Starting Our Second Year
By Amy Miller
We are now on month 13 and I’m feeling grateful for where we are at. It is funny because this month I’ve suddenly felt like we gained a little bit more maturity with completing one year. Every year brings it’s certain experiences that allow us to learn and grow, so each year we’ll become just a little tinsy-tiny bit more wiser than the year before, and I’m looking forward to it :) With that being said, I think it is important to look back at things we have learned. One thing we learned in particular, is that we are starting to see what matters most to us. For example, we discovered that traveling all over the world is not as important to us as it used to be, for me anyways. We definitely want to get away every now and then, but for the most part, we’d rather use that money to go out more often than normal – dinner, movies, concerts, etc. I know other couples absolutely love traveling and that’s an awesome thing to do as a couple! It can create some unique memories. Each couple has their own interests, and it’s great.
What matters most
We had an experience recently that helped me realize how important it is to talk to each other about what is important to us, even if you think you already knew.
Cutest/coziest cabins ever
The famous “Spudd Drive-in Theater”
For our anniversary, we took a fun little get-away trip up to Driggs, Idaho to hang out with the Grant Teton Mountains in a cabin for a few days. The trip itself wasn’t really expensive so it we felt really good about it. However, one of the big events we had planned was pretty expensive… and it got us feeling some regrets. I planned for us to go on a hot air balloon ride over the Teton Valley on one of the mornings we were there. This balloon ride was not cheap. It was such a neat experience, and we really did enjoy it. However, when we got back, we were both feeling bad about how much it cost us. I don’t know about you, but I have a hard time enjoying things when I feel bad about how much it cost. The feelings we were having lead us to a great conversation about what makes a memory so meaningful for us, and ultimately, what matters to us most.
No regrets
Though it was expensive, the hot air balloon ride was an experience I’ll never forget for a few reasons. I remember the beautiful scenery I saw from 1000 feet in the air so well that I feel like I’m back hovering over fields right now. We got to do something together that neither of us had ever done before, and it really is so cool to be in a hot air balloon floating in the sky! After we remembered all of these things, we stopped regretting it, especially since we had already done it. We just realized that it was a great one-time experience. In the future, we’ll make sure that our big purchases are something we do really want, and make sure we both feel like it’s worth the cost. We also decided that in the future, we would put our time and money into things that would be more meaningful and enjoyable to us, and I’m very happy we had that conversation. I have since stopped feeling bad about our purchase because it helped us learn something we found valuable to our marriage. So again, I’m grateful for our hot air balloon ride experience, and know I’ll never forget it.
This experience has been one of multiple reasons why I feel we have started our second year of marriage off right. There are for sure other things that we are still trying to get the hang of (That’s a surprise ;) haha), but I’m grateful that each year under our belt can make us feel that much more confident that we can do this marriage thing!