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I Don’t Hate Hillsong

Kyle — March 10, 2011 — 4 Comments

Last night our home group started a study based on the work of Tim Keller on cities and how we as Christians (and really as humans) function within them.

Much of the discussion centered around a portion of the Bible in which the Israelites were exiled to Babylon and then instructed that they were to,

…seek the welfare of the city…and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. (Jeremiah 29:7)

As we talked about what this means for us in our place in 2011 society of Dallas, Texas and what our group could do to “better” the neighborhoods and cultural pockets we reside in I was struck by a few things.

The first is this idea that the growth of our faith is fully played out within our small homogenous church groups. It’s not. I would argue that progressive sanctification is more likely to take place outside of these comfortable parameters we’ve laid for ourselves than it is within them. Progressive sanctification is more Derek Webb than it is Hillsong United.

The other thing that struck me is that Jen and I have this blog that’s read by hundreds of people each day who sometimes know more about our lives than we do ourselves and yet I can’t tell you any of the first names of the people who sleep in our eight-room apartment building.

That’s sad and needs to change.

So to my lovely wife I herein charge you with the burden of helping me reinforce our spiritual backbone and to pray for the courage to ask our God for help when we haven’t the strength to do so ourselves.

In Culture

Make Your Own Butter

Jen — March 9, 2011 — 4 Comments

Because we’re always looking for ways to save money or make things into something new, I wanted to share this little tutorial I found on making your own butter. My only issue is that I never really find extra cream laying around the house… I can usually dream up something to bake or find some berries to drizzle it on. So I don’t know how much you’d save if you bought the cream specifically for this purpose. Here’s to someday having leftover cream in the fridge.

How to Make Your Own Butter
(via Prudent Baby)

Check out the tutorial on their website. Have any of you ever made your own butter?

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In Recipes Butter, DIY

Things I’m Learning

Jen — March 8, 2011 — 1 Comment

1. My ability to be a good wife stems from what I’ve learned about how to be a good friend, a good sister, and a good stranger.

Some roles come easier than others depending on the day, but I’m finding that most things that apply to one apply to all the others. This theory gives credence to the fact that I feel sorry for only children who find themselves in the midst of marriage. They’ve had much less practice than the rest of us.

2. When we go to sleep at the same time, our marriage feels a lot more successful.

I write this after having fallen asleep at 8:30 last night while Kyle didn’t come to bed until the wee hours of the morning. It’s difficult to do most days (especially when running two blogs and requiring different amounts of sleep) but there’s nothing that compares with the half hour before sleep. We get to break down the day together, laugh about weird things that happened, talk about the future. And those times are our favorite part of any day.

3. When painting a piece of furniture, use a matte finish.

After spending countless hours painting a computer armoire that isn’t quite finished yet, we’re finding that all my work is useless when things stick to its semi-gloss finish and peel the paint off. I really think this can be helped with a matte finish, though I really wish I would have read more about it before I started. Chalk this one up to my stubborn self thinking I can conquer anything with a gallon of paint.

4. Keeping a house clean requires your constant attention.

I know my mom is laughing at this one because I’m finally getting to practice what she’s known for years, but if I want to have a clean house, I really can’t stop cleaning. Dishes are continually needing done. Things are always being left in the living room, laundry never stops piling up, and how does the bathroom sink look that dirty so quickly? Then there’s sweeping, mail, bed making, shoe pick ups, and the endless string of craft supplies throughout the house. And there are only two of us. Hug a mom today. They deserve it.

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In House & Home, Relationship

Game Night

Kyle — March 7, 2011 — 10 Comments

We’ve discussed it before I believe but our game nights used to go something like this:

Jen: “yeah, I got Lady for ‘famous females’”
Me: “who?
Jen: “you know, ‘Lady’ from ‘Lady and the Tramp’”
Kyle: “okay, first of all, she’s not famous. Second, she’s not real. And third, she’s not even human.”
Jen: “whatever, I’m counting it.”
Kyle: “[usually shouting by now] Okay well then I’m done playing if you’re going to blatantly alter the rules of the game to your advantage!”

{cut scene}

Next day…
Kyle: “yo”
Jen: “she’s real to me!”

We’ve come a long way since those days and still have a long way to go. I guess the point of this post was to ask you guys what your favorite games are and I started Jesus Juking all over the place.

So here’s a Cliffs notes version of our favorites:

1. Scattergories – even though Jen never wins…
2. Bananagrams – (see above, replace ‘never’ with ‘rarely’)
3. Catch Phrase

We’ve been looking to mix it up a little bit though so tell us what yours are in the comments section…

In Relationship

Sunday Letter

Jen — March 6, 2011 — 1 Comment

Dear husband-

I know weddings aren’t always my favorite thing and that I’ve often won the award for worst bridesmaid amongst my friends, but this weekend was really fun with you. I think maybe now that we’re married, the wedding itself holds a little more meaning and a lot more emotion. Let’s be real- I always cry at weddings, but when you hear the pastor talk about marriage representing Christ and his church, it stirs up so much within me to remember that we get to live this out every day.

Chalk this wedding up as another that proves rehearsal dinners are the best part of any wedding. More intimate crowds combined with a more relaxed atmosphere plus time for conversation plus a lack of scheduled photo shoots plus a lack of scheduled anything and really heartfelt toasts? Any day. I’ll do that any day.

I write all this without my wedding ring on, and can’t actually quite remember where I left it. This always turns out to be a little funny, but I know the day is coming when I lose it for too long to be considered humorous. Good thing it doesn’t hold all my love in it.

Not sure why you married me because sometimes it’s like babysitting,

Your bride

In Sunday Letters

Saturday Morning Creativity

Kyle — March 5, 2011 — Leave a comment

From us to you, some encouragement to go do something great.

What is being creative? from Kristian Ulrich Larsen on Vimeo.

In Stuff We Love

Sports Mentor 6 – Part II

Kyle — March 4, 2011 — 2 Comments

Untitled from Marriage Project on Vimeo.

In SportsMentor

Sports Mentor 6 – Part I

Kyle — March 3, 2011 — 7 Comments

Jen talks college hoops and the Thunder in the latest rendition of the hit show…

Untitled from Marriage Project on Vimeo.

In SportsMentor

AT&T Jesus Juke

Kyle — March 2, 2011 — 2 Comments

Okay just so you know beforehand, this is probably going to be a borderline Jesus Juke of a post so if you aren’t into that kind of thing just be forewarned.

We haven’t had internet for about 48 hours. I have no idea why or what the problem is. I’ve tried everything I know to fix it and come up empty-handed each time. Thankfully, our internet service provider provides online chat support which is wildly helpful so we should get the issue solved shortly.

In the meantime though it makes for some interesting blogging days. Uhhh, I’ll go to Barnes & Noble tonight at 10 and use their Wi-Fi but not buy anything. Okay, you put together a few posts, put them on a flash drive, and I’ll upload them at the coffee shop on our laptop in the morning. Sometimes we just resort to typing things out on our phones. I know, I know, privileged first world people problems.

But still problems, and frustrations. More of the latter than the former. Here’s the thing though, because we (and by “we” I mean Jen and I and most of the people reading this blog) have been blessed with so much material wealth we find ourselves leaning on that wealth to prop up our deepest desires for joy.

Is it imperative that we have the internet at our house? No, but it is convenient, and for some reason we think we’re entitled to the most convenient, easy lives imaginable. Jesus even called people like us, who get frustrated when their broadband 100000000 gigabyte (I don’t know if this is a thing?) internet doesn’t work in .0002 seconds, out in Luke when talking to a man who probably had sundial-up (thank you, I’ll be here til June),

When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “One thing you still lack. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” But when he heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich. Jesus, seeing that he had become sad, said, “How difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!

It’s not that we have things, it’s that we cling to them as if they can save us.

That might have been two Jesus Jukes, my bad.

In Culture, Writing

The Way You Do

Jen — March 1, 2011 — 3 Comments

I’m sitting quietly at home waiting for you to come home while humming into my ice cream cone a song about waiting for you to come home. I know it’s confusing to most, but I know you can picture me with little Norah and my chocolate almond double dip. And that’s just because you love me the way you do.

At midnight last night for one second (or at least that’s the way I calculate it in my head) we celebrated the three year anniversary of our first date. Leap year days make it easier to remember anything, especially when it comes to first dates. I still remember coming to pick you up for a trip to Tulsa to hang out with our friends. There was so much tension between me and you, the kind that comes only from the sort of love that blossoms out of really cool friendships and a lot of coffee dates. This was the same driveway in which you would ask me to be your girlfriend several months later, but that day it was simply a driveway, now hopefully a home with kids who ride their bikes and play basketball every day. But then it was the driveway of 5 college boys who had no plans for the future and only dreams of winning the next tournament of FIFA soccer. But as we got ready to leave, I remember you stumbling through the fact that you thought of our 4 friend hangout as more than that. And I remember how I hugged you so tightly- our very first real hug- and then held my breath until you got in the other side of the car.

We were so late. Mostly because my taillights kept going out periodically, at which point I would pull over, jump out, and change the fuses. A moment, as I remember, when you were completely in awe that I knew anything about changing fuses or broken lights. I never told you that’s really all I knew about cars, though I would guess you’ve figured it out by now. And after many attempts at fixing the lights, we had to turn around and take your truck- the way I think it should have been from the beginning. Maybe it was God’s way of letting you lead me to Tulsa and into a relationship with you.

I think it was the most silent I’ve ever been on a car ride with you, except for the times when I’ve been severely frustrated. I just remember watching all the lights go by, hardly wanting the car ride to be over but so excited for our first date to begin. Happy three year anniversary of our first date on the invisible yesterday. I can’t believe you liked me then and still can’t believe you love me now.

All my love and all I am-
Your bride

In Our Story, To Each Other