2017: My Year in Review
(Wish I had done one of these for 2016...)
JANUARY
We got married!! What a whirlwind the month of January was... Christmas turned into family-in-town, which turned into our wedding, which turned into our honeymoon in Colorado, which turned into our first week of married life! I should've been writing everything down... I definitely wasn't.
What I will say is that our primary sentiment toward our wedding was not that it was stressful or expensive or exhausting (though it was all of those things). We were so overwhelmed by how BLESSED we were to be surrounded by people who loved us and would sacrifice to serve us as we celebrated becoming husband and wife.
FEBRUARY
In February it was crazy to celebrate two years since our first date. We went to Olamaie (our favorite), ate unforgettable (and kind of "out there") dishes like venison heart tartare. I think sometimes I can't believe how short an amount of time we've known each other, given the depth of our relationship and commitment to each other. It already seems to be going by so very quickly, and I know we'll blink and five or ten years will have passed.
Something that strikes me as interesting (and different from how folks told us marriage would be!) is that we continued to feel, even after getting married, like we didn't get to spend that much time together. For most of the year we didn't share a "day off" other than Sunday (which is typically filled with church and other social activities) so we often felt like we missed each other. We made the most of it with brunches during my later-start days in the coming months.
MARCH
Jesse was sick for a week or two, and then I was diagnosed with mono in March (no wonder I had been feeling so sick and exhausted!) but at that point was past contagion and didn't take any time off work. But it wasn't all bad. Stuart Scott led a marriage conference in Houston, and we made it a point to go (even though it was difficult for Jesse to get weekends off!).
Also, our house was broken into and our TV stolen. Joke's on them though-- the TV was broken! Still, such a violating feeling. We were both so thankful that neither of us were home at the time it happened.
APRIL
April marked J's first business trip to Seattle, which I got to tag along for, and then a return on his own two weeks later. It was our first time being separated for long weekend since getting married.
Honestly, most of the spring was a blur. Lots of working, trying to see each other, interspersed by random and much-anticipated bits of travel. Our little times of getaway together in the spring were sweet, but I felt really down for most of the spring. I was crying a lot and returning to the depression I had felt when I first started hormone-based birth control last fall. During this time I made it a point to daily write out thanks to God to combat my inclination to view everything through a dark lens.
MAY
Nana passed in May, the day after Mother's Day. The last time I saw her was for Thanksgiving in 2016. I had Jesse with me and she was telling us that she was so happy we were together and that she thought he was a good man. She seemed so little, so frail even then. This photo is from the last time we were together.
It was a tough season for my mom, and not made easier by the fact that I wasn't close to offer comfort and practical help. This is one of the factors of moving far from family that I hadn't fully considered. There's an amount of help that I can offer if I'm physically present that is just not accessible if I'm not.
JUNE
In June we went to California to see my family for Nana's funeral and for Father's Day. A bittersweet combination. All our trips to see family are too brief.
June concluded with a little getaway to the national forest between Austin and Houston for my birthday. I hold memories of riding our bikes down dirt roads, steering clear of wasp nests, random forest rains then bright sunshine for swimming, lots of reading, singing, talking, and mooing at cows on the other side of the street. That was a joyful time for us-- we reflect on it with lots of happiness.
JULY
This month I got my long-time wish of flying Jesse's sister out as a surprise early birthday present! I ended up calculating that we had had people staying with us for 25% of the weekends we'd been married. Crazy! That's pretty cool given that our hope for our home was that it would be a place where we could serve people. Jesse and I want to create a culture of hospitality in the Hartman home where anyone and everyone feels welcome.
In July Jesse took a trip to Colombia funded by the podcast. The photo above was taken by Jesse at a coffee farm in Colombia. It looks absolutely beautiful, I hope to go one day as well! But a word to the wise: your first year of marriage is a hard time to cultivate a side-hustle. When you're working 50-ish hour weeks and spending another 15-ish on your other project, you're gonna have a haaaard time balancing everything.
AUGUST
In August I left my "dream job" and began working for Jesse's podcast. I wish I could explain the amount of inner turmoil that surrounded that decision in just a few words... I'm planning on writing a post about it in time. In true Jesse Hartman form, I received a beautiful bouquet of flowers as an "I'm proud of you" on my last day of work.
I traveled to California to help out my mama and came back just in time for Jesse to quit his job to start at a new coffee company. We got about two weeks together where neither of us were working before he started his new job as the retail operations manager of a local coffee roasting company.
SEPTEMBER
This was a bittersweet month. We dodged hurricanes and visited Jesse's family in Florida before heading to Costa Rica (a replacement of our original plan to go to New Zealand for our One Year Anniversary). That time together in such a beautiful place was lovely. We visited one of the top ten most beautiful beaches in the world (which required a hike through a national forest filled with sloths and monkeys!) but didn't get a picture since Jesse took his phone swimming with us... oops. The biodiversity left us in awe, and we swam and explored and played pool and chess during our time at the resort.
The rest of September, however, was unspeakably difficult. In our marriage, in my own heart... I began to formulate what would become the post "'Til I find myself in Thee". God evidently planned to do more in the span of my several months un(officially)employed than I thought when I first quit my job. Though I was sinned against and feeling pain deeper than I had ever known, I also realized ways in which I had been sinning. With the stripping off of the sub-identities that I held near, God once again humbled me to the point of recognizing that he alone is God and there is no other. He deserves my whole heart and no idolatry is subtle or tolerable to him.
OCTOBER
Took the hubs to his first ever pumpkin patch. He also insisted that we decorate the house for Halloween so the whole front door and planter were covered with fake webs and spiders. We dressed up as aliens for Halloween and hung a UFO in the window. Too bad only two trick or treaters got to see it!
This month we protected our spiritual, emotional, and relational health and planned a "staycation" weekend. The idea was to focus on saying "no" to extra activities and build time together in the Word and prayer. We had little at-home dates and sat in Romans and talked about how God is continuing to win victory in both of our lives as we continue to surrender ourselves to him.
NOVEMBER
A visit to Florida again for Jesse's mom's wedding and more news characterize this month. God was so faithful to answer our prayers for growing peace amongst Jesse's family members. We even got to stop in Atlanta on the way to visit the Georgia Aquarium and see Bon Iver!
That trip, however, was bookended by several "shockers": my car needed major repairs (-$$$), our podcast sponsorship fell through (-$$$), my potential new business opportunity fell through (-$$$), and we got a ticket (-$$$). How can all these things happen at once?, we wondered. And with only one line of income! With the holidays around the corner we determined to crack down on budgeting (a good discipline to build for the future) while trusting God to continue to provide for our needs.
DECEMBER
I am a huge fan of Christmas and this Christmas was definitely a time for celebration: enjoying the Savior, my family in California, and the weddings of two dear friends, all just days before the year comes to a close. We even had our first-ever Austin snow and played in it in matching Christmas PJ's.
Though this photo is sweet and silly (and also Jesse's beard looks GRAY, somehow?!), when I look back on this year I feel a definite weightiness to all that has occurred. 2017 has been FILLED with God's blessings: someone giving us their car, keeping us safe when our house got broken into, providing money for adventures together and to visit our families, service to and with the body of Christ, wonderful friends to learn and grow with, and more. But there's been death, sickness (physical and spiritual), pain, heaviness, and lots of tears.
God is good ALL the time. May I say in all circumstances, praise the Lord! The Lord gives and the Lord takes, blessed be the name of the Lord!
JANUARY
We got married!! What a whirlwind the month of January was... Christmas turned into family-in-town, which turned into our wedding, which turned into our honeymoon in Colorado, which turned into our first week of married life! I should've been writing everything down... I definitely wasn't.
What I will say is that our primary sentiment toward our wedding was not that it was stressful or expensive or exhausting (though it was all of those things). We were so overwhelmed by how BLESSED we were to be surrounded by people who loved us and would sacrifice to serve us as we celebrated becoming husband and wife.
FEBRUARY
In February it was crazy to celebrate two years since our first date. We went to Olamaie (our favorite), ate unforgettable (and kind of "out there") dishes like venison heart tartare. I think sometimes I can't believe how short an amount of time we've known each other, given the depth of our relationship and commitment to each other. It already seems to be going by so very quickly, and I know we'll blink and five or ten years will have passed.
Something that strikes me as interesting (and different from how folks told us marriage would be!) is that we continued to feel, even after getting married, like we didn't get to spend that much time together. For most of the year we didn't share a "day off" other than Sunday (which is typically filled with church and other social activities) so we often felt like we missed each other. We made the most of it with brunches during my later-start days in the coming months.
MARCH
Jesse was sick for a week or two, and then I was diagnosed with mono in March (no wonder I had been feeling so sick and exhausted!) but at that point was past contagion and didn't take any time off work. But it wasn't all bad. Stuart Scott led a marriage conference in Houston, and we made it a point to go (even though it was difficult for Jesse to get weekends off!).
Also, our house was broken into and our TV stolen. Joke's on them though-- the TV was broken! Still, such a violating feeling. We were both so thankful that neither of us were home at the time it happened.
APRIL
April marked J's first business trip to Seattle, which I got to tag along for, and then a return on his own two weeks later. It was our first time being separated for long weekend since getting married.
Honestly, most of the spring was a blur. Lots of working, trying to see each other, interspersed by random and much-anticipated bits of travel. Our little times of getaway together in the spring were sweet, but I felt really down for most of the spring. I was crying a lot and returning to the depression I had felt when I first started hormone-based birth control last fall. During this time I made it a point to daily write out thanks to God to combat my inclination to view everything through a dark lens.
MAY
Nana passed in May, the day after Mother's Day. The last time I saw her was for Thanksgiving in 2016. I had Jesse with me and she was telling us that she was so happy we were together and that she thought he was a good man. She seemed so little, so frail even then. This photo is from the last time we were together.
It was a tough season for my mom, and not made easier by the fact that I wasn't close to offer comfort and practical help. This is one of the factors of moving far from family that I hadn't fully considered. There's an amount of help that I can offer if I'm physically present that is just not accessible if I'm not.
JUNE
In June we went to California to see my family for Nana's funeral and for Father's Day. A bittersweet combination. All our trips to see family are too brief.
June concluded with a little getaway to the national forest between Austin and Houston for my birthday. I hold memories of riding our bikes down dirt roads, steering clear of wasp nests, random forest rains then bright sunshine for swimming, lots of reading, singing, talking, and mooing at cows on the other side of the street. That was a joyful time for us-- we reflect on it with lots of happiness.
JULY
This month I got my long-time wish of flying Jesse's sister out as a surprise early birthday present! I ended up calculating that we had had people staying with us for 25% of the weekends we'd been married. Crazy! That's pretty cool given that our hope for our home was that it would be a place where we could serve people. Jesse and I want to create a culture of hospitality in the Hartman home where anyone and everyone feels welcome.
In July Jesse took a trip to Colombia funded by the podcast. The photo above was taken by Jesse at a coffee farm in Colombia. It looks absolutely beautiful, I hope to go one day as well! But a word to the wise: your first year of marriage is a hard time to cultivate a side-hustle. When you're working 50-ish hour weeks and spending another 15-ish on your other project, you're gonna have a haaaard time balancing everything.
AUGUST
In August I left my "dream job" and began working for Jesse's podcast. I wish I could explain the amount of inner turmoil that surrounded that decision in just a few words... I'm planning on writing a post about it in time. In true Jesse Hartman form, I received a beautiful bouquet of flowers as an "I'm proud of you" on my last day of work.
I traveled to California to help out my mama and came back just in time for Jesse to quit his job to start at a new coffee company. We got about two weeks together where neither of us were working before he started his new job as the retail operations manager of a local coffee roasting company.
SEPTEMBER
This was a bittersweet month. We dodged hurricanes and visited Jesse's family in Florida before heading to Costa Rica (a replacement of our original plan to go to New Zealand for our One Year Anniversary). That time together in such a beautiful place was lovely. We visited one of the top ten most beautiful beaches in the world (which required a hike through a national forest filled with sloths and monkeys!) but didn't get a picture since Jesse took his phone swimming with us... oops. The biodiversity left us in awe, and we swam and explored and played pool and chess during our time at the resort.
The rest of September, however, was unspeakably difficult. In our marriage, in my own heart... I began to formulate what would become the post "'Til I find myself in Thee". God evidently planned to do more in the span of my several months un(officially)employed than I thought when I first quit my job. Though I was sinned against and feeling pain deeper than I had ever known, I also realized ways in which I had been sinning. With the stripping off of the sub-identities that I held near, God once again humbled me to the point of recognizing that he alone is God and there is no other. He deserves my whole heart and no idolatry is subtle or tolerable to him.
OCTOBER
Took the hubs to his first ever pumpkin patch. He also insisted that we decorate the house for Halloween so the whole front door and planter were covered with fake webs and spiders. We dressed up as aliens for Halloween and hung a UFO in the window. Too bad only two trick or treaters got to see it!
This month we protected our spiritual, emotional, and relational health and planned a "staycation" weekend. The idea was to focus on saying "no" to extra activities and build time together in the Word and prayer. We had little at-home dates and sat in Romans and talked about how God is continuing to win victory in both of our lives as we continue to surrender ourselves to him.
NOVEMBER
A visit to Florida again for Jesse's mom's wedding and more news characterize this month. God was so faithful to answer our prayers for growing peace amongst Jesse's family members. We even got to stop in Atlanta on the way to visit the Georgia Aquarium and see Bon Iver!
That trip, however, was bookended by several "shockers": my car needed major repairs (-$$$), our podcast sponsorship fell through (-$$$), my potential new business opportunity fell through (-$$$), and we got a ticket (-$$$). How can all these things happen at once?, we wondered. And with only one line of income! With the holidays around the corner we determined to crack down on budgeting (a good discipline to build for the future) while trusting God to continue to provide for our needs.
DECEMBER
I am a huge fan of Christmas and this Christmas was definitely a time for celebration: enjoying the Savior, my family in California, and the weddings of two dear friends, all just days before the year comes to a close. We even had our first-ever Austin snow and played in it in matching Christmas PJ's.
Though this photo is sweet and silly (and also Jesse's beard looks GRAY, somehow?!), when I look back on this year I feel a definite weightiness to all that has occurred. 2017 has been FILLED with God's blessings: someone giving us their car, keeping us safe when our house got broken into, providing money for adventures together and to visit our families, service to and with the body of Christ, wonderful friends to learn and grow with, and more. But there's been death, sickness (physical and spiritual), pain, heaviness, and lots of tears.
God is good ALL the time. May I say in all circumstances, praise the Lord! The Lord gives and the Lord takes, blessed be the name of the Lord!
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