As promised… the pics

Here’s baby. (and do please note our immaculate green lawn in the background that he works very hard for!)

and Jen… see that little cover right behind his bum… that’s where I sit, there’s a seat under that cover!

He’s HAWT!

and just to make you smile… here’s a pic of our bear who just lost his two front teeth yesterday… they were both very loose and we knew they were comin any day now…he lost one eatin wings but was scared to pull the other for fear that he’d “look stupid”… so if you see the bear with no teeth… tell him how AWESOME he looks!

I’m proud

This is my side of the family.

This is my older brother Matt and his wife Jen

These are Matty and Jen’s kids… Jackson Eli and Megan Elizabeth

This is my younger brother Ben and his wife Teresa

this is Benny and Teresa’s son… Zachary (he wanted his picture taken on this big rock… it’s a boy thing)

and this is my daddy…

and finally here’s the handsome heart throbs….

like I said.  I’m proud. 

that’s it.

 

Thankfulness is a result of being content with God’s will

Ok, this is the last post on Part 1 of this book (The Help Meet).  I realize most of you don’t like to read the long posts… So I’ll try to throw in some shorter ones.. but not today.  Ha!

The very heart of reverence is extreme appreciation and profound thankfulness that this man, just as he is, has chosen to love me, just as I am.

I sat in that for a few minutes.  She used the word ‘extreme’ (intense… excessive… severe) appreciation.  Not minor… trivial… or inconsequential.  Are you TRULY thankful that you’re husband chose to love you?  That he picked you out of aaaaaaaalllllllll the other women in this world to stand beside for the rest of his life?  I am.  I don’t deserve my husband and I say that with complete confidence and no reservations. I simply don’t deserve him.  But God has blessed me with him.  And it is no exaggeration that I thank God on a daily basis for him.  When is the last time you audibly said, ‘God… thank you for my husband’?  Honestly.  I know I never did with my first husband.  Now, I did not have a personal relationship with Christ then, and maturity and wisdom has changed my mindset 100 fold. 

I believe that Trent and I truly are thankful for each other.  Not the ‘oh yeah, he’s great’ or ‘yeah I could’ve done worse’ but truly thankful.  I’ll be the first to tell you I’m no prize, I’m overweight, moody and have my own quirks… but Trent was in shock that I would be interested in ‘a guy like him.’  I know a lot of you giggled just now but it’s true, he really said that.  And he thinks I’m a catch (still not exactly sure why)… therefore he’s thankful for me.  And I KNOW there were women everywhere that would have loved to been Mrs Trent Austin… and he chose me.  I’m still in shock and we’ve been married over 2 years now.  We are giddy in love because neither one of us have the mindset that ‘he/she is lucky to have me.’  We both feel very undeserving of the other but yet receive God’s gift and appreciate it every day. 

When you stop appreciating what God has given you, you lose the joy. 

I know a lot of you are thinking, yeah keri, that’s great, if my husband was like Trent our marriage would be great too.  I am here to tell you that Trent has flaws.  He’s human.  You all see Trent on stage every weekend… and at home, he IS the same man you see on stage… I am a very blessed woman.  He has a passion for Christ like no other I’ve seen… and it is inspiring.  But don’t think our marriage is all butterflies and rainbows.  The only thing I can tell you is that I enable him to lead our home, I don’t emasculate him, I don’t speak negatively of him to anyone or even myself… he tells me everyday how beautiful I am, weather I’m straight out of bed with crazy hair and cat litter breath or I’ve spent the last hour getting ready.  He encourages me and lifts me up.  He asks my opinion and seeks my advice.  We guard each other.  If our priorities are straight (#1 God, #2 Spouse) everything else just falls into place naturally.  We tell each other all the time, you’re my #2 and that’s where we want each other to be, because that means we are putting God first. 

The thing you have to get past is to not accentuate his flaws.  I have flaws.  You have flaws.  We all do.  If I spent my days telling my husband the things I didn’t like about him, he wouldn’t want to come home.  When you first meet someone and you’re sitting across the table from them you don’t say ‘your nose is big’ or ‘your teeth are crooked’  because you are so overwhelmed with this person and have so much innocent love and attraction for them that those slight flaws don’t matter.  In the beginning you spend all the time in the world making that person feel special and lifting them up and letting them know you think about them non stop.  Is there any better feeling in the world than falling in love?  Yes.  Having that same feeling 2 years down the road.  10 years down the road.  We were so willing to put all this effort into our relationship in the beginning… find that passion.  Don’t just assume that ‘we’ve been married 10 years, he knows I love him.’  Remind him.  You did then.  He knew you liked him a week into the relationship, but you still drove by and left a note on his car with his favorite candy bar while he was at work.    

Marriage is work.  Team work.  You both have to work… daily.  It’s the smallest things that make the biggest difference.  A man simply wants to know he’s respected and a woman simply wants to know she’s loved.  You show your man respect and he will show you love.  It’s truly that simple.

Let him lead

Ok… so this picture is posted for two reasons… 1. because it is my all time favorite movie and should be yours too and 2. because he portrayed an amazing leader…

William Wallace, Maximus… there’s a reason why your men love these movies ladies… ponder on that a bit.

Becoming less independent was somewhat of a struggle for me… at first. 

Growing up my mother was very strong and independent, but I still knew my father had the last say so.  In other words, I knew my father was the leader of our home.  So letting the husband lead, by nature, is instinctive for me.  However, I was not fortunate enough to have married well the first time, so I was left to raise a 1-year-old boy on my own for seven years making me the mother and father of the home.  Seven years.  That’s a long time.  A long time for me to make the final decisions… me to call the shots… me to rule our home.  So when I married Trent, my instincts battled my habitual behavior.  I was always quick to answer to make a decision and had to condition myself to defer to my husband.  It was a awkward at first, almost feeling as though I was being stripped of something, but it wasn’t that I was being stripped of anything at all… it was that I was being relieved of something that was never meant to be my role in the first place.  It is my first reaction when being asked if we can have dinner, or make plans, to say, that sounds great, let me see what Trent has planned.  Even with Noah, my response is always, ‘I think that’s ok, let’s ask your dad, or I don’t care, go ask your dad.’  It lets him know that we do EVERYTHING together.  We are truly one, in every sense of the word.

Debi Pearl writes…

God created Adam and commissioned him to take the position of leadership.  Since then, every son of Adam has received the same mandate. Man was created to rule.  It is his nature.  But the only place most men will ever rule is their own little kingdom called home.  At least, every man’s destiny is to be the leader of his household.  To deny him this birthright is contrary to his nature and God’s will.  

 

She goes on to say…

It is NOT God’s will for your husband to reverence you.  It is not God’s plan for you to remain seated at the dinner table or in your lounge chair and expect him to serve himself.  Our modern society has conditioned us to expect him to serve us.  It hurts our feelings if he doesn’t do things that we feel he owes us, but that is not the plan God set into place.  Our failure to know and believe the written words of God has caused us to accept a cultural lie.

This one’s powerful…

Reverence is not just how you act; it is how you feel and how you respond with words and with your body language.  It’s like I said before, you have to believe it before he’ll believe you.  If that’s a struggle for you, just ask God to help you… ask him remind you of the good, of why you married him, and to allow you to focus on those attributes.

To lead his home was a bit of an adjustment for Trent as well… although it was natural for him to want to… for 19 years he wasn’t allowed to.  So having a wife that defers to him and reverences him has made him a whole new person.  He’s more confident, he stands taller, and he’s an amazing leader.  Leading our home doesn’t mean he just goes out and makes decisions without my input.. it does mean that what he decides is the way it’s going to be and I’m ok with that.  I love it… I love it when he takes charge.  I’m telling you, get off your self-righteous, feministic, high horse just for short time and serve and lift up your husband and allow him to lead and you will see a man who stands with his chest out.  You’re whole house will realign the way it should be. God’s design.   

The Banana Clip

I’M BACK!!!!

So for many years now I’ve wanted to bring back the banana clip.
Not to be confused with the banana guard. Which will be a whole ‘nother blog in itself.

I must admit, I was an avid user in my day. It was so addicting… what young girl who had hair down to the middle of her back would not want a device to make it look as if you had a mohawk with bangs? It really doesn’t get any cooler than that! And the variation possibilities… they came in every color to match any outfit or Jellies that you might be wearing at the time, they came fat, thin… they came in shapes like a girraffe…

Last night I’m at Wal-mart (which for someone who still doesn’t have television service, by the looks of Wal-mart and the people, I would have thought the world was coming to an end) and I’m scrolling through the toiletry selections looking for something of a shower caddy. What to my wandering eyes doeth appear? The Banana Clip. I’m pretty sure I heard angels singing and saw God smile at me at that very moment. However, here’s the catchy part. Don’t go into Wal-mart and ask where the banana clips are, they’ll smirk at you and say something to the effect of ‘we don’t sell banana clips, that was so 1984!’ Oh no. What you have to ask for in 2008 is the Banana Clasp. I kid you not. Who do they think they’re kidding? The clip… oh no, that’s so not cool… but hey… check out the clasp! You can get 3 in a pack (Black, Brown and White).

So as many of my older friends know, the day has come where I can no longer just CLAIM to bring back the banana clip… I have to do it. It’s my destiny. If Justin Timberlake can bring sexy back, I can bring the banana clip (or ‘clasp’ …if you will) back. Now the only question is…
with bangs

or without?

Thanks Coach Wingard

I always said that if I ever had the chance to change one thing in my life, it would be my decision to quit basketball.  It was my life.  I loved it.  I loved the game, I loved movies about the game. I loved songs about the game.  I loved bus rides to away games.  I loved Magic Johnson.   I loved the smell of the locker rooms.  I loved the drills.  I loved game days.  I loved it.  I was good at it.  It was natural.  A God given gift.  Even though it was natural, I wanted more.  I wanted to be the best.  I spent every waking moment I could in that gym.  Before school, lunch, after school… logging hours.  Basketball camps.  I played on my driveway at home and ran lines and drills at home. 

Then, I went our for cheerleader in Jr. High… and got it.  I loved gymnastics too and thought I’d just see.  I got it!  Didn’t change my dedication to hoops though… I still was in that gym before and after school, just in my cheerleading uniform on game days. 

Up until this point, I was a starting guard.  I played probably 90% of every game.  I was the only guard coach had who could stand in the out of bounds at one end of the court and throw it completely over 5 girls heads to my forwards on the other half of the court (this was still when girls played half court).  But see coach didn’t like her basketball girls to be cheerleaders.  So all of a sudden I went from starting guard playing the majority of the game to sitting on the bench the entire game and maybe seeing a couple of minutes of court time right before half time.  It crushed me.  My practice didn’t faulter, my heart didn’t waiver, just the fact that after the game, I put on a cheerleading uniform and did a couple of herkie’s for the guys game.  That was enough for her to bench me.  So I let her get to me.  I quit.  I got tired of running my butt off, practicing like mad, logging more hours than any other girl on the team, and sitting on the bench for the games.  To top it off, coach rode horses with my mom and she actually told her once that ‘keri isn’t one of my pets because she’s got the natural talent.  Stacey and Teri are my pets because they have to work for it.’  It raged my mom, cuz she knew how hard I practiced, how much time I put in it and how much I loved it. 

Well, the following year I didn’t make the cheerleading squad.  That was it.  I was out of organized sports from then on out.   I started gaining weight, hanging out with different people…

I always wondered what my life would have been like had I stuck it out through coach Wingard and played for Stidham in highschool.  I knew I’d be great.  But I never did.  I wondered if I would have played for some college somewhere and actually had a college education.  I blamed all of that on Wingard.  I always wondered how an adult could crush a kids dreams like that.  Why was she a teacher?

Here’s God’s sense of humor.  I went with my amazing husband to Jami Smith and the Nockels Christmas concert at Crossings Community Church last year and this concert is in honor of teachers… the teacher of the year that year… she named her most influential teacher growing up… the teacher who made the biggest impact in her life… Sharon Wingard. 

She may have shut down my life in basketball real quick, but apparently she made a difference in somebody’s life.  Likely many others lives as well, who knows. 

I always thought if I ever saw her face to face again, I’d tell her just exactly what I thought of her stupid cheerleader/basketball opinion… and how she ruined my life…I even tried to look her up once to call her and tell her… but I’m glad I never found her.  I’m glad I am who I am.  I’m glad I never became the college educated basketball playing Keri.  That Keri may have never given her life to Christ and never met her Trent.  And THAT’S the dream that I still can’t believe I’m living. 

Thanks Coach Wingard.

Anyone change the path of your life that you wish you had a do-over?