards. No pressure, right?

That year, we did a highly scaled back version of my normal Christmas extravaganza, but it was so sweet, and I still remember it with great joy. I remember one picture specifically. Ryan texted it to me in the wee hours one morning, just a couple of days before Christmas. He had gotten up early to wrap my gifts and put them under the tree, telling me to stay in bed a little longer. (No problem!) This picture felt like the first piece of absolute serenity that I'd seen in several weeks! 

It seems appropriate that this tenth anniversary year feels much like that wedding year! We have a little bit of chaos everywhere. The last few weeks have been packed full of visiting different churches for Love INC, taking on our first solo run with a major annual Love INC project, preparing for my upcoming start with my new job, traveling to Ohio for training, prepping for Lexi's first birthday, prepping for our 10th anniversary...it has been a whirlwind that has filled all of our days, every single day, leaving little time for luxuries.

Decorating?

HOW?

WHEN?

But I did manage to do it! I spent this past Saturday and Sunday putting up our decorations, and even though it's a different sort of version from what I normally do, it's cozy and pretty, and we love it.

Just like we did last year at WillowBridge, our living room holds two smaller flocked trees with white lights, and on those trees are all our sentimental ornaments. Ryan and I put them on the tree together. I read the stories of the ornaments while he placed them. Lexi and Braeya listened from their respective spots.

Here's the nighttime, football version:

I haven't hung the stockings because I don't have enough holders! The set I've owned for probably 15 years only had three holders, so I gave it away last year after Christmas. We need four now! I actually don't plan on hanging them this year because I'm afraid Lexi will pull them down and hurt herself with the holder. (I marked a freestanding stocking holder on my wish list to try to avoid this in the future.) So far, she seems to leave the trees and ornaments alone. Let's hope that continues!

Our kitchen isn't set up to hold a full sized tree, so I just put up some countertop decorations in there. (Our space between our cabinets and the ceiling is much lower than it was at any of our previous houses, so I didn't do any decorating up there.)

I love this little gingerbread-themed spot in the corner!

We have frames from every year of our marriage, and they hold a picture of us on Christmas Day for each of the years. I have them scattered around the house. A tour of my hair colors! 

I do love this little foyer table. Thought it turned out pretty sweet. 

My grandparents' family Bible...

The Holy Family my mom painted back in her ceramics days...

Also like I did at WillowBridge, I put our Christmas tree farm on our headboard. Here are the day and evening versions of that. :) I put some fairy lights on the trees for subtle coziness.

Our dining room doesn't really have room for a tree either. I probably could have forced one to fit if I had tried, but I ran out of time to do one more big tree. So I did a couple of smaller ones and added gingerbread ornaments. It's a quick job, but it works! (Seriously do not judge my decorating based on this corner. It's the worst one!)

I put a few little things in Lexi's room, just because:

And here are a few close-ups of random decor:

Each piece makes me smile because they all tell stories and hold important memories. 

It may not be a normal year, but it's still a good year, and I'm so glad to be sitting by the cozy lights already!