days of gratitude: {3} my girlfriends.

{source}

one of the greatest blessings in life is friendship.  friendship that stands the test of time and distance.  friendship that builds up and speaks truth in love.  friendship that is both life changing and life giving.

i grew up in a home where my parents put such an emphasis on the importance of relationships.  from a young age, i saw my mom and dad invest in others.  we shared life with other families, made memories and laughed a lot; those were some of the biggest things that shaped my childhood.  friendship was taught and shown to me my whole life, and it is something i hold so dearly.

this last weekend i went away with some of my best friends from high school.  we've done annual get togethers the past few years, and this was the second year we've gone away for a weekend in the fall.  it's something we look forward to all year.  our husbands are so gracious and just all-around awesome to help make this an annual thing!  we stay at a hotel in portland, lounge by the lobby fireplace in our cozy clothes, huddle up on the pullout couch for movies and chinese takeout, walk around the old port and shop with starbucks in hand.  all of these things are such luxuries to us and we drink it all in, savoring each second spent together.  we did the math this weekend and we've been friends for nineteen years.  yikes.  we're getting old, friends.  getting old.

but i hope this tradition lasts fifty more.

life has brought me several different places and through many various seasons.  at each stop along the way, i've been blessed with the sweet gift of friendship.  some for just a time... but others that have lasted and endured through the passing of years.  high school and college friends.  roommates.  seminary classmates.  we've celebrated with one another as god has given us careers, traveling opportunities, husbands, homes, families... we've supported each other through trials, losses, disappointments and tears.  it's a pretty sweet journey, friendship is. 

i would not be who i am today without the gift of friendship.  i share with these women laughter from memories retold or just being silly, tears from honestly sharing in each other's hurts, words spoken in challenging truth, prayers of support and hugs of love.  

to all of the women who have walked life beside me; thank you.  i truly am honored and blessed to call you my friend.  i am better because of you.

"and in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter and the sharing of pleasures.  for in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed."

- kahlil gibran

thursday three.

so this week's highlights are pretty much the same for all three of us (even though bella is not really aware of two of them... i'm still going to go ahead and say that they are some of her top moments. i'm her mama. i can do that).

here is this week's thursday three.

1. welcome, sophia!

our precious niece, sophia joyce cornwell, was welcomed into the world on tuesday afternoon at 5:15 weighing 4 lbs, 11 oz and measuring 18 inches long! she was born five weeks early but is doing splendidly. we are so grateful she is here and that she, jd and stella are doing great! we haven't gotten to see her yet since she is still in the NICU... but we are praying that she will be able to go home with her mommy&daddy on saturday! nick&i cannot WAIT to hold our beautiful niece (our first one!) and--even though she doesn't know it yet--bella is super stoked about her brand new cousin!

2. girls/guys weekend

last weekend was such a gift... for all three of us! nick left friday night with two of his guy friends to go on a camping trip in oklahoma. they had a great time hanging out by the camp fire, rock climbing and hiking, aaaand, you know, other stuff guys do on camping trips out in the middle of nowhere (??). us girls chose a different route: a hotel suite at the omni in las colinas. i know. this was a much wiser decision than camping in oklahoma, right?! my friend, amanda, works for the company that owns omni hotels so she hooked us up with a beautiful room complete with a couple bottles of champagne. yes, please. we had such a wonderful, fun, girly time. we ate sushi takeout, took lots of ridiculous pictures, stayed up late, ate junk food, slept in and had brunch sunday morning. did i mention it was perfect? i felt like i was in college again. minus the animal crackers and frosting-out-of-the-can.

bella got to spend the day saturday with her nonnie (nick's mom) and then spent the night and all day sunday hanging out with her uncle james, aunt jessica and cousin wyatt. she had a ball. i mean, just look at this pic: i don't think she could love that little guy any more than she does!! little cuties!

3. march madness, baby.

oh yeah. ever since i was in junior high this has been one of my *favorite* times of the year. second only to christmas. it's true. ever since nick and i started dating we've competed against each other with our brackets and we spend these days infront of the television, watching games as often as possible! (we are watching now as i type) bella loves it too--i promise. this year is extra special because the final four is in houston and my parents are flying in town! we have family there so we are all meeting up for some family time/final four craziness in exactly two.weeks. cannot WAIT!!

the cornwell thursday three. it's been a good week. so thankful for our family time (nick's been on spring break this week!), watching our little girl grow (full fledged crawling, pulling up, destroying her crib at nap time, shaking her head "no", repeatedly doing things we tell her not to do--while looking at us with a smile on her face, pulling out her ponytail and hair bows...this girl has no lack of personality, that is for SURE!) and praising god for his miracle of life and adding to our family this week! he is *good*

before--or after--you say "i do" (part one).

one thing i'm passionate about (if you haven't figured this out already) is improving marriages in our society. i wrote this article a few years ago when i was working as a counselor on staff at irving bible church. it was for a friend of ours who asked me to create something for his blog and a series he was doing on singleness, dating and marriage. robert asked me to write on three things i thought contributed to hardship in marriage. whether you are single, dating or married i think it's important to challenge ourselves in this area. we can (and should) always be improving ourselves, which in turn, will improve our relationships.

with valentine's day around the corner, i decided to dig out this article and post it in a three part series on my blog. it challenges me to stay proactive in my marriage and i hope that it may encourage and challenge you--whether single or married--to live out what jesus calls us to.

part one.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------as we look around it is impossible to deny the state of marriage today in our society.

divorces are happening at an alarming rate, our society tells us if we're not "happy" to jump ship, and mainstream media seemingly applauds adultery presenting it as a glamorous option within marriage. it would be highly negligent of us as a Church not to examine the cracks in the sanctity of marriage within our culture to see what is at the root of its brokenness. as i have met with countless men and women as a pastoral counselor, i have seen several patterns contributing to such pitfalls within marriage. i'd like to outline three of them in this article--three ways to increase the likelihood of conflict and hardship within your marriage... current or future.

making marriage your everything

this pitfall establishes itself early on... well before marriage in most cases. our hearts begin to long for the love of a person who will live life with us. this desire in and of itself is not necessarily a bad thing; however, it can become very harmful if marriage is set as "life's biggest goal". before we know it, we've begun putting our life on hold until "the one" comes and sweeps us off our feet. this is where the danger begins. when this poor person does come, unbeknownst to them, they have all the pressure of the world on their shoulders because we have made them our everything...the fulfillment of all of our dreams, our satisfaction, our first love, our main goal in life.

can you see the danger here? i remember struggling with this so much at times during my singleness. i wanted so badly to have that companion, that best friend, that man i was going to do life with. i had ten... yes, ten... bridesmaids dresses hanging in my closet, one of them i wore in my sister's wedding who is almost four years younger than me. i remember it being a struggle to fully live and enjoy those years being single. and now, as hard and lonely as they were at times, i have moments of missing them because they were some of the sweetest years of my life.

jesus found me in that season and helped me see that it was HIM and me doing life together. i remember my dad telling me "megan, even after you get married, it's always going to be you and jesus." if the lord did have marriage for me, i wanted my husband to be attracted to me because of the way i was running after jesus and making him my life... because that's what i wanted to do together in our marriage.

i have also seen married couples who make marriage their everything and at some point in their journey together, they're bound to be sorely disappointed. god made us for relationship. and that doesn't mean just with our spouse; it means with his people--single, married, old and young. period. once couples return from their honeymoon, there is a temptation to shut others out and just enjoy each other. while this definitely needs to happen at times to grow and enrich a martial relationship, there is so much joy that takes place in reaching out to others, getting involved in ministry, having alone time and time with individual friends (girl time/guy time) that is essential for a healthy, happy marriage. in their book just how married do you want to be?, authors jim and sarah sumner touch on the importance of living in community as a married couple:

"every christian couple needs to be in christian community. couples who get along well need it every bit as much as couples who argue and fight. being active in christ's body is part of what it means to love the church's head, christ jesus. authentic christian community is interpersonal. being in it is not the same as merely attending church. to be in christian community is to be relationally connected with other people who are connected to jesus christ." (just how married do you want to be? p. 156)

this again, is a pattern that begins in a dating relationship; before one even enters marriage. if you're dating, make sure to surround your relationship with community. not only will this help establish a sense of accountability for both you and your partner, but it will also keep your sole focus and attention off of each other and help remind you both that there is a world that exists outside your dating relationship! stay grounded in your church community, in your friendships. don't center your entire life around your romantic relationship. this will only assist in creating a pattern of unhealthiness in your relationship. make sure you're spending time apart and enjoying your own individual friendships, ministries and activities. if you're expecting your spouse to be your everything, you're setting yourself up for disappointment and you're guaranteed to cause your spouse undue frustration. that is *not* the way god designed marriage to be. he wants to be our number one love, passion and desire. no one and nothing else is designed to fulfill that position in our lives, including our spouse.

when my husband and i were first falling in love, he always made a point to tell me that i was his "second love." he told me that i will never be his first, nor should he ever be mine. i found myself getting annoyed when he would tell me that; it sounded so abrasive to me! now, i'm so thankful that my husband reminds me of that because it reminds me of my place in his life, and where his place in mine should be. this order was not instituted after we walked down the aisle; it was established in each of our lives long before we met one another. this only helped us keep god where he needs to be--as number one; not only in our individual lives, but in our life together.

**stay tuned for parts 2 and 3...

thursday three.

ahhhhh, the thursday three. yes, i'm fully aware that it is--indeed--friday. i know i kept most of you waiting with baited breath. and i apologize.


here we go.


nick
{a disclaimer: i haven't actually asked nick what his highlight was this week, so this is pure speculation on my part. however, i will do my best to name a few so that i will inevitably hit his top moment eventually}
i'd venture to say that one of nick's top highlights of the week was guy time. my poor husband is outnumbered in our household at the moment... and is also in the middle of basketball season, coaching a team full of high school girls. so i'd say any time he can hang out "with the guys" is a good thing. he was able to get away and play basketball with some friends on saturday and on sunday night after church, he had some additional "guy time" with his best buds playing this really-stupid-board-game-where-they-trade-stuff-like-wheat-and-bricks (settlers, anyone??) geesh. anyway, i was really happy for him this weekend to get some good time with friends because i know how hard he works during the week, it's good to have some down time on the weekends. he also got to spend saturday morning with bella while i had some girl time. i know it's always a highlight for him when he gets to hang with his lil girl. he seriously is the *best* dad it makes me want to cry just typing this post. bella loves her daddy! the smile that comes across her face every time she sees him at the end of the day, and how she kicks her little feet in excitement is a top moment of every day for nick. they are so cute together :)


meg
as previously mentioned, i had some lovely "girl time" on saturday morning. one of my sweet friends left this week to start a new nanny job in nyc. so a few of us girls met at one of our apartments for breakfast saturday morning. any time i get to hang out with girls is refreshing to my soul... and as much as i *love* my daughter, it is a wonderful thing to get to go places without lugging half of our apartment with us; or trying to keep her entertained the entire time. it was a nice break for mama! i've also been working hard to incorporate exercise back into my life... and it's been soooo nice. i'm a huge fan of the "30 day shred" with jillian michaels. if you're looking for a good, quick workout to do at home, this is your new bff.


bel
our sweet girl is changing by the minute. this has been my most favorite stage so far... she is just so fun! this week, there are three highlights for little bella grace: first, we have a tooth! nick&i have been on "tooth-watch" lately, as her four front teeth look like they are about to pop through. she has been putting anything and everything in her mouth to chew on... her favorites include our noses and chins. lovely. just on tuesday i put my finger in her mouth and felt along her gums to find a sharp lil tooth that had finally poked through! secondly, our sweet little one has taken a while to develop her leg strength. her auntie gret has lovingly described her as a "rag doll" while trying to get her to stand. she is just such a peanut!!! i have put her in her jumper every morning for the past few months to try to develop those lil legs and it has finally paid off. just this week, while the girls were over one night, bella stood like she had been doing it for years. she grabbed onto our friend, kristin's fingers and stood for a while, looking around at everyone like "what? i'm standing, what?" so cocky-like. love it. and lastly, she took her first big-girl bath this week in the rub-a-dub-tub. can't believe it. she loved it. she chases the bubbles, trying to grab them and kicks and splashes the entire time. our girl is fearless. and she is growing... and we love watching her change, her personality emerge and the sparkle in her eyes while she discovers new things. love her so much!


and there you have it, folks... another thursday three. tune in next week... same time, same place. i will leave you with a few photos of bella's big week.