One Year Anniversary!

Well, we made it. This year has been a year full of life. We have experienced blessing and loss, and through it all I think the biggest lesson God was communicating to us was “trust me.” We’ve learned so much about ourselves, about marriage and about each other. And as we enter our second year, we are excited to see what’s next!

For the last year, anytime our wedding was discussed, we always ended up talking about how great our Groom’s cake was. It was a chocolate rum cake, and it was AMAZING. We decided that for our anniversary we would like to have it again, so I set out to find a great chocolate rum cake recipe. I consulted my cousin Aubrey, who made our Groom’s cake, and she set me in the right direction. So Friday night, I gathered the (expensive!) ingredients, and got to baking. We rented a couple of movies, and had pizza night, to save me from having to cook anything else. I started with the chocolate ganache filling…a huge bowl of dark chocolate melted into cream. Ummm, YUM. Then I baked the cake…a crazy process that was so temperamental and exact. Nothing like baking a cake from a box!! That was all I could do that night…my kitchen was a wreck, and my brain hurt. I cleaned up my mess, and called it a night.

On Saturday morning, we headed to the driving range for a golf lesson…for me. We went one time when we first started dating, but for some reason never returned!! (I really wasn’t THAT bad…). I felt like I did decent, but soon realized I am cursed with beginner’s luck. With almost any sport that requires coordination, bowling, tennis, ping pong, golf, softball…I am great for the first 10 attempts. And I start to feel good…and my teammates start to have faith in me. But then it all comes crashing down. I need to actually learn SKILL so that it isn’t luck that my golf ball actually makes it past my feet. Nonetheless, we had a great time together, and I’ll say it again: Jason is a great coach. He is so patient, and really TEACHES me what I need to do. And the best thing is, he doesn’t get mad or embarrassed when I flub up.

After golf, I went to the gym while Jason did some yardwork. I then got back to baking, and boy what a mess I had. Apparently the cake layers don’t hold up well when the ganache is too thin. I had a whole layer turn to mush, so I had to scoop the whole thing off carefully, with my bare hands. Once I stabilized the rest, I ended up with 3 wonderful layers of chocolate and cake. I stuck it in the fridge to set, while I tackled the icing: a Mouselline buttercream icing. It’s a very involved process, but with heavenly results. It also had to set up overnight, so the cake was not assembled until Sunday!! We tested the layer that didn’t make it into the actual cake, and AH-MAZING. While we kept the failed layer out, we were good and froze the rest of the cake to enjoy over the next couple of months. (Don't laugh at the finished product. Cake decorating class is on my agenda!)

Walking into church Sunday, Jason and I both felt like we had entered a new stage of married life. We were not “newlyweds” anymore, we were just simply “married.” It was a neat feeling, and we’re excited what this next year holds.
After church we watched the Cowboys (correction: JASON watched the Cowboys), then went to look at some houses with our realtor. We aren’t planning on moving any time soon, just a little curious what the market looks like right now.

Since it’s tradition for us, we decided to celebrate Sunday night at the Cheesecake Factory. It’s one of our favorites, but this time we didn’t get cheesecake! We had the top to our wedding cake waiting for us at home! As soon as we got home from dinner I rushed to put on my wedding dress! It was fun to wear it again!

My favorite part of our anniversary was watching our wedding video. I was so meaningful to hear our vows in light of having an entire year together. He’ll get me for saying this, but we both had a hard time keeping the tears back. It was a really special time. We enjoyed seeing the top to our wedding cake again, and it was surprisingly tasty, even after an entire year! Thanks Aubrey and Aunt Dawn!

So with that, we wrapped up an entire year of marriage. I think we’d both agree it’s different than what we expected, but that the Lord as blessed us more than we could imagine. On Sunday we said that we were looking forward to this next year, and what it might hold. It’s almost as if we are experiencing a little bit of freedom when it comes to what is next. We enjoyed being home together, but I think we are both looking forward to actually living out “real life.” This year was a dream; almost a sabbatical for both of us. And while it is refreshing, a part of us was longing to start life together. So we are prayerfully expectant for what this second year might hold, and thanking the Lord for an awesome first year!