1. Celebrating life isn't just about birthdays...or humans. A few weeks ago, Jack found a roly poly in the sandbox. Oh, the enthusiasm over such a tiny bug almost overwhelmed him. And then watching him marvel over the bug while he tried to figure out how it managed to get into the sandbox was equally entertaining. And then when I showed him the way "Harry" could roll into a ball to protect himself, the light in his eyes made me smile. Watching this Jack's enthusiasm for life of all forms has encouraged me to notice the tiny things. Like the ants in my kitchen...a nuisance, sure...but how did something so small know to crawl all the way up the house to the window? Then how did it know my sugar jar was on the opposite side of the kitchen? THEN how did it find it's way back to the window? It's really quite incredible when things are put in Jack's perspective.

2. Sometimes the wait for the fish is much better than the actual catch. On this particular day, we learned our ABC's, talked about his daddy (and how much we love him,) and out of the blue, this tiny sweet baby in a little boy's body says "I wuv you, Kaywee...all da way to the moon!" I don't know about you, but in my own life, I feel like I'm always waiting for something. Waiting to be a mommy, waiting to find a million dollars, waiting to move into our house, waiting to feel like a grown up. It's such a wonderful relief when something as genuine as being loved all the way to the moon makes the waiting a little easier to handle. So I'll wait for the fish to bite, as long as love still beats out the waiting.

3. Siblings really are your best friends. I am 4 years apart from both of my brothers (I suffer from Middle Child syndrome. I'm in constant need for affirmation. I'm okay with it.) My brothers and I were always in awkward stages because Bing was too old and Jared was too young. Jared and I played together all the time and we grew closer as the years went on. My older brother and I weren't as close because he moved out right as I was getting old enough to relate to him... And then Jack came around. And we both found out what real love was on the same day at the same time. We bonded that day in a way that we really hadn't before...and it never really went away. I've been Through a lot of bad friendships and bad relationships, but my brothers have remained constant in my life. I watch Jack and Stella love and comfort each other even though they're still too young to really have a relationship. I'm so thankful that when the rest of their world is chaotic, they'll still have each other, and most days I think they already know that. There's a lot of comfort in knowing that somebody always has your back, and who better to have your back than the ones who have never left you hanging?

4. Falling in Love is not always romantic. I had boyfriends in high school. I had plenty of people that I "loved." I made promises that I knew I wouldn't keep. I had found "the one" about 3 times, because those people made me happy, and that's what love is all about, right? Wrong. When Jack was born, it was all over for me and my love illusions. The minute they wheeled that big-headed baby into the waiting area, I lost my heart for the first time. Everything about him was beautiful. When he cried, I hurt for him. When he yawned, he may as well have hung the moon. When I put his hand in mine, I saw the beauty of our creator and realized for the first time how much he really must love us. The older he got, the harder I fell. I would've jumped off of a bridge if it meant he would laugh. When he said my name for the first time, my heart skipped a beat. I would lay in the floor with him for hours and just listen to him talk about nothing. I was head over heels for this perfect little human. I never wanted to break a promise to him. I wanted to be there for every chapter of his life, even when he started the "I don't want to go with you" phase. It amazes me how much I miss him, even now, when I can't make him stop talking at bedtime. I almost love him as much as I love Cody...and he knows it. So he taught me how to love, which has benefited me in so very many ways.

5. Getting older doesn't mean you stop dreaming. Cody and I took Jack to Lubbock for the day on his birthday this year. We spent most of the day at the science spectrum and then we took him to Toys R us to let him choose a toy for his present. This kid is OBSESSED with Buzz Lightyear, so of course that's the toy he had to have. We were eating dinner at Joe's Crab Shack, and just before they sang happy Birthday to him, I asked what he was going to do when he grew up. He said "I'm gonna work on da rig wike my daddy." I said, "Is that really what you wanna do?"  "Yeah." So I laughed and enjoyed the rest of our evening. On the drive back home, Jack was unusually quiet. I turned around and saw him staring with this crazy intense look on his face at his glow in the dark buzz lightyear. "What are you doing, Jack?" "How him light up like dat?" "He's a space ranger, that's his uniform." "Oh." About twenty minutes later, he sighed a heavy sigh and said "Kaywee?" "Yeah?" "I'm gonna be buzz lightyear when I get big like daddy." "I thought you said you wanted to work on the rig." "I will." "You just said you were gonna be Buzz Lightyear." "I'll do that too." I laughed...and then I started thinking about my own dreams as a child. Am I chasing the dreams I had as a child? Or am I settling into mediocrity because I'm getting too old to run? He's an attention getter, that Jack.

This was a really corny blog and I'm well aware of that. But these are things that I want to remember about him. These are pictures that I want to have a caption, not a "I don't know what you were doing here or why I held on to it." This is a kid that has changed me completely, and it's important to me that I remember why.

Jack has a little sister that's growing up quick and I know that there will be another set of lessons that I'll learn from her. Don't worry, I'll drown you with another sappy blog about her when the time comes.

Love never fails (Even when your Aunt uses your stories as a life lesson)

KG

The Anniversary Post

*Sigh of Relief*

I dropped my summer class. Am I disappointed? A little. Am I relieved? Absolutely.

Misery in a class is really quite the blessing in disguise. I was so bored. I was bored in a class that should have really intrigued me. Well, some of it was interesting...but the things that really should have captivated me ended up making me want to run into a brick wall. So I'm currently riding the fence about what to do next. I'm obviously trusting the Lord to make it a wide open door that I can't miss...or at least make the decision a peaceful one. Time shall tell! =D

It's almost our anniversary, y'all! This has been the fastest year of my entire life. It is so hilarious to me that that two months leading to the wedding drug on and on and on...and the past twelve months are almost a blur. Oh, that wedding. Have I ever shared that hurricane of a day with you? Let's check out a few highlights:

-The Wedding in General-
I did not want a wedding. Not one little bit. I was willing to go to the courthouse and have a really awesome two week honeymoon. I was willing to fly to the beach and get married in a white sundress and flip flops.  I was willing to go to Vegas. I was willing to get married on a Wednesday afternoon in the church prayer garden. Cody was not willing to do any of these things. Cody wanted a day to celebrate our wedding. It was a very dramatic decision. I finally threw my hands up and said "Fine, you invite 25 people and I'll do the same." For the record, my list had 14 people. They were all family.

-The Wedding Date-
I had convinced myself that if we were going to have a wedding, it was going to be bumpin'. So we decided to get married on October 23, 2010. I gave myself almost a year to find everything that would make my day amazing. I found my dream photographer, dress, someone to make my cake as weird as I wanted, and a decorator that was going to put Christmas lights EVERY WHERE for our evening wedding...and that's all I cared about. I decided that since it was fall, we'd do kind of an "Arabian Nights" theme. Dark purples, Blues, Oranges....it really would've been beautiful. The more people heard about it, the more people invited themselves. The more people that invited themselves, the bigger the dollar signs got. I almost had a cardiac arrest when I received the quotes from the caterers.

Around April, I thought that I might lose my mind if I had to make another decision. I think the final straw was somebody threatening not to come because they hadn't been invited to help me plan. I blew up, cried on my daddy's shoulder, and said "I couldn't handle anymore." So daddy shrugged and said "Then what are we waiting for?" I popped my head up and the wheels started turning. I considered a surprise wedding on the 4th of July. I thought it would be funny to invite our close friends and family to my parent's backyard and have the wedding there. Then I knew that the people who couldn't come would be upset about missing something that they didn't know was happening. So instead, I called Hannah Katherine to see if she had any July dates available (which I didn't find likely, because she was a rockstar and everybody wanted her at their wedding.) She had one. On July 3rd. I was super pumped, because 4th of July was (and is) my favorite holiday (I'm a firework freak) and we would ALWAYS have the day after our anniversary off of work. =] So the shotgun planning began.

-The Wedding Venue-
Of course, not everything was quite as simple. Our original venue was booked that weekend for a rodeo or something. No churches wanted "non-members" getting married at their church. There was an ADORABLE venue in Lubbock that was available, but we got tons of "Oh, well I don't want to drive all the way to Lubbock." and tons of "That's kind of complicated..."And it was, I'll acknowledge it. But it annoyed me enough to make me cry enough that it caused my Mother-In-Law to say "Why not at my house?" And then Life was good again. She has a gorgeous stretch of Land with Willow Trees everywhere and nothing surrounding it. I was picturing an evening wedding with lots of lights and bright colors. I was relieved. Plus, she lives in Wink...I knew that only the people that REALLY wanted to be a part of our day would drive to nowhere land. So, I let the ball roll.

-The Wedding Cake-
Cody and I always refer to each other as our "Lobster." It traces back to "Friends," where Phoebe claims that lobsters only have one mate for the duration of their lives. I thought it would be adorable to have a simple 3 tier white cake with a bride and groom lobster on the top of it . I found someone that was crazy enough to attempt this cake and I was quite excited. The week before the wedding, I got wind that said cake decorator moved to Dallas. One of my dear friends came to my rescue and helped me make about five dozen cupcakes. And THEN she made a little double tiered cake for us to cut and eat/ save for our one year anniversary. My best friend Julie and her best friend Julie helped us. Then they threw a surprise lingerie shower for me. My cheeks stayed red and I got a little emotional because of the overwhelming kindness, but what began as a disaster turned into one of my favorite wedding memories. Insane rainstorm and All.

-The Wedding Weather-
It was literally about this time last year that Hurricane Alex let his fury roar across the states. That fury roared right into West Texas. And it roared for a week. At the time, I thought to myself, "Yay!" I was thrilled that the grass was going to be a little greener and the flowers a little brighter. Then on July 2nd, that last little bit of hurricane rain blew in. My poor family (and friends that are practically family) were out in the rain trying to put tents up in case the weather kept up it's nonsense. It did. We didn't change any plans, but we called a little rinky dink church in Wink, just in case. We had a rehearsal dinner that night and we all laughed at the possibility of getting married in that church. The rain stopped for several hours and things were looking up for the Gaines Wedding.

I woke up on July 3rd and felt the dread creep over me. My room at the time had an enormous window in it, so if it was sunny, the room was bright. If it was cloudy, the room was dark as night. It was a dark room. I threw the covers over my head and cried a little bit before I got out of the bed. I walked into the living room and heard my mom on the phone in the bedroom with a hint of panic in her voice. Almost on cue, a clap of thunder rattled the house. My dad came in and said "Let's Talk." in every body's favorite dad voice. I stared at the fireplace the entire time he talked (I could really punch myself for being such a brat.) "Kayde, I think it's pretty obvious that it's raining now. And there's no sign of it stopping. And you need to think about the fact that even if it did stop, the mud would be awful out there. And even if the mud had time to dry, the mosquitos and the humidity would be enough to ruin the day...so we need to think about the church." I took a breath...shrugged...and said "Okay." What else could I do? My parents couldn't stop the rain or dry the dirt. Nobody could. I called Bailey (the same one who saved the wedding cake catastrophe) and cried about the venue in the privacy of my bedroom. She said "You know what, I think that getting married is the whole point of this day, so while the church may not be convenient, you'll still be married." And so I let it go. When all was said and done, the church was still rinky dinky, but my daddy sure made that altar pretty. There were so many people that worked their hind ends off to make our day beautiful, and for that I will always be thankful. 

The list literally goes on and on. My dress didn't fit me on my wedding day, so the back of it was safety pinned so that it didn't fall off. My wedding shoes were two different sizes (which I didn't notice because I foolishly opted out of "breaking them in.") The flowers that we ordered in April for the wedding never got ordered, so we bought flowers at Sam's and made our own bouquets/boutonnieres. A diamond fell out of my ring the day before the wedding. My nephew refused to carry the ring pillow so I threw one of my nieces into the job at the last minute(literally, as she was walking out the door to go down the aisle.) The humidity in the air caused my bridesmaids and my own hair to be flat and straight. So my dream of having my hair down and curly at my wedding was dashed... but in the end, we were married. And we were happy. And we don't remember a single detail about that day other than being in each other's arms at the end of it. Would I have traded it all in for a wedding on a beach? Totally. But I think every bride says the same thing after her wedding.

It was all a huge testament to the Lord's Faithfulness. As soon as we kissed the bride and walked out of the church, the sun blinded us. It was absolutely gorgeous outside. We were talking to our photographer after, and while we had a wonderful day, I think she knew it wasn't what I envisioned for our pictures. SO we planned another session for around a month later, where I had my hair down and we were outside. They are gorgeous pictures. And I love them.

I never ever ever thought that I would look back at wedding pictures and smile. But now, I love to look back and see the rain on the ground when Cody saw me for the first time. It's a beautiful moment on top of a not so beautiful circumstance. You can look at pictures of me from earlier in the day when I was so sad but trying to be happy and compare them to pictures of me when I saw him. You can literally watch the sadness melt away into uncontainable joy in a single frame. It was the best moment of the entire day, and HKF is the only one that got to witness it...and the camera...but it's not the same. I love the imperfection of the dots and the icing on the cupcakes. I love That my best friend got to put each dot on the cupcakes that I iced. I love that a stranger had the heart to "smush" the dots. I love that a stranger had a big enough heart to help save a bride to be wedding cake disaster. I love that I had friends who were willing to step in and help. I love that the Sun came out just in time for our bridal party pictures and made it look like we planned a church wedding on purpose. As Jay (Our minister) said, "I guess God just wanted a wedding in a church."

Ultimately, It's been a wonderful year with the man that gave me his name. I love you more than anything in this world, Cody Gaines. I can't wait to grow your babies and watch your hair turn grey. You're everything good in my life, and I treasure the day I became your wife. Here's to another 79 years!