Tag: marriage

Love and Marriage vs. Life Challenges

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Three years ago I committed my life to this beautiful woman and our life together as husband and wife started off in the best possible way. We were in love. Our kids loved each other. We had good paying jobs. We had an amazing wedding surrounded by our family and friends, and then headed off on a dream honeymoon.

Anyone with half a brain knows that life will throw challenges at you and your marriage. But despite that, there is nothing that can really prepare you for those challenges or how to handle them when they occur. God knows, we didn’t fully realize what was ahead of us.

We’ve had a lot of AMAZING things happen to us and so many good memories that have been made. But challenges have come whether we liked them or not.

Over the past three years we’ve dealt with job losses (hers last year, mine this year), job changes (4 for her, 2 for me), credit card bills that got out of control, crazy rent increases, my autistic son moving in/starting college, and my depression rearing its ugly head once more. This is all on top of the regular challenges that affect every marriage.

CHALLENGES SUCK.

But today as I reflect on the past 3 years as a married couple (4 years as a couple), I’m not reminded of the bad. I see the woman who has stuck by my side and continued to love me, truly for better or worse.

I know living with me is no cup of tea everyday, but she still chooses to do it.
She still does it with a smile on her face and love in her heart.

She does it when she makes silly faces or belts out some tune off-key.

She does it when she cleans dishes or makes a meal.

She does it when she holds me and says that everything is going to be alright, even thought it feels like the world is crumbling around us.

She has placed her absolute faith, trust and love in me and believes in me when I don’t even believe in myself.

Sometimes, I question why (because my mind is whack like that) but I just try and accept/appreciate the fact that she does, and hasn’t failed to in the 4 years we’ve been together.

8 years ago I saw the movie Juno and came to love the following line…

“Look, in my opinion, the best thing you can do is find a person who loves you for exactly what you are. Good mood, bad mood, ugly, pretty, handsome, what have you, the right person is still going to think the sun shines out your ass. That’s the kind of person that’s worth sticking with.”

I had wondered if it was possible to find a person like that, or if it was another movie fairy tale.

Today I realize it’s no fairy tale and I’ve got that kind of person.

So today I say to the woman who is still just a beautiful today as she was 4 years ago. Thank you.

Thanks for choosing me to be your husband.
Thanks for loving me as much as you have and continue to.
Thanks for sticking by me and continuing to believe that the “sun still shines out my ass”.

Happy Anniversary Honey. Here’s to the rest of our life.

I love you Jennifer Lynn Tellez. Yesterday, Today and Always.

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The Wonderfully Perfect Family Mess

When my wife and I got married, seeing as we were joining two families we decided to involve the kids in the ceremony. We like many other re-married couples with kids, wanted to show it wasn’t just about the two of us. It was about ALL of us.

After searching through all of the possibilities, we decided on using a special picture frame that held sand. Each of us would have our own color sand to represent us.

The big day came and the kids and we took turns pouring our sand into the frame. Kaylin first with her usual pink, followed by Josh’s “Mario” red. Jenny came next with her favorite color green, and I completed it with my favorite blue.

20121111 - 462 of 1134 - IMG_9455Once we were done, we had created a PERFECT and beautiful pyramid of sand.

20121111 - 476 of 1134 - IMG_9464Soon after we were officially a family, and went to celebrate with family and friends.

As the celebration wound down, I spotted Kaylin carrying around the frame, except now instead of the perfect pyramid it was a big jumbled mess.

Me: “Kaylin, what are you doing?”

Kaylin (with a super innocent face): “Mom said I could mix it up.”

I looked over at my wife

Me: “Babe?”

Jenny: “Yeah, it’s fine..”

Me: “Okay, Kaylin, just be careful with it, don’t let it break”

I walked away very frustrated. I had loved how it looked and the symmetry of the lines. It was going to look gorgeous on our mantle. For a brief instance I thought we could do it again. Then realized the significance of doing it would be lost.

As time went on, it sat there on our mantle, still missing the rest of the sand and in its big mixed up state.

photo 2I’d glance at it and some of the frustration would return.

Then one day after we had been through another one of the family challenges life had thrown at us, it hit me.

This mixed up state is exactly what being a family is all about. In our case it’s 4 different personalities, preferences, attitudes and beliefs all working together.

Sometimes we’re clashing or revolving around each other in what I believe is best described as controlled chaos.

Then there’s the incredibly awesome times where we’re blended together so strong that we’re super bright and vibrant. We’re more colorful together than we are apart, and we create colors, and joy that some people would never think of.

So after almost a year and a half later I finally added in the remaining sand. A little more of Kaylin, a smidge more Josh, a helping of Jenny and a healthy amount of myself. Then I shook it up really well to come up with a unique pattern that will never be duplicated but so aptly reflects all of us.

I don’t expect the sands to stay in the same place and have no doubt that as time moves, and we change that it too will change. We’ll have our messes. We’ll have our perfection. We’ll have our jumbled states of chaos and happiness. Most importantly we’ll have what’s most important, an amazing family built on the love God has for us, and the love we have for each other.

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Countdown To A New Life…T- 6 Months and 3 Days

In a little over 6 months I am going to get married to an absolutely incredible woman.

ImageA woman who reminded me how incredible she was over the last couple of days and continues to show me what a mature and healthy adult relationship is like. She’s even able to put up with me, which can be no small feat sometimes. 😉

After having a really good evening with Jenny last night and feeling a little more in the creative writing mode I decided to work on my vows while on the train ride in.

I had already written a good part of them and I went through and refined it, added a little here and there and took out some of it so they don’t go on too long. While I think they’re mostly done, I imagine over the next few months I’ll continue to touch them up. In the end though my my ultimate challenge will be getting through them without tearing up.

After working on my vows and reading a Mashable article on using Pinterest to help plan a wedding, I thought why not journal some of my experiences as we get closer to my wedding day? So with that I’m going to start threading in blog posts about my journey towards the beginning of a new life.

We are for the most part pretty well done with the essential parts of the wedding planning.

The location, DJ, photographer, florist, baker, best man, man of honor and rings have been chosen and deposits made.

Her dress is sitting in a closet that I am making sure I go nowhere near and at this point pretty much everyone I know has seen it, but me (of course).

I think this is where it gets interesting though…all the little details.

We still have as yet to do our tasting and set the menu. The flowers while generally thought of aren’t totally selected. The music playlist is something we’ll actually let some of our friends and family help select…just NO CHICKEN DANCE and NO MACARENA!!!

There’s a multitude of other details and selections as well as a special project and a few surprises for our guests that have as yet to be done and I intend to share that experience here so it should be interesting.

So stay tuned…this is gonna be fun!