The story of a wedding ring

Tim and I have been blessed beyond belief in many different ways this past year. Today I just finished our update letter to send to our families (you know, the one you’re supposed to send out at Christmastime…) I was so encouraged thinking back to everything that happened in 2010 – all the ways that God blessed us, all the occasions we had to celebrate – from getting engaged, to graduating, to attending friends’ weddings, to our own wedding, to moving across the country and starting afresh in a new place, the list could go on. When I travelled to Wheaton back in November to gather all our belongings so we could fully move out here to Seattle, our good friend Adam Pratt had just finished editing our wedding photos. He did an incredible job capturing the joy and emotion of our wedding day, and in the midst of our day, I felt so at peace knowing he was behind the camera. I honestly had to stop myself from carrying my camera around with me on my wedding day, because I so love to capture things from my own perspective. Adam has a way of being in the right place at the right time though, and he captured our wedding day more beautifully than I could have known to ask for. The next few blog posts will be dedicated to showcasing Adam’s photography talent, through our wedding photos :)

Last spring when Tim and I were planning for our wedding, and considering what wedding band we’d purchase for him, my Aunt Irene contacted me with a proposal. She and my Uncle Paul used to own a jewelry store in Green Bay, WI, before they retired several years ago. When they closed their store they kept several pieces of jewelry that they’d be able to gift to others in the future. She offered a men’s wedding band to us as a wedding gift! Tim and I were stunned and easily accepted her offer, knowing it’d be a beautiful ring and much more meaningful than if we just bought our own wedding band. As we moved forward with that plan, she asked me if I wanted to have the ring inscribed with our wedding date on the inside. Now, originally when Tim and I were looking at bands for him, we considered purchasing a pretty plain band and having my name in Hebrew engraved on the outside. I knew this band would be too detailed to do any engraving on the outside, so we put that idea out of our minds. Unbeknownst to Tim, I asked my Aunt Irene if it would be possible to have my Hebrew name, instead of our wedding date, inscribed on the inside of his wedding band. She went to the only person she knew who still does this sort of work, and he was able to do just what I’d asked for!

My name means “blessed” in Hebrew, and it’s the name that my Dad picked out for me even before he’d met my Mom. This word has labeled me and has been spoken over me my entire life. It defines who I am. It also defines what Tim and I have together. I don’t think there could’ve been a more perfect word I would have chosen for his wedding band. Paul and Irene weren’t able to attend our wedding, so they sent the ring down with family. We didn’t see it until the night before our wedding, just after our rehearsal. I let Adam in on the secret and had him photograph the moments that Tim and I first saw his wedding band. You can see the recognition in his face once he saw the engraving. I love that we have these moments captured in photographs. It reminds me how much I love being a photographer – so much depth and meaning can be captured in just one frame.

Exploring Touristy Seattle

Currently Tim and I are working the 4am shifts at our respective jobs. I honestly didn’t know people bought diamonds and desired coffee at 4am…but alas, they do. It seems a little ridiculous that we set our alarm for 2:45 am and that 7:30 pm is beginning to sound like a really good time to go to bed. However, when 12:30 pm rolls around and we’re both finished with work, we can’t help but be thankful we’re working the same schedules! We’ve been trying to mix up our afternoons by doing fun things other than Target runs and cleaning our apartment. The other week I had a free pass from Starbucks to go up in the Space Needle – after I picked Tim up from work we found parking near Seattle Center, picked up some lunch nearby and joined all the tourists to see Seattle from up above. It was a gorgeous sunny Seattle day, but cold enough that we even saw some snow flurries from the top :)

In other news, I’ve started my internship with Chris and Sarah, and I am loving it. It’s been wonderful to see how a successful photography business runs from behind the scenes. Sarah is so encouraging to Tim and I, and Chris so patient in teaching me all the technical aspects of what they do. And they’re both amazing question-askers and listeners, something I want to grow in. I’m looking forward to all I’ll learn from them in this next year.

We live approximately...over there.

Finding Meaning in Making Lattes and Selling Diamonds

Lately Tim and I have found ourselves in the cycle of work, eat, sleep, eat, work, eat, sleep…and very quickly it can get terribly mundane. We know firsthand how incredibly difficult it can be to find work right now, and because of that we are very grateful to both have jobs. But sometimes it’s hard for us to see why it is I’m helping to caffeinate Seattle and why Tim is helping to add some bling to the world. In our conversations we keep coming back to our desire for something more, for our work and life to add up to something meaningful. The prayer I wrote down and placed on our bathroom mirror a couple weeks ago comes from Praying With the Psalms, “We need you, O God. We cannot sustain meaning and purpose by ourselves. We don’t have within us the stuff to make life whole. We run out of resources. We run out of strength. In our emptiness we wait for your fullness. Fill us with life anew.” When I see these words each day it is a reminder that my meaning and purpose comes from the Lord, not from my work or any of my own efforts. Even in writing this now, it’s as if a new wave of that realization is hitting me. My desire for this season of life is not to be discontent with where we are right now (something I’m continually struggling with), but to be seeking the meaning and purpose even in the mundane. Even though I’d rather every day of my life be filled with new challenges, and something I love doing, I also have to be reminded that there’s a time for rest, a time for training, and a time for preparing for our next steps. It seems to us as if we’re being prepared for something we’re not aware of quite yet. We’re wrestling with our own desires for the future – to live in Latin America, to do ministry together, to fuse our passion for art and photography with our care for people through counseling. I was once told by Hule Goddard to “expect a long runway” regarding my desire to be used in overseas ministry – meaning I didn’t have to fly before I was ready. Instead of pressuring myself to get married and move overseas immediately, Hule shared the analogy of a long runway as a time of preparation and allowing God to ready Tim and I for whatever he has for us, be it overseas ministry or something else. So here we are in Seattle, doing life – the mundane and the not so mundane – and seeking to find joy in each day.

These photos are a preview of a post to come :)