Always grow. Grow all ways. All ways, always.

Yesterday I bought the January edition of Oprah’s magazine, which I wouldn’t normally do because I think it’s expensive for a magazine. But the reason I did was because I saw in the top right corner the words ‘Eat, Pray, Love…and Then What? An exclusive excerpt from Elizabeth Gilbert’s inspiring new book’. And BOY was I excited. I have been waiting for her next book for so long! I loved her last book; it really spoke to me and opened me up to an idea of what God can be that I was comfortable with. So I’ve been very eager to hear about her thoughts of marriage and how her and her husband are making theirs work.


When I read the excerpt there were two ideas that really stood out for me the first was that she actually made an honest list of her top 5 faults, I found this inspirational! How can you possible work on improving yourself if you aren’t honest about your faults and if you haven’t faced them? Just based on my nursing background and how much we need to reflect on your practice in order to develop further, and provide better patient care. I think in order to continue to grow as a person, once must also reflect upon themselves and their life. Always grow. Grow all ways. Always, all ways. This is something I feel I should do too. Then she shared it with her then fiancée, which I think was brave and open. What a great way to start a marriage, with a conversation about who you are, both the good and the bad, and not to hide anything. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a relationship that is beyond the point of deal breakers?

The second point in the excerpt that really struck me and actually made me sit back and think WHOA. It’s so simple, yet I’ve NEVER thought of a relationship being like that before! What a great way to clearly look at a person and know whether they are a match for you or not. In the book it states that Elizabeth asked her husband Felipe how he could still love her after sharing her list of faults with him. To which he explained that anyone can fall in love with the best parts of someone, it’s by looking at the not-so-great parts of a person that you see whether those flaws are something you can ‘work with’. I think when we don’t do this we can easily fall into the habit of creating a partner in your head that only has these great qualities, rather than actually seeing them as a whole and accepting that. A great quote from the book states that “there is hardly a more gracious gift that we can offer somebody than to accept them fully, to love them almost despite themselves”. After all, nobody’s perfect! God knows I’m a prime example of what a hot mess can look like :)

I hope to reflect upon myself and make a list of my faults in order to learn from it to improve myself. And I want to share that list with Mike so we can communicate about it and so he can encourage me too. I also want to be able to truly reflect and put into organized thought why I love Mike, I’d like to have a better answer than ‘I do because you’re wonderful’. So that’s what I’ll be working on, along with studying for my exam that I have tomorrow night – wish me luck!

Thought I'd add some wintery photos, just for fun! In case anyone doesn't get to see this out their back door.

Some things from my life right now

• when I left my moms I forgot Brady's food there (he eats raw) and I have to drive an hour (one way) to the store to get it, so I'm just making extra fish and rice tonight and he can eat with us ;) Which I'm sure will make him gassy
• every time I cook rice I spill it all over the counter and floor
• my wiper blades decided to stop working for some reason during my drive, which gave me some rage
• getting prescriptions filled annoys me - just give me like a year's worth because I don't want to keep coming back
• I have a laundry pile taller than I am
• I got to see my step neice or nephew in a sonogram pic last night
• we didn't eat at the dining room table tonight because it's coverd in folded laundry, my laptop, textbooks and papers
• I'm drinking wine while I write my paper, hoping that helps me - verdict is still out
• I'm sick of school
• aaaand I need something chocolate

What's YOUR day been like??

*Tree of Enchantment*

This year is my and Mike's first year living together, therefore our first Christmas together and I'm quite excited for it! I think it's going to be a great year filled with visiting family and some friends. We got an artificial tree because...well I wanted one!

My brother is allergic and so growing up we always had a fake tree and I have such happy memories of 'putting together the Christmas tree'. On ours growing up it was basically a metal pole and all the branches were colour coded so you just had to match up the colours. I loved doing this with my brothers.

Also, an artificial tree ends up costing less because you only buy it once. It doesn't have any mess. Nobody will have a reaction to it. AND most importantly you can have it up WAY longer! Its an all around winning situation :)

We started out not having any Christmas tree decorations at all, just the lights which come already on the tree. And I was okay with that - I knew that throughout our years together (hopefully there are many) we would gather decorations that mean something to us, lots of memories and keepsakes from our lives. One night we had Mike's parents over for dinner and his mom suggested that I put up the extra (and old) candy canes that I had from baking on to the tree. I loved this idea! It looks great and it was free - I love free and thrifty  :)

Then Mike and I decided to go to Hallmark to pick up an ornament that celebrated our first Christmas together. I have a slight obsession with Hallmark :)

I also remembered that my very best friend gave me a beautiful glass ornament (this photo does not do it justice AT ALL). It sparkles and shines off the lights and is so pretty - I want about a hundred of these! The colours on the globe are all fall colours and it comes with a little tag that explains it all:

Enjoy the magic of the seasons with this beautiful

glass ornament. Like the trees in a forest, no two

are the same, and each is a symbol of growth,

strength and the cycle of life. As the seasons

change so does nature's colour palette.

How nice eh? The ball she gave me is autum which says:

The fiery ambers of Fall bring to mind a magical

sunset on a cool Autumn night. The trees explode

with colour just before a Winter Slumber. 'Look

too closely and you may just fall into your own

fairy tale'.

AH! I just LOVE this ornament. And I'm happy to have a symbol of the wonderful friendship I have been so lucky to recieve.

The last ornament that we have Mike's sister bought for us. She saw it at the hospital she is doing her placement at and thought of us and bought it. She brushed off my thanks saying that it was just a cheap one, but it means so much to me that she was so thoughtful - it doesn't matter to me how much it costs. I will always treasure the gift of thought from his lovely sister! Who I am thanful to call a friend as well :)

Believe me, Brady is not as tortured as he looks in this photo! He hates having his picture taken. Too bad for him that he's just so stinkin cute :)  (Lastly, I could not find spell check for this post for some reason so please excuse my mistakes. It's probably right in front of me and I can't see it for lookin!)