welcoming april & lessons of a newby wife of a pharmacy student

Woops, the whole month of March passed before our eyes and it's already April! SO CRAZY!!

A lot of things happened last month. Eugene got WAY busier with school (we see each other 2-3 times a week these days....sad!), I got a new job (YAY, praise the Lord!), quit my old job, then actually decided to stay "per diem" at my old job, started to prepare for our grandparents to move in and I learned how to crochet! It'd be impossible to update you on everything that's happened recently, but in a nutshell we're doing okay :)

Eugene will get less busy in a few more weeks and I'm counting down the days! I start my new job tomorrow and I'm pretty excited to start fresh, learn new things, meet new people, etc. I feel like 2013 has been a year of transitions- we've  been constantly trying to adjust to different circumstances, opposite schedules and changing living arrangements. Through it all, we've been learning to be flexible, to take each day as it comes, and to be willing to adapt as new challenges come our way. Being a wife to a Pharmacy student is no easy job! Our marriage has changed a lot since Eugene has started school, and I've had to pick up a few new responsibilities!

My new responsibilities include:

• making lunch and snack packs for Eugene to take to school when he has to stay on campus all day. Trying to find healthier snack ideas for us! Recently, I've gotten into these veggie/protein bags with chopped carrots/broccli/celery, a handful of almonds and a boiled egg. I want to eventually add a cheese stick in there. :)

• waking Eugene up from his "15 minute naps" which actually become  30-minute naps, or sometimes even a 1-hour nap because I feel so bad waking him up.. Doesn't he look really pooped out?

• revising essays and helping Eugene change slide themes and add transitions to his powerpoint presentations. Sometimes it makes me feel like I'm in school again too! It's actually pretty fun :)
• reminding him of his work schedule as his very own personal assistant. His schedule is so crazy busy and sporadic sometimes, he tends to forget things here and there. We have his schedule pasted onto the wall now so that I can make sure he doesn't forget to go to work :)
• driving to church on Sundays so that he can take TWO 1-hour naps in the car (he usually stays up really late on weekends, so these naps are sacred!)

The wife I am today looks much different than the wife I was when we first got married. Before Eugene started school, I used to measure how good of a wife I was depending on whether or not I made him breakfast, packed him lunch and made him a variety of different home cooked meals. I depended on neatly folded laundry, an empty sink, well-ironed clothes, a clean and sanitized bathroom and well dusted bedrooms to feel like I was doing a good job. However, now that Eugene is barely home and is rarely ever home to eat a meal-- it was confusing how to do this "wife thing" during this particular season of his life.

However, by God's grace I'm slowly learning that as a wife, my responsibility is not merely to make him good meals and keep the house clean. I realize that being a good, supportive wife means meeting my husband where he is, seeing the needs he has in his day-to-day life and seeking out opportunities to serve him. (Of course the most important and most difficult thing is to do this with a joyful heart!) 

This is no easy task. 

On a day-to-day basis, I am really naggy/whiny and I complain a little  waaaaay too much for my own good (even if not always outwardly). When I'm not careful, its easy to become burdened by this because in and of my own strength, I am so limited. I find that when I try to be a good wife and serve unconditionally and love and sacrifice on a daily basis -- I fall short and fail. I can really testify to that because I seriously fail every day. But praise God that His mercies are new every morning, and that he so faithfully provides us with the grace and strength we need to do all things faithfully! What joy and great comfort we can find in abiding in Christ. I realize I can do absolutely nothing good on my own. How true and how precious the Word of God becomes in my greatest times of need. It's been a slow and painful learning process, but I know that the Lord will carry us through to the end. I know that through every circumstance of our lives, He is growing us in our dependence on him, deepening us in our appreciation for the promises of His Word and sharpening us so that we can grow in Christlikeness.

There is definitely NO way I can muster up the strength and love I need to do this well.
So thankful for God's faithfulness in carrying us through his first year (He only has about a month left.....Yay!)
Only 3 more years of Pharmacy school left..... !!!!! God's grace has brought us this far...  :)

Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

John 15:4-5

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses,
so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships,
persecutions, and calamities.

For when I am weak, then I am strong.

2 Corinthians 12:9-10

give thanks: a weekend of celebrations, time to cook, excitement for a new job, brazilian blowout hair treatments, latte art, a successful attempt at pot roast (yipppee!)