Skip to main content

Happy Birthday to John!

Today is John's birthday!  It is also the day that Zaycon Foods is having their chicken delivery in our area.  (This delivery got rescheduled; I wasn't planning on spending John's birthday in the kitchen dealing with 80 pounds of chicken breasts.)  Anyway, I thought a birthday post was called for, and if something is worth saying once, it's worth repeating, right? This originally posted last year, but if anything, I mean it even more this year than last.  Happy birthday, John; I love you!






In stream-of-consciousness order: 

1.  I'm thankful for John's intelligence.  We met in college, and in our first conversation, he told me he was an engineering major "by default."  Who in the world defaults into an engineering major?!  What happened, did you flunk out of neurosurgery?

2.  I'm thankful for John's sense of humor. His "engineering by default" answer made me realize he also was funny, and he has continued since then to make me laugh.

3.  I'm thankful for John's spiritual strength, and (4.) our shared religious convictions.  Though both sets of our parents demonstrate that it is possible to have a strong, happy marriage without belonging to the same church as your spouse, our shared faith brings a depth to our relationship that I would otherwise miss. 


5.  I'm thankful for John's forgiveness.  Generally speaking, we have a great marriage, and neither of us is prone to vindictiveness or spite.  We are, however, human, and I have certainly made some mistakes.  John's always met my goofs with kindness and understanding.  If you'd like a laugh, read about my biggest blunder here.

6.  I'm thankful for John's thoughtfulness.  I've had a lot of demands of my time this week.  After one particularly busy day, I arrived home to find the John had fixed dinner, and our daughter had set a lovely table.  When John noticed how tired I was, he suggested that I just go to bed after dinner, and he would take care of the clean-up, too.  I was out like a light before 7:30, and I felt much more rested the following morning.



7.  I'm thankful for John's fun-loving nature.  I tend to be task-oriented, and John has helped me realize that fun is important, too.  We've enjoyed weekly dates throughout our marriage, and make getaways a priority, also.




8.  I'm thankful that John is a Renaissance man.  Not only does he understand math and science, he writes well and enjoys the arts.  We're as apt to attend a museum or play as a sporting event.  Recently, we've seen movies as disparate as Gravity, Captain Phillips, and Austenland, and enjoyed them all.  



9.  I'm thankful that even though John knows a lot about many topics, he never makes others feel inferior or stupid.  

10.  I'm thankful that John's a great dad.  He has carved pumpkins to resemble Ernie (of Sesame Street), held interesting conversations on toy telephones, and taught teens to drive.  Now our kids are mostly adults, and John's a wonderful grandpa.  We're not growing old, but I definitely am thankful for the years we've spent together so far, and the years we have yet to see.  







 photo visiting2_zps6d4521f3.jpg

 photo ThankfulThought4_zps7d9599c2.jpg
Thanks for John!

 photo signature3_zps16be6bca.jpg




Pin It

Comments

  1. Your husband sounds just as wonderful as mine... What a blessing a good man is, isn't it?
    Happy birthday to your hubby and I hope you can celibrate for many more years to come.
    I'm raising my glass (of cocacola in lack of something better/stronger) to him and to a lot of wonderful years in good health and happiness. xxx

    ReplyDelete
  2. John really is a lot to be thankful for! I hope it is a wonderful birthday!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Happy birthday, John! Still love that picture of him going down the slide!

    80 lbs of chicken breasts?!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Well, I for one am SO thankful for John TOO!!!! Happy birthday (belated- sorry!) to such a wonderful father, husband and man of GOD. I love every bit of this post Kristi!!! XOXO

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Conversations are so much nicer when more than one person does the talking. :-) Please leave a comment and let me know your thoughts; I'd love to hear from you!

Popular posts from this blog

Ten Things of Thankful: Live from Oregon, part 2

stock photo of old computer monitor When I was 10 or 11, I remember sitting next to my dad in our living room and reading computer code to him as he entered it into an Apple computer. We would finish the exercise and he would hit enter (or was it "run"?) and wait expectantly for the green type to appear on the screen. If we were lucky, the whole conversation would occur. Most often, there would be an error either in my dictation of the code, or in the typing of the code. We would then go painstakingly back through the lines, character by character, to find and correct the error. After what seemed like hours (and might have been), we would succeed and the computer would finally run the entire program. It was magical! My dad designed and built an earth-sheltered, passive solar home decades before solar panels were commonplace. He also was on a 9-month waiting list for a Prius, when hybrids were not seen on every street.  While my dad is definitely on the cutting edge of technol...

Monday Mentions: Equate Crutches

Have you ever needed crutches? I hadn't, until a week ago.  I'm pretty sure I strained a muscle while running a half-marathon.  (That sounds kind of cool, doesn't it? I'm not actually that cool; the last time I strained a muscle it was from carrying too many shopping bags at once.) In any case, I found myself in need of some crutches. I sent my husband to the store to get some. Photo: A pair of crutches leans against a wall  Not that crutches are all that complex, but because I hadn't used any before, I wondered if I could figure out how to adjust them to fit me properly. I shouldn't have worried. John came home from Walmart with their generic store brand of crutches, complete with instructions. First, I needed to take out a long bolt that went through the hand grip. Then I needed to find my height range, push down two metal pieces, and slide the crutches until the little metal pieces came up in the hole near my height range. (Having two people for this...

What a Wonderful World! (An #AtoZChallenge Post): Z is for Zion National Park

  Visitor Center sign in Zion National Park My husband recently re-retired, and we are front-loading travel. My #AtoZChallenge posts this year will explore our adventures--some pre-retirement, some post. Today's location: Zion National Park in Utah.  Zion is a bit of a shibboleth. People from outside of Utah (or those who are not members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) tend to pronounce Zion as "ZIE-on." Locals (or tourists who are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) use more of a schwa sound, pronouncing Zion to rhyme with lion. However you choose to pronounce it, it is an amazing, beautiful national park and has some amazing hikes. The last time my husband and I visited Zion National Park, we entered from the east, and traveled through the mile-long Zion-Mt. Carmel tunnel. It is an engineering marvel, completed in the 1920s. Before we passed through the tunnel, though, we spotted a group of bighorn sheep, including some babies...