Savannah in December.

We spent most of last week in Savannah, Ga.  This trip was originally supposed to happen in October to celebrate our three-year anniversary, but as it turns out, morning sickness (which lasts far longer than just the morning) got the better of me.  So we decided to reschedule for last week when, thank the Lord, I was feeling much better.

I realized too late that I didn't take enough photos of our time there.  Or, more accurately, I didn't take a lot of good ones.   I also managed to forget all of my makeup and hair stuff (including my hair brush, for Pete's sake).  My one perfect opportunity to get all jazzed up, and I blew it.  So...these photos are definitely not super aesthetically pleasing to the eye.  Oh well.

But you know, sometimes it's good to just focus more on making memories and less on capturing them.  And that is ok.

We had a lot of fun.  It was the first real vacation we've taken in two years and the first time we left Evie for that long.  I was sad to leave her behind, and we missed her so much we spent some of our down time watching videos of her in our hotel room.

But you know, sometimes you just need a just-the-two-of-us getaway, and that is ok, too.

Early December is actually a great time to go because it isn't too crowded and the hotel rates are a lot lower.  Also, everything is decorated all festive for the holidays, and it was just cold enough for me to wear boots (yesss!!) without feeling like a total weirdo, which is how I feel when I try to wear them in Florida.  

Though I did a terrible job actually capturing these memories, we visited some great spots, shops and restaurants that I wanted to share, in case you ever decide to go to Savannah.

Favorite Restaurants:

• Mrs. Wilkes' Dining Room- The best southern food you'll probably ever taste.
• The Olde Pink House- Also southern food (there is a lot of this is Savannah).  The praline basket for dessert is delicious.

• Back in the Day Bakery- A super cute little treasure a little ways away from downtown, but worth it in my opinion.  I got banana bread and an old fashioned cupcake to-go, and both were delightful.

• Lulu's Chocolate Bar- This is a great place for dessert and drinks.
• Leopold's- Because...ice cream!
• Huey's- A wondrous place that serves up some darn delicious beignets (fried squares of dough smothered in powdery sugar goodness).  Definitely get the praline sauce with them.  It is wonderful.

Favorite Shops:

• The Paris Market- This is such a fun store.  It's full of hand-crafted, antique and vintage finds and is super classy.  We found this ornament for our tree (because we are in need of more ornaments now that we have room for a bigger tree, and it's a great souvenir) and this toy fox for Evie's Christmas present.  I had been wanting this exact fox for her and came very close to jumping up and down with glee when I saw it just hangin' out there in the kid section.

• Savannah Bee Company- If you like honey, you won't be disappointed.  Literally, anything you could ever imagine being made out of honey awaits you here in this shop.  They also offer $5 meade (wine made from honey) tastings, which is a lot of fun and which we had to unfortunately skip this year because of my preggo self.  But we did this a couple of years ago, and it was real tasty.
• Fabrika- This is an awesome fabric and sewing shop filled with unique fabrics and project ideas.

Favorite Spots:

• Forsyth Park- This is a lovely park perfect for taking a leisurely stroll or for having a picnic.  This was a great place for us just to sit and talk without worrying where we needed to be or what we needed to do.  And it was great.
• Broughton Street- Great for shopping.  You can find the Savannah Bee Company and The Paris Market here.

• River Street- It's just what it sounds like.  Brick streets lined with shops and restaurants and a view of the river makes this spot quite picturesque although it is a little touristy. 

• The Brice Hotel- We stayed here for the first time, and it was such a good decision.  The hotel has a fun, modern yet vintage vibe, and they offer free wine and hor d'oeuvres every evening and coffee and tea in the morning.  Classy.  We had a great time staying here, and the rates are super affordable in December.

a letter to my husband.

Dear Michael,

I never call you Michael, but it seemed like a better way to begin a letter than just calling you Mike.

On Wednesday, as you know, we celebrated our third year of marriage.  Three years doesn't seem like much when it's written out like that, but then again, if I were to actually write out all that has happened in these three years, I would have quite a lot of writing to do.

And I could, indeed, write about everything.  From that awkward first month of adjusting and stretching ourselves in ways we never had in order to figure out just how to love each other well all the way to this first year of being parents, where we are still adjusting, still stretching and still figuring out just how to love each other well.

But what I would really like to focus on is saying thank you.

Thank you for sticking around even now that you know how quirky and how much of a hot mess I can truly be.  Thank you for continuing to like me while you love me.

Thank you for being my best friend even when it is hard and I'm not that great of a friend in return.  Thank you for giving me an example of God's love through your loyalty and your trustworthiness and your grace over and over again.

Thank you for laughing with me when I share really corny jokes with you and when I use "Your face!" as a comeback line (again).  Thank you for not rejecting me when I bust out my goofy dance moves.  Actually, just thank you for even thinking my dance moves are cool.

Thank you for being such a caring and tender-hearted daddy to Evie.  She already has so much fun with you.  I can't wait to see what kind of shenanigans you get yourselves into a few years from now.

Thank you for helping me so much with cooking dinner and doing dishes when I'm a slacker.

Thank you for being kind and understanding but honest with me when I need to change my thought process.

Thank you for loving and providing for us.  You work so hard, and I am so grateful.

Thank you for choosing to look on the bright side and for pulling me out from under my rain cloud on many occasions.

Thank you for walks with Evie by the bay and for family popsicle dates and Lord of the Rings references and words of encouragement.

I know we have much more growing to do, in ourselves and with each other.  I know we aren't always perfect and sometimes we struggle and sometimes we drive each other crazy.  But I'm glad I'm doing all of it with you.

Here's to many more years filled with growing and learning and perfecting and loving and driving each other crazy. 

Love, Sara

*All photos by Raquel Sergio.

thoughts on cooking.

I hate to cook.

There, I said it.

It's true.  I wish it wasn't true, but it is.

Meal planning stresses. me. out.  Grocery shopping is inconvenient, to say the least.  Pan-frying meat in a skillet does not do anything for me.  Chopping up a bunch of onions and tomatoes and broccoli sometimes makes me want to just lay face-down on my kitchen floor.  

Oh, the comfort of cold tile on my forehead.

When I was in college, I was around mothers and wives who rocked the cooking thing out.  Like homemade meals every day from scratch.  Plus homemade whole wheat bread from scratch.  And when I would eat at their house, I felt special and valued, like I was participating in something meaningful because I knew how much thought and effort went into the meal in front of me.  It was delicious.  There really isn't anything quite like partaking of a meal you know was hand-crafted from beginning to end.  It gives you this wholesome feeling.  It's wonderful, and these women were so wonderful.  I wanted to be just like them when I grew up.  

And here I am almost three years into providing meals for my family, and I am nowhere near this level.  We eat out much more often than we should, and I make freezer meals more often than I should (thank you, Trader Joe's, for selling super tasty yet slightly addicting freezer options).  

To be fair to myself, I'm not a bad cook.  I can get the job done.  One time I made homemade fried buffalo chicken bites from a recipe I found on Pinterest.  I chopped up the raw chicken and breaded it and fried it all myself and even made a homemade sauce.  Bam.  My husband loved it.  I thought to myself, Never Again.

I can survive in the kitchen.

I would just rather be somewhere else.

But it's awesome when moms are naturally excited about meal planning and know how to work a kitchen efficiently.  And it's even more awesome when those moms have blogs and share their secrets so people like me can preserve a little sanity.  I've appreciated my friend Brittany and her blog for this very reason.  Just today she posted about a pumpkin banana smoothie I plan on trying with Evie that sounds pretty delicious, quick and convenient.  

I've also recently discovered companies like Blue Apron and Hello Fresh that will ship recipes with all the ingredients you need for three meals every week.  Everything is laid out for me.  All I have to do is cook the meals.  It's great, but we can't do it every week because it's expensive.  But this is a great option if you need a break every once in a while. Which I do.  I really, really do.

Maybe I'm lazy.  Maybe I should challenge myself to muster up a better attitude. 

I'll admit that I need to grow in this area.  I could definitely put in more effort.  But I think it's also ok if my way for feeding my family looks a little different from someone else's.  When reality and I are staring each other in the face, I realize I will probably never be a woman who makes homemade bread on a regular basis.  But as long as my husband is happy (and full) and Evie is actually eating, I think I can chart a couple of tallies in the winning section.  And I think it's ok for me to not be passionate about cooking.  It's not something I naturally enjoy right now.  I need to work on being excited about serving my family in this way, but I don't think I necessarily need to fall in love.  I don't think disliking to cook makes me a bad wife or mother.  But I do think it couldn't hurt to take advantage of a growing opportunity when I see one.   

I came across this quote while I was reading some of Creative Counterpart by Linda Dillow:

"Frustration doesn't come from the nature of the work; instead, it comes from the boredom inevitable in any job done poorly or unimaginatively."

So true. And a little bit convicting.

There's hope for me yet.  I just need to be a little creative.

In the meantime, what works for you and your family?  Ever get stuck in meal planning?  Any favorite recipes you'd love to share?  I can use all the help I can get!

when connecting is a struggle.

In the car, we drive and sit and the seats are filled with a million thoughts jammed into two bodies.  

Two entirely distinct sets of thoughts.  

I'm thinking of our daughter and her eating habits and what I'm going to scrap together for dinner because I didn't plan correctly.  I'm thinking of writing and whether my friends like me and that one scene from The Newsroom and how I really want to buy Evie a new pair of shoes.  He's thinking of our daughter and her goofy little faces she makes and wondering what's the plan for dinner.  He's thinking of how we can serve God better and that arrest he made last night and whether his coworkers like him and the workout he's going to do later. 

Maybe our thoughts aren't so different.  But there are so many of them filling us both, and they don't overflow into words.  

He walks up behind me as I scrape peanut butter or dried beans or whatever off of Evie's plate. He hugs my waist and tells me he loves me, and I kind of hear him, but the plate is clean and I need to go give Evie a bath.

He goes to work at three and doesn't get home until three.  I'm up at seven while he's only had three and a half hours of sleep.  He wakes up at 11 and we eat and get him ready for work, and he's off cleaning up the streets while I clean up the pencils scattered all over the floor and the yogurt splattered on Evie's face. 

He does a traffic stop on a man who has a loaded gun under his seat.  I sit on the couch with my computer and my cookies, wrapped in a blanket, scrolling through Pinterest. 

Sometimes we go for walks, and I don't even think to hold his hand.  I remember when all I wanted to do was hold his hand.

We are ships in the night, sailing silently past each other without even noticing, really noticing, each other.  

Until.

The waters suddenly become not so smooth, and we collide.  Hard.  And our bows are snapped, and our decks are smashed.

I'm sitting on the bed, and he's sitting on the floor as he asks me in frustration why I won't tell him what's bothering me.  He rubs his hands roughly over his face and asks me how I can get mad at him for not understanding when I won't even talk to him.  I sputter through tears that I have needs, too, and I feel ignored.  

We both feel unloved.  

When there are just two of us ships attempting to sail under a pitch black sky, it's no wonder we end up steering ourselves into rougher waters.  I guess we forgot how important the lighthouse is.  It helps us remember where to focus our gaze so that we can avoid the rocks.  And so we can see each other.

"Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain.  Unless the Lord watches over the city, the guards stand watch in vain." -Psalm 127:1  

I've been thinking that staying vigilant means I should make sure I cook dinner or put together Mike's uniform or pack his lunch.  I've been thinking that it means I shouldn't ever ask him for time to myself because he works so hard everyday at work.  I've been thinking that as long as I just get all of these things done, I am a good wife and I am doing what needs to be done to keep us going.  

But lately it has felt like I am building in vain.  Those things are good and need to be done, but I have been depending upon my own strength and goodness to do them.  And to be honest, I'm not all that strong or good on my own.  Bitterness and pride tend to nudge their way into my thought process and I withdraw, which is the worst way to be a good wife to my husband.

What I think would mean more to him is if I let the Lord take watch over our marriage because he knows better than me how to stand guard, to keep it safe and to keep it good.  That means loving him how the Lord says to love him: to believe the best in him, to be vulnerable and humble enough to tell him when something is wrong and when I need help, to listen to him and ask him questions, to hold his hand and kiss him more often, to tell him what I love about him, to think it's worth it to work our problems out instead of just ignoring them, to give him grace.

When I let God shine a light on our marriage, I can see my husband more clearly.  I can plot my course with more accuracy.

He is learning these things, too.  We are both learning. 

At our wedding, instead of pouring sand into a jar to represent the commitment we just made to each other, we braided a cord with three strands.  One for me and one for Mike and one for God.  Life moves fast and hectic, and we forget He is our third strand sometimes.  We tend to operate on two strands most of the time.  And that makes us feel fragile. 

But He is still woven tight around and through us just as we are still woven tight around each other, no matter what might happen.  

Because when there are three strands, a cord is not easily broken.

"Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves.  A cord of three strands is not quickly broken." - Ecclesiastes 4:12

words.

I should have known better.

The book I've been trying to read on how to be a better wife clearly stated this was not the proper response to the situation, but I went right on and responded anyway.

We've been going through what seems like a never ending broken refrigerator saga.  We find someone to fix it, and he stands us up.  We find someone to actually come and fix it, and it breaks again.  We buy another one, and it doesn't fit.  We get it to fit, and the water dispenser doesn't work.

Welcome to homeownership, we are told.  

Yes.  Welcome.

All this to say my frustration had been steadily building.  Mike's frustration had also been steadily building, judging from the banging and huffing I heard from the kitchen as he ripped out our base board to create just enough room to literally jam in the new refrigerator.  

And after he had worked so hard, soaked himself with sweat and cut his finger in the process, I came in and began spewing words of doubt, discouragement and regret all over him.  We should not have bought this fridge.  I think we got ripped off.  Our kitchen looks so ugly now.  Why did we do this?

Of course, what my husband hears is, It's all your fault.

Though I didn't intend to totally blame him, I've learned yet another lesson on how much my words affect him; they can leave him built up, eyes bright with encouragement or they can leave him torn down, shoulders slumped in defeat.

I realize this is how it starts.  How two people who love each other and vow to love each other the rest of their lives become estranged roommates...maybe even total strangers. 

With nouns and verbs and adjectives bunched and thrown and stuffed together without thought.  With small skirmishes of careless words.  With tiny decisions to make myself feel better at his expense.  Over time, they have the potential to erode until nothing is left but a fragment of a thing that we once called a marriage.

I know this sounds kind of dramatic.  But I really believe that part of being made in the image of God means that the words we speak have power behind them.   We don't create oceans and mountains and stars when we speak, but our words do carry weight with enough force to create unity and peace, strife and bitterness, pain and joy.  And it is a choice, a responsibility, to gather words that when spoken bring forth life instead of destruction.  

As I stood there in our kitchen, offering words of apology and trying to sort out the mess my previous words had made, my husband asked me if I'd like to go outside with him to pull out elephant grass.  

Of all things.

But another thing I'm learning is that even a simple word spoken with care and followed with love can carry enough weight to repair what many jumbled and reckless words broke down.  

So I gave him the best word I could come up with, though it wasn't exactly eloquent and though elephant grass-pulling was about the last thing I wanted to do in that moment.  

I said, Okay.

But it's funny because the weight of that tiny okay, that choice to show love instead of to self protect, worked it's magic while I picked and pulled and threw that grass into the garbage can with my husband.  The burden of those previous syllables began to lighten, and I didn't feel so frustrated anymore.  I won't pretend everything was picture perfect in a second, but it helped.

My one-word peace offering. 

I'm learning sometimes a word is all it takes.  Sometimes it takes many.  And sometimes none at all.

Whether the next time calls for many or just a few, I hope I can be a good steward of the words I gather.