The Summer of Love 2014

My good friend and colleague told me recently that she is planning on having this summer to be her summer of love.  (That sentence is really horrible grammar, but I can't figure out how to fix it right now, so you will just have to deal with it.) She is a few years older than me and single and fiercely independent.  She and I are kindred spirits, but that's a post for another day.  Her summer of love is one of finding love and a companion who can walk beside her and support her in her adventures and start a family (see! Kindred spirits!)

I have been thinking on this phrase, and I have decided to adopt it and also make 2014 the summer of love for Tiffany.  How is this possible when I'm already married?? Keep reading! That's why we're here!

After I got pregnant I thought my life was perfect, things were finally falling into place and life was beautiful. When I found out I lost the baby I was devastated. If you've read my blog, you know how I felt. You also know how I felt when I found out I couldn't have children.  What you don't know is that I feel like since December-ish, everything else in my life has fallen apart.

Yes, my husband joined the church and has gained an amazing testimony, he loves me unconditionally and is my rock, he keeps me grounded when all I want to do is sink beneath it. But things have been so hard. Work, church, life, home has been so hard.

I look in the mirror and I don't like what I see.  I have gained a tremendous amount of weight (between pregnancy weight that I didn't lose, birth control weight, and stress weight), I look exhausted, and I just feel unhappy.  I hate feeling the way I do, but I feel like my life is spinning out of control, much like the tornado we had here in Akron earlier this week. I am just struggling, (hence my lack of writing lately) but this post is not about my struggles, it's about how I'm going to change all that, and how I'm going to do that this summer of love.

First and foremost I bought a new pair of shoes.  Now what does a pair of shoes have to do with love? Well we all know a woman's true love is an amazing new pair of shoes, but also, this:

                                                                                  

                                                 

Typically I don't think this is referring to a pair of running shoes, but in my case it does. I've always wanted to run a half marathon, ever since I was in cross country in high school. It's a bucket list item so to speak, and I have wanted to get into running again, but I didn't have a good pair of running shoes (despite what Chris says about the amount of shoes in my closet.) I have been wanting a pair of ASICS, but they are a bit pricey. ASICS are what I wore when I was running daily in high school and no other pair of tennis/running shoe can compare. I've heard Brooks are pretty fantastic too, but they're even more pricey, so I'll stick with ASICS for now. Plus I got a killer Kohls deal on this pair:

In addition to just owning a fabulous pair of new shoes, these shoes will lead me down my path of love. I am planning on running a half-marathon on Labor Day, which gives me all summer to prep my body to do an amazing thing, and doing this amazing thing (I mean running 13 miles is pretty amazing) I can start to love myself again. I am pretty sure by forcing my body (which looks as if the only half marathoning it's capable of is eating) to run a half marathon, I can not only be proud of myself for an accomplishment, but also love my body, because just saying, I will probably lose some weight in the process. Win-Win for loving myself. 

Secondly is to love my Heavenly Father and to love my Savior, Jesus Christ. Now don't get me wrong, I do love my Heavenly Father and my Savior, I just feel as if I don't have a strong enough relationship with them. I've made this comment before, but in our desperate times we have a tendency to do one of two things: cling on to the gospel and it's teachings, or we let it go because we are just so overwhelmed. I have a tendency to do the latter. I've done both, but my tendency is to stop doing everything we are asked to do because it gets too hard to "do it all".  So this summer I want to work on my testimony and loving my Savior and my Heavenly Father. I also want to be ready for my endowment by the end of the summer, because Chris and I are planning on next March making a special trip to Logan to be sealed for time and all eternity (more on that later). I want to be ready now instead of getting there and realizing I am not ready, and I don't want to be the reason Chris doesn't go through the temple when he is ready.

Third. Love my job. This year I have been flying by the seat of my pants. I have struggled this year with so many aspects of my career. In fact, it has brought many conversations at home on whether or not I want to stay in education, or if I want to go get a Master's degree pursuing another career entirely. I want to give it one more shot, so this summer I am planning on going into school once a week. On this weekly trip, I am going to clean and organize my classroom. Clean, uncluttered environments are the only way to learn. I am also going to get my whole school year ready (because they're changing what I'm doing for the third year in a row). I want to get my lessons, activities, handouts, etc. ready for the entire school year. If I get all of this ready this summer, it will take off a lot of stress during the school year, and I can focus on other things, like being:

                       

Fourth: love my home. I will be the first to admit I HATED our house when Chris bought it. Many may even know the story of how I started crying when I first stepped foot in our house. So I was a little bitter for a while, until I realized the power of paint. Holy cow! That made a world of difference! Then we put pictures on the wall of one of the happiest days of my life, (my wedding, duh!) and I started to put a little work and sweat into our house and with help from Chris, my in-laws, and Kale, I felt like we had a home. In fact we were talking about moving a couple weeks ago, and it made me sad, because I really love what we have done to our house. It is far from perfect, but we have put so much time and work into the house that it feels like home. It feels like ours. Holy Mack- sidetracked! Love my home. Still much to do. I don't think a house is a home until there are flowers in the front yard. I am planning on putting some love into the outside of our house now: clean up the yard, plant a garden, plant some flowers, paint the exterior, and truly love what an amazing place we have that we OWN, that we can fix and make better. Sometimes the task is daunting, which makes me have my negative attitude, but I am planning on loving my home and putting all kinds of work into it this summer.

(This is a little preview of something we started, but you see?!?! Flowers! Of course it snowed shortly after I planted them, and they died :( so I will have to replace them)

And last, love my honey. I mean this kind of speaks for itself, cause look at that face:

How can anyone not love that face? I mean seriously, he's the cutest! I hate to admit this, but there are times when I am just mean to him. It is a horrible thing to admit, but I am.  I think because I know he will still love me unconditionally, but that's no excuse. He is more than I ever wanted in a husband (you know those silly checklists we make when we're young? Yea, he's more than that). This summer I am going to work on showing and expressing my love to him in simple, pure ways, so that he knows I don't take him for granted, because my life with him really is my happily ever after:

                          

So that is my plan for the 2014 summer of love.  My summer doesn't officially start for 12 1\2 more days (but who's counting?) but I am going to start working now because it's never too early to start loving yourself.