What is being married like?

The question comes from my 16 (almost 17) year-old brother-in-law on the eve of his sister's wedding. Derek and I look at each other, unsure how to respond. What is being married like? There's no one word to describe the covenant between two people and God. It's like being with your best friend 24/7, which is awesome most of the time, and occasionally difficult. It really is like two people learning to be one...which is especially hard when you've been two people for so long. Being married is like no other relationship. It's not like having a roommate, or siblings, or even a best friend. It's like having an extension of yourself, who you're still getting to know, who you rely on completely and who completely relies on you. It's like having a leader and a partner and follower all at once...and in that respect, it's a lot like dancing.

Let's play with that analogy: being married is like dancing.

Sometimes (more often than not) the man leads, and if he knows what he's doing, the dance goes more smoothly. He can only lead well, however, if his partner follows well and trusts in his leadership. You can expect to have your toes stepped on from time to time, and every once in a while you'll get out of sync and have to rediscover your rhythm. But for the most part, the dance is way more fun than you could ever have on your own; it does, after all, take two to tango. The dance can be fast, slow, sexy, flirtatious, fun, mellow, even awkward...but only truly enjoyable with your partner. Which dance you do is sometimes dictated by the music, but not always: you can lindy to a foxtrot when the mood takes you, and that's part of the joy of it all.

I love dancing with my husband. He is my favorite person to dance with, now and forever. I hope we're still tearing it up after 60 years of marriage.

Engedi

It has been a while since I last posted (amazing how the months can fly by, yet seem to drag into eternity), and while I don't have much of an update, I do have a free afternoon with not a lot to do aside from posting narcissistically on our blog =)

So here I sit, in the shade in our BEAUTIFUL backyard, now that summer has finally arrived. Such is the joy of owning a laptop. The temperature hovers just below 80, and butterflies dance through the garden against a crayon-blue sky. This is what I have been longing for. Time, warmth, relaxation. Family, friends, and long days to spend laughing with them, until warm nights wrap us in happily exhausted sleep. A garden in which to grow green things, and an expanding belly in which to grow a daughter. A long to-do list that is, for once, riddled with fun and creative things. I love this sensation of peace.

I'm going to go sit in the hammock for a while and just stare at the bugs circling lazily in the shade of the mimosa tree.

Forced Sabbath

The food poisoning fairy has been by to visit the Hann house and has forced me to take a Sabbath. This is not a welcome Sabbath, as I was planning to take one anyway... and wasn't planning to take one that involved a night of vomiting and a morning with an IV in my arm. On the upside, we did get to hear the baby's heartbeat for the first time! On the downside, I am still super dizzy and have a hard time standing up. Sucks.

I can't remember the last time I was sick like this. I think this is the first time I have vomited since early high school...maybe even longer than that. The whole dizziness thing is the worst part since it puts me on forced bedrest and I can't drive anywhere. I'm hungry, but I'm on a clear liquids diet for 24 hours, then a BRAT diet for the 24 after that, and I'm worried I'm not getting enough calories in for baby. How do I get sufficient caloric intake off of gatorade and chicken broth? Ugh.

At least I don't have to miss work or use any of my sick days. Pray that I'll get better fast so I can get back into the swing of things...I had a lot of stuff planned for this week and not getting it done is not an option. Taxes and the like. Double ugh.

Pregnant!

Saturday, February 6th, I decided to take a Sabbath. But I couldn't rest easy, knowing that something hadn't started that should have. I decided to take a test. Is that a faint second line, confirming a positive?

Trying to interpret the results through a haze of oversleeping and excitement is never easy. Better go out to breakfast, go for a walk, drive to the local Walgreens, and buy another test.

It's hard to tell from the picture, but the second test's second line was a lot darker. Derek decided we'd better hit the clinic, which was closing in a half an hour, to be sure.

The nurse walked in to the examining room and told us our due date. Derek and I looked at each other as if to say, "so...that means we're pregnant?" Duh.

So we're pretty excited. We just hit the 6-week mark, so it's still early, but we're just going to keep praying over our little Doodlebug and asking God to let us steward His kiddo. Looking forward to being parents in October, God willing!

How to Grow a Human

Step 1: Rely on God's plan and timing...but, you know, go through the motions ;-)

Step 2: Start taking vitamins that you probably should have been taking anyway

Step 3: Obsess over every little pinch and pain in your abdomen until finally deciding that it's probably just constipation from the vitamins and you're not actually pregnant afterall

Step 4: Discover that you, in fact, ARE pregnant and begin to seriously doubt your powers of self-assessment.

Step 5: Eat EVERYTHING IN SIGHT

I'm at about step 5 right now. Except...for once in my life, I'm not the least bit interested in sweets. Derek's mom made what was probably a delicious pie, and cookies, and chocolate cake, but it all tasted like dust in my mouth. I'm officially broken. To top that off, I'm craving savory/salty things...this must be Derek's kid =)

Week 4

I'm going to have too much fun with this website:

My Baby

By two weeks after conception, the ball of cells implanted in the lining of your uterus has divided into two parts. One half will become the placenta, which nourishes your baby as she grows. The second half is the embryo itself. Around this time, nerve growth begins, as a sheet of cells folds backward to create the neural tube, or spinal column.

...and

Oh yeah. Praise to God for giving me and Derek a baby =) Due date is October 16, 2010. Found out this afternoon. WOOHOO!!