The Seventh Anniversary Book: this is why .
Every year it sneaks up on me. The annual 'book', that is, not our anniversary! Usually about a week before our anniversary, I have some sort of heart attack, realizing that I better get my act together if I'm going to finish the book on time! This 'book' is something that I started our first year of marriage and I'm so glad that it's continued to be a tradition.

I mentioned last time that we celebrated our anniversary at a beautiful restaurant, Firehouse, and then finished our date off at Salt + Straw, farm-fresh ice-cream. If you are ever in Portland, please go. You will not regret it. I'm almost too embarrassed to tell you that I settled on plain old 'chocolate with chewy brownies'. But seriously, it was so wonderful.  Steve chose their 'strawberry, honey-balsamic, and black pepper' and loved it too. Salt + Straw sold a variety of old-time candies too, and we decided we needed to bring back a string of Sixlets for Graeme. He was beside himself.

  
This year, Graeme decorated the cover of the book with fingerprint paint and crayons. He did a wonderful job. He also graced my 'layout' page, above, with lots of scribbles. I have to admit that each year, during the process of putting the scrapbook together, I get easily frustrated with how the book looks. Do you struggle too with being happy with a completed project? I've heard that artistic people frequently do that-- that they are their own worst critic. I believe it, even if I don't particularly think of myself as an artist.


But at some point, usually as I'm writing/typing everything out, I realize there is something much bigger to this project than the artisticness of it. And it's this: via this little blog, I document how God answered our prayers that year. Each year I am so refreshed and encouraged in my faith by calling to mind how God cared for us so personally and perfectly. I also am so excited that our boys will have these books to look at some day. I want them to have these written accounts of God's work.

It's been a wonderful year. Here's to many, many more years of recalling God's goodness. ( ps. Yes! I am in love with my husband's gift to me-- my 'new' vintage polaroid camera! )


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3 comments:

  1. I love this idea, and the way you wrote about it put tears in my eyes. Such a beautiful way to document your years.

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  2. Such a wonderful idea. I was thinking of doing this for each of the kids for Christmas. You have inspired me to start working on it. Where did you get the lovely journals?

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  3. Shannalee--
    thank you so much. I highly recommend it because it is so helpful in recalling events and answers to prayer. I usually print everything out, but this year's was hand-written because I was short on time. Most likely because I was blow-drying my hair instead, ha! :)

    Rachel--
    thank you-- a Christmas one would be so neat. This journal was actually just several pieces of paper that I sewed down the middle to create a book, but I have picked up our other books at differing places. I found a book once when we visited Seattle several years ago ( before we even moved here ) and I just glued our pictures and stories right over some of the pages-- it had several great sayings in it and beautiful colors. I've also gotten books at Target and Michael's before.

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Thank you so much for reading here and sharing life with me!

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