The Year of the Wood

Today marks our 5th Wedding Anniversary!  I can't believe it's been five years.  In a way, if feels like time has flown by, but in a way it feels like it has been longer than that - maybe because we've been together for 8 years total!  That's a lifetime in Hollywood!  When I asked Adam what he was going to get me for our anniversary he asked why and I told him that this year we are supposed to give each other the gift of wood.  His response was less than poignant!  He went on to tell me that that was just a way to get people to buy each other stuff for their anniversary.  Um....yeah, exactly!  Apparently the travel anniversary gift for the 5th year of marriage is airline tickets and/or cruise.  Check and Check!  We depart for our cruise in less than 40 days!

The past five years have been wonderful, yet challenging!  Adam and I have really never had it easy or remotely so.  We were both still in college when we got married.  Why you might ask.  We had been engaged 2 years and were so in love, and my grandmother was dying with cancer and my brother was home from his tour of duty in Iraq.  I knew I couldn't get married without my brother there, and there was no guarantee.  Also, I wanted my grandmother to be there if at all possible because my engagement ring and wedding band were made from the diamonds of a ring she gave me.  So we got hitched!

Adam commuted to Chattanooga to school twice a week during the first 5 months we were married.  It was hard, but Adam and I had sort of had a long distance relationship from the time we started dating.  I was just starting UTK and he was just starting grad school at UTC.  We talked by phone every night, Sunday through Thursday.  Then we saw each other EVERY weekend, even when we both took summer courses.  But still, being newlywed and not seeing my husband two days out of the week was hard.  Then 15 months after we got married, my dad moved in with us temporarily for 17 months, when he moved back to TN to be closer to his kids and to look for a job.  Ryne was born two weeks before our 4th anniversary, so there has not been a lot of "just the two of us" time in the past five years.

Sometimes it seems like a miracle that we've made it this long!  When I look back, sometimes I wonder why we didn't wait a year until we were both done with school.  But then I see the picture from my wedding of my grandmother's smiling face in the blue dress and blue hat, and my brother looking so handsome in his dress blues and it makes all these years of hard work and hard times worth it!  Obviously every marriage is hard to some extent and every marriage takes work, but Adam and I took our hits pretty early on.

Sometimes it's hard to remember why you got married, or how you felt when you got married.  It's easy to lose sight of that when life starts to set in and take over.  It's true that people grow as the years go by and some people grow apart, but remembering why you joined in Holy Matrimony in the first place is so important.  Adam and I have vowed to work on communication this year.  Our communication has become consumed by how the baby is doing.  We realized that we weren't asking each other enough about each other.  Not that Ryne isn't important, because he is.  However, we want Ryne to grow up with his two parents in the same house who love each other and communicate well with each other.  We are people who wear many "hats."  We were finding it hard to balance the husband and wife hats with the new mommy and daddy hats.  I guess we will have plenty of time to wear the husband and wife hats when we go on our cruise...without my little Watermelon Ryne!  Until then, it's a work in progress.

Speaking of works in progress.  I am giving Adam some form of wood for our anniversary.  I'm not done with it yet, so I'm a little late (oopse).  I would post what I am doing but Adam has actually started reading the blog.  Hi Honey!  So I'll have to keep it under wraps for now!  

Happy Anniversary and Happy Friday!