Marriage

Clean Sweep: Cleaning the Refrigerator!

April 19, 2013 by Caroline · 1 Comment

It’s Friday! I don’t know about you but Friday brings cheer to my heart, even if we don’t have anything special planned for the weekend. Just knowing we made it through another school week and we get to have time with my husband home is a wonderful thing.

Here are your assignments for today!

Physical Challenge

Today we are going to clean out the refrigerator! I know it can be a big job but we must tackle it!

Pull out all your old food that is rotting in the clear back of your fridge. Most of us have one or two items like this that gets buried and forgotten at times.

We are going to clean the shelves and drawers. I like to clean the main part of the refrigerator first, and then clean the door. Take out the food from the main part, scrub it down, put the food back and then do the door.

Spiritual Challenge

Do you ever flirt with your husband? Do you do anything or say anything that brings a funny grin to his face, and reminds you of when you were dating/courting? So many times we get busy in life and forget to cherish our marriage and do anything to nurture it. Last night my husband and I went on a date and had so much fun being together!

We actually went to hear a talk at a local art museum for extra credit for his college degree, but we made a date out of it by going to dinner before (we had a Groupon for a yummy steak restaurant thanks to my mother in law!) and then we went shopping after the talk. Of course the night ended with some ice cream from Chick-Fil-A!

Today I want you t0 think of one thing you can do for your husband that is above and beyond what you normally do. Pick up a special treat for him, do something at home for him that he has been asking you to do, or put the children to bed early and plan an awesome date night at home!

When I need ideas I always go to the Dating Divas website. They have ideas for all types of marriages so I’m not saying I like every single idea but I’m sure you will find something there that would work!

Protecting Your Marriage On Facebook

March 7, 2013 by Caroline · 39 Comments

Photo CreditMillions of people are on Facebook every day. I have a business/blog Facebook page and a private page. Facebook is a wonderful tool to use, but it can also be detrimental to your personal life. This post is not going to be yet another caution on how much we should spend on Facebook. I think everyone realizes that Facebook can steal not minutes, but hours of your time every day if you allow it. Rather, I want to talk about Facebook and your marriage.I joined Facebook four years ago with no knowledge at all about what I was getting into. I really had only heard about it in passing, and didn’t know what I was missing.

Some friends were over for dinner one night, and started talking about Facebook, and the rest is history. It’s been a blessing to connect with so many lovely ladies online and form some online friendships.

But I knew I wanted boundaries. After being on Facebook for a few months I saw how quickly everyone connected with each other. I also saw the debates, the chats, the teasing, the camaraderie that can be found on Facebook. And I knew that I wanted to be careful. I didn’t want to compromise my marriage in any way on Facebook.

I’m not the typical person on Facebook that has lots of high school classmates looking them up – there were only two others in my school with me, my brother and sister. I don’t have ex-boyfriends to look up – my husband was my first and only love. But I’ve seen marriages fall apart in ways that astound me, and frankly, that scare me. I’ve seen how little things build up into big things, how slowly over time relationships can start suffering without even knowing it. Tragically, I’ve witnessed first hand separation and affairs happen in marriages that I longed to believe would be solid and rock proof. So I don’t play around with my marriage. I don’t assume that we will always be madly in love. Effort has to be applied to relationships, most of all marriages. With this belief, I decided to be careful with my marriage even on something as simple as Facebook.

A few months after joining Facebook I made a rule for myself, and four years later I still have the same rule – I do not personally friend men on Facebook. Whether they are long time friends that I consider to be more like brothers, or wonderful friends from church that are friends with as a couple, I don’t friend them. My only exception has been if a husband and wife have an account together, I still friend them because I’m friending the wife on the account. I also have friended a few men’s business pages, whether it be for religious or homeschooling purposes, but it’s not a personal page.

You might think I’m extreme, but it’s been a good rule, and one that my husband appreciates. My husband is not on Facebook, and only occasionally gets on my account to see what is going on. This rule extends out of Facebook as well, while we both freely chat with friends at church that are male and female, we don’t call up the opposite sex on the phone for friendly chats and to catch up. My husband has had opportunities to grow his business through business lunches, but it would require meeting a woman alone for lunch, so he has declined. I’m profoundly grateful for that.

When I made this rule for myself, I simply went in my account and deleted the men on my Facebook account that I was friends with, and honestly they probably didn’t even notice!

I only have one chance at my marriage. Sure, there are wonderful stories of marriages coming back together again after tragedy has struck the marriage, but the painful memories of those times would never go away. I’m far from the perfect wife, but this is an easy way for me to show my love and faithfulness to my husband.

How do you protect your marriage online? Have you created online boundaries? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

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Is there such a thing as true love?

February 22, 2013 by Caroline · 28 Comments

This post is written with my younger unmarried readers in mind, which I know I have because of the emails I receive.

When I was growing up I was madly in love with the idea of one day falling in love. Of giving my first kiss to the man that would have my heart forever, someone that would cherish me, treat me like a princess. Yes, I wanted the dashing prince to come along on horseback and take me to his castle to live happily ever after.

Does such a thing exist? Is there really such a thing as true love? It all sounds lovely in fairytales, or in Jane Austen novels where the good guy always either changes his ways and wins the girl’s heart (Hello Mr. Darcy!) or they triumph over the bad guy (Enter Colonel Brandon!). But can a man really bring you happiness and make you feel like a princess?

Absolutely, but only if you are resting in Christ.

My 32 year old husband is back in college with all the 19 and 20 year olds. He is surrounded by young ladies who have all settled for boyfriends that they are not happy with, they complain about how they are treated, the lack of respect and tenderness they get. In short, they have stopped believing what I’m sure their girlhood heart wanted to believe, and all examples of manhood around them have been everything but Prince Charming.

If you want something badly you will wait for it. And if the Lord wants you to have it, you will find it.

I didn’t have to wait long at all. I met my future husband when I was 17, and was married to him at 19. My sister had to wait, and wait, and wait until she was 32 before getting married, but she waited until she found the man that God had in store for her, and she is so thankful that she did.

My sister and brother in law’s wedding. My husband I were the maid of honor and the best man. Such fun!

After being married for 10 years now, I’ve definitely had moments in my marriage where everything was roses and the sky was blue, and other times where thunderclouds gently rumbled. I am a sinful human and I’m married to a sinful human, which makes us grouchy, irritable, moody, and impatient with each other at times. Struggles trying to launch businesses, difficult pregnancies, fatigue and adrenal problems, and being parents to five children nine and under can bring tension to a happy marriage. But in spite of all of that, I can say that my Prince Charming indeed did come, and I still believe in the “happily ever after” fairytale. Oh not in the Disney fairytales of fairy godmothers and magic pumpkins, but in a happily ever after story where a man cherishes his wife as tenderly and lovingly as the Lord cherishes his Church. Where a wife adores and loves her husband, and submits herself to him, as the church submits herself to the Lord. Mix in some sacrifice, long suffering, and the belief that marriage does not end when the going gets tough, and you have the makings of a perfect love story.

Every marriage is going to look different, based on the two people that are yoked to each other. What makes one couple happy would make another couple miserable. You might marry a man whose love language is acts of service, so even though he does not quote Sonnets and Shakespeare, he might express how much he loves you by doing the dishes for you when you are exhausted. Another man might express his love through gifts, so even though you might desperately want help doing dishes that night, he goes out and buys you a new dish drainer to show how much he loves you.

After 10 years of marriage I can happily say (with true thankfulness to God) that the our love for each has only grown stronger. We have bonded even more since my husband went back to college, as we both are working hard together to get him through this. Both of us express our love through physical touch, so we can be seen holding hands, putting our arms around each other, and just siting next to each other when we are out, as much as five children between us will let us!

No marriage is perfect, but please don’t settle for a man who will not cherish you, love you, and adore you. It will make your life miserable, and the children you have together unhappy. A vicious cycle will start where your daughters will think that is normal, and then they will grow up and marry a man who treats them with little respect and very little affection.

Wait for Prince Charming – because such men really do exist. Don’t wait for Barbie’s Ken to come along, the dashing prince with all the physical charms and looks. Patiently rest in the Lord, and wait for a man who has godly charm, and who has desires to lead a family unto the Lord.

My Prince Charming gave me this video for my Valentine’s Day Gift, because doing such things is his love language. Remember, this might not be the love language of the man you marry. Don’t compare, don’t envy, and don’t have a perfect man built up in your mind, unless you are a perfect woman.

I cried and cried watching this video, it melted my heart that my husband still loves me this much after 10 years of marriage. It gives me confidence during the thunderclouds, and hope for the future. And most of all, it nurtures that girlhood dream that I still have of desiring to be the Princess in one man’s eyes.

Happy Anniversary to my darling husband!

October 12, 2012 by Caroline · 16 Comments

10 years ago today I walked down the aisle to marry my beloved husband. After courting for 16 months, we were more than ready to get married and start a new life together. I can’t believe that 10 years has already come and gone! Having had five children since then makes it feel a little more real though.

I thought I would share some pictures and memories of our wedding, as I’ve had a few people ask about how to put on a wedding on a budget.

We had what some would consider a very simple wedding. We spent just a little over a thousand dollars for the whole wedding, and had around 150 people there. My sister sewed my dress and the most of the bridesmaid dresses. I sewed the flower girl dresses, and we bought fresh flowers at a wholesale flower supplier and had a good friend help us arrange them all the day before the wedding. We spent the most on hiring a photographer, and then we paid $100 for our wedding cake, and bought sheet cakes from Costco to feed people once our wedding cake was gone. We just had cake, punch, and mints. Friends and family provided the music.

My sweet friends! The bridesmaids, candle lighters, and flower girls.

My sister attaching my veil

I loved the pearl buttons and lace flower at the back of my dress

I love Pansies, so we had fresh pansies on our cake, and for decoration in pots on the tables.

Our first kiss! I don’t ever regret waiting to have our first kiss at the alter.

We kept it simple, and only rented a tuxedo for Sean. His brother was his best man, then my brother and his cousin were groomsmen. My sister was my maid of honor, and two of my friends were bridesmaids. Little did we know at the time that my sister and his brother would walk the aisle a few years later together as husband and wife.

Both Sets of Parents with Sean and I

This is about the only picture I have of my mom and I at my wedding I really wish I would have gotten more of us together, but at the time I didn’t even think of the fact that she wouldn’t be alive at my ten year anniversary.

I’m so grateful for the past 10 years of wedded bliss, and just pray that I have many more years spent with my husband as we raise our family together! I couldn’t have asked for a better husband, and still feel so incredibly blessed to be Sean’s wife!

Resolutions as a Wife

January 9, 2012 by Caroline · 3 Comments

My Husband and I

A guest post by Jennifer Allen

When the new year rings in my husband and I like to sit down together and write goals for the coming year. We have personal goals, and mutual goals for our life together. After three blessed years of marriage I find each year I begin with the same goal: Loving my husband to the best of my ability.

If you are a married Christian we share something in common. We are told in Titus 2 to be sober, to love our husbands, and if we have children to love them as well. The practical reality of showing love to our husbands can vary greatly from marriage to marriage, but let me share some of my personal goals to achieve this in my life.

1. Grow in my walk with God: It is foolish for me to assume I can love my husband with Charity, the pure love of Christ, without walking with Christ himself. My living faith and devotion to my Savior will touch every other aspect of my life, including my relationship with my husband. The more I am full of the love of Christ, the more I will bless my husband with that love. For it is a love not born in selfishness, trying to get the most out of this relationship for my sake alone. It will be a mutual love that seeks to encourage and bless the other. I must daily make stop for quiet time with God. In becoming a woman with a heart set after God I will bring blessings to my husband’s life.

2. Be in prayer daily for my Husband: I know well the power of prayer. God will hear the supplications of His children. God has done mighty things in the life of my husband and I through prayer. Some time ago my mother had given me a sheet of paper she printed out and laminated for me. It was Praying For our Husbands, 31-Day Plan. It is my desire this year to follow these prayer suggestions each month. Far too often as a perfectionist, goal oriented, list loving person I fail to stop, drop to my knees, and pray to God for my husband. God knows what is best for my husband. It would be a really good idea to ask for His wisdom instead of running ahead with my own thoughts!

3. Find Marriage Role Models: No doubt about it. Marriage is a scary prospect in this day and age. The rate of divorce is astronomical. With marriages failing all around me I want to look at marriages that have lasted and find out why. God himself has shared plenty of wisdom as to what makes a marriage work. So reading His Word concerning marriage is a must. Are there godly older couples who have been lovingly married 20, 30, 40 years or more? I want to read what they have to share, or speak to them in person. I want to find older Christian women who will encourage me to love my husband, even if the days get tough or trials come. I want to use discernment in reading books about marriage. There are many voices and many ideas as to what the perfect Christian marriage looks like. I want to avoid taking advice that encourages me to make an idol out of my husband. Such as implying he is right in any situation, I am to follow his directions even if he is telling me to do something that is very clearly a sin, or that teach the wife is always the one in the wrong if there are serious problems in the marriage. I want to be encouraged to repent when I am wrong, and be honest with myself in seeing how that sin affects my husband.

4. Guard my heart for my husband: As Christian’s we are taught to keep ourselves physically pure for the one we would marry. I knew before marriage that this started with an attitude of the heart, it extends into my marriage as well. That desire for purity is to keep my heart set on my husband, the one God gave me. Physical adultery is not the only way I can be unfaithful to my husband, that is only an outward action of an unfaithful heart. In my single years I would be amazed to listen to or see married women openly lusting after men who were not their husbands. Movie stars, other women’s cute husbands, some model in a magazine, a man in they met in the gym. Yes, they would talk about these men, look at them in magazines, watch movies they were in, go to a concert they were putting on, or flirt with the man in person and ignite the “flames” they were allowing in their hearts. It is a fire I never want to play with. Their hearts were not set on their husbands alone. I want to guard my heart for my husband, and him alone. I made a covenant with him I never want to forget.

5. I want to find practical ways to show love for my Husband: Just as my husband loves to make me happy and find special ways to say “I love you” I want to do the same for him. I love to get him special treats, fix his favorite meal, play a game together, talk about our dreams and goals in life, or send a love note with his lunch. This aspect would vary in every single marriage since most are not exactly the same in personality and taste. One example is before we were married I had a list (with my mother-in-laws help) of the foods my husband likes the most. It is still a delight to me to prepare meals that taste good to him.

6. I want to look beautiful for my husband: I want to remember I am dressing myself for three reasons:

1. For the Lord (His desire for me to be modest and chaste in heart and outward appearance)

2. For my husband

3. For my personal taste (colors, styles I like etc.)

I love clothes! I am able to sew my own clothes, and I enjoy frequenting thrift stores and clearance racks. However, my taste in clothing is quite different than what my husband thinks is beautiful on me. So I want to careful not to have a closet full of outfits that are for “me” and none for “him”. I want to look beautiful in his eyes. Again, this would be very different in each marriage! An example is I have come to like wearing dangly earrings. My husband on the other hand thinks I look best with my engagement and wedding ring. No other jewelry needed! I wear those dangly earrings for me, but when I’m thinking of looking beautiful to my husband, they are left in the jewelry box.

7. I want to remember that life is not all about me: My mother taught me from a little girl in so many ways to remember that “life is not all about you.” How true that is! I am not in this marriage to be a taker, but a mutual giver. I want to read this ABC’s of marriage often and take it to heart. I want to take joy in the husband God has blessed me with in this year ahead.

ABC’s of Marriage

Accept one another as he or she is
Be sensitive to each other’s needs
Compliment each other regularly
Don’t go to bed angry or with an argument unsettled
Express your love and appreciation for each other daily
Forgive one another totally and unconditionally
Give 100% of yourself to the marriage relationship
Honor one another
Identify areas of conflict and work on root causes
Judge not
Keep courting
Listen to one another
Measure up to your God-assigned role in the marriage
Never drag up past mistakes
Open your heart to one another in honesty and understanding
Pray together
Quit nagging
Renew your commitment to God and to each other
Speak the truth in love
Treat each other as friends and lovers
Undergird one another in child-rearing, work and responsibilities
View your marriage as a covenant before God
Worship together
X-ray your heart with the prayer, “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me,
and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”
Yield yourselves daily to the will of God
Zero in on common goals and interests and enjoy each other for life

“Except the LORD build the house, they labor in vain that build it”
(Psalm 127:1).

Jennifer Allen is The Modest Mom’s sister. She is a seamstress for The Modest Mom. She is happily married to the love of her life and still trying to convince him he is the most wonderful man in the world!

31 Days of Femininity: Being Feminine In Public

October 31, 2011 by Caroline · 7 Comments

We have covered a lot of different topics concerning femininity this past month! I’ve really enjoyed doing the series, but I have to admit I’m really looking forward to not blogging *every* single day in November. I have a lot of exciting giveaways and a fun new topic planned for November, so stay tuned!

I wanted to wrap up the series by talking about being feminine in public. It can be easy to learn how to be feminine at home, but sometimes it’s harder to apply these principles when we are out and about.

There have been many times I have been blessed by seeing a woman in a store who, just by her demeanor and appearance, instantly strikes me as being a feminine woman. It encourages me and uplifts my sometimes draining shopping trips to see another woman striving to be who she is called by God to be.

I’ve realized that at times it is hard for me to be feminine when I am out. Going shopping with four young children can be exhausting, and I have to put on a strong mental attitude before I go out! Plus, I prepare myself for all the comments that come my way – “Are these all yours?” ”My, you must have your hands full!” ”You are expecting again? Oh my!” and the list could go on. There have been times an older gentleman has offered to help me load up my groceries, put away my cart, etc. and while I have certainly accepted these offers many times, I have been known to refuse the help also and tell him I am just fine. During those moments I recognize that I don’t have a feminine attitude, but more of a feminist attitude. I’m trying to prove that I have it all together and I don’t need any help. I personally think that’s the wrong attitude to have. If a gentleman is trying to help you out of the kindness of his heart, let him be that manly gentleman and accept his help! Obviously you need to be discerning in today’s world and make sure that the help you are accepting is just from a gallant knight, and he does not have any other motives in mind. I hate to even mention that, but it is sadly the world we live in today.

It is also perfectly acceptable to let a gentleman open a door for you, and you graciously accept his gesture of gallant manhood. I notice that I get the door opened for me far more when I am in skirts than the few times I have gone out in pants. Just a little observation of mine….

Being feminine in public is a mindset. It is a determination before you step out your door in the morning that you are going to put on a meek and quiet spirit and try to witness to others about the Lord through your example. This brings to mind the following quote. Not that words do not matter, for they certain do; but sometimes…

Photo Credit

We might very well say that we believe in being feminine, and we might say we are a follower of the Lord, but our actions speak louder than words. How we behave in public clearly shows what kind of person we are. I have deeply regretted the times I have been in public and spoken crossly to my children when I was tired, only to look up and see someone watching me. That was my only opportunity to show them that I do enjoy being a mother to a larger than normal family, but I wasn’t showing it at that moment. And of course I regret it because I’m not showing my child that attitude of a meek spirit in their mother.

As I close this series out, I would just exhort you to continue to display Godly femininity no matter where you are, whether it is in your home with your children, spending time with your husband, or out in public.

Clean Sweep: Cleaning the Refrigerator!

Physical Challenge

Spiritual Challenge

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Protecting Your Marriage On Facebook

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Is there such a thing as true love?

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Happy Anniversary to my darling husband!

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Resolutions as a Wife

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31 Days of Femininity: Being Feminine In Public

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