Crowder Chronicles

Friday, August 24, 2012

These are a few of my favorite things....

Date night with this handsome fella!

Hanging out with sweet friends

Anything Orange and Blue....Go Gators!

Surprise flowers from Ethan!

Ethan has successfully completed week two of this semester and things are already crazy busy. I started my Seminary Wives class for this semester and already love it! Ethan is working really hard to manage all of his course work and I am really proud of him! This is my favorite time of year. I love all of the fun events that happen between now and Christmas! So many exciting things!

My sister Apryl is coming to visit us labor day weekend and we cannot wait! I love visitors! This will be her first time to Louisville so we are excited to show her around campus and around the city! I will post pictures of our adventures shortly after her visit!

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Summer Lovin'

Can you believe it is August 1st? Ethan starts classes back in 2 and a half weeks. Here are a few photos to recap the past few weeks!

Ethan and I gladly partook in Dress like a cow and get free Chick-fil-a day! We love Chick-fil-a and will do almost anything for free food!

Ethan doesn't get alot of Saturday mornings off so 2 weeks back when he was off we took full advantage of it! We went to breakfast at this fabulous breakfast/brunch place here in Louisville! Here is a picture of me with my (to die for) stuffed french toast!

My most recent do it yourself project was a headboard. We got the idea from our friends in North Carolina and it was surprisingly easy! I absolutely love the way it turned it and I think it makes a big difference in our bedroom. Here is the before and after picture!

Our most recent investment was a grill. Ethan was really excited about this buy. We love it and have used it several times since we purchased it. It nice because Ethan is helping alot more with dinner :)

Last week I was a Vacation Bible School volunteer. The apartment complex that we live in hosts one every summer and one of m friends asked me to help with arts and crafts. I really loved meeting so many new people. We had about 60 kids. I am so thankful that these sweet kids were loved on and that they also heard the Gospel!

Last weekend we grilled out with the Hinton's and the Mathew's and my favorite part was loving on Miss Story! She is 8 weeks old and getting so big!

That's all for now folks! Hope you are enjoying your summer!

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

A time to reflect

July 12th 2011. The day we began our lives in Louisville. Tomorrow makes one year in Louisville! I honestly cannot believe how quickly the year has gone. I have spent some time reflecting over this past year the last few weeks and the one thing I keep going back to is God's faithfulness in our lives. I wanted to take a few minutes to share what God's faithfulness has looked like for us over this past year.

Jobs. When we arrived in Louisville we had no jobs and just enough money to get us started. God quickly provided me with a full time job that I have held over this last year and that I enjoy. Not long after I began working Ethan got a part time job. God is faithful.

Our church home. We began attending Highview within a few weeks of arriving in Louisville and really enjoyed it. We struggled to get plugged in for the first several months, but in January Ethan began an internship under the Education paster at a different campus and so we moved to that campus to get involved there. We simply love it. Highview has several campuses which are all great, but we just feel so much more at home at campus we now attend. I have gotten plugged in with choir and praise team. We love our Sunday school class. Ethan has been given many opportunities to teach in different settings and he really enjoyed the internship. God is faithful.

Friends. Thankfully we had several established friendships with people in Louisville and if it would not have been for those we would have felt lost. It was a lot harder to make friends then we at first expected. Most everyone in well adapted to their lifestyle and it was hard to break in. The Lord graciously blessed us with new friends who we have grown so close to. They challenge us and encourage us. God is faithful.

Homesick. This has been by far been the most difficult part of this past year. I cannot tell you how much we miss our families. My heart breaks at the thought of missing out on what is going on back home and if it is brought up in conversation you will most likely see tears in my eyes. I have realized now more than ever just how important family is and how much we love our families. Ethan and I would not be who we are or where we are if it where not for them. It's still hard. I think it will always be hard. Being homesick for my family constantly reminds me that this earth is not my eternal home and that homesickness ultimately points me to be homesick for my heavenly home. God is faithful.

Financially. God has provided in this area in an extremely vivid way. We live pay check to pay check yet because of God's grace on our lives we do not go without the things we need. Yes, we make sacrifices, but ones that are well worth it. We successfully made it through our first year of seminary debt free. This was a huge goal of ours. God is faithful.

Our marriage. I am so thankful for how the Lord has grown our marriage. He has pushed us to our limits, driving us to lean fully on Him, and reminding us that He must always be the center of our lives. Constantly reminding us that Christ's love for His church is a picture of marriage. What a blessing marriage is and oh how it sanctifies us! My love, trust, dependance and gratefulness for Ethan has grown so much and for this I am extremely thankful. God is faithful.

Spiritually. Christ has been teaching me many different things, but the thing that He is teaching me the most is contentment. I have always struggled in this area and know that to an extant I will until Christ's return. However, I am slowly learning how to place my contentment in Christ. He is everything I need. Life, breath, peace, joy, humility, thankfulness and so much more. My contentment must be in Him. God is faithful.

I am thankful for all that I have learned over this past year and as Ethan and I plan for the year ahead I have high expectations for what the Lord is going to do and show us. We are so thankful for the opportunity to be here and for training that both Ethan and I are receiving.

God is so very faithful and for this we must praise Him!

Monday, July 9, 2012

Roadtrip

This past weekend Ethan and I headed to North Carolina for our good friend Corey's wedding! Ethan was a groomsman in the wedding. We were excited to go and see some of our good friends who were driving up from Florida for the wedding.

We set out early Friday morning to make the 8 1/2 hour drive to Raleigh.

We arrived Friday afternoon and enjoyed catching up with our friends and going to the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner!

We stayed with our friends Ben and Moe who live outside of Raleigh and on Saturday morning they took us to see Southeastern Seminary's campus. It was really pretty, but has nothing on Southern's campus :)

The beautiful ceremony!

I loved catching up with these 3 lovely ladies!

The most handsome man at the wedding!

On our way home yesterday we rented this audio book! Decision Points by George W. Bush! We listened to it the whole way home and we loved it!

It was busy but fun weekend and we loved catching up with so many of our friends!

Sunday, June 17, 2012

The first two weeks of June....

These past two weeks have been busy but super fun! I have lots of pictures to show you so I thought I would walk you through via pictures! Seriously, get ready for picture overload!

On June 5th we celabrated Ethan's 22nd birthday! We went to a Japanese Steakhouse with our friends Brian, Ashley, and Jarrod. I was extremely adventurous and tried sushi for the first and what will most likely be the last time :) We had a great time and are so thankful for such great friends!

FYI: Our good friends Brian and Ashley are expecting baby #1 on 12/25/12!

On June 6th Ethan and I celebrated our 3rd wedding anniversary! I honestly cannot believe how fast these 3 years have gone by. Marriage truly sanctifies you and I am so grateful for the godly example Ethan is to me. He encourages me, provides for me, supports me, loves me, and leads me to Jesus! I could not ask for a more awesome husband. This past year we have grown more in love with each other and stronger as a couple. I am so thankful for the Lord's grace in our lives and marriage. He had truly blessed Ethan and I! I look forward to many many more years of marriage!

We celebrated our anniversary by going to dinner at Olive Garden!

My beautiful rose and 1 hour massage from Ethan!

I painted this canvas for Ethan. This is one of his favorite verses!

On June 7th our friends Kendall and Luke welcomed their second baby into the world! Sweet Miss Story Sophia was born! Ethan and I enjoyed visiting with them before leaving for Florida!

Doesn't Kendall look fabulous? She doesn't look like she just had a baby.

On June 8th Ethan and I headed to Florida for vacation! We had been counting down the days till we would get to see our families for weeks! After several delays due to mechanical problems(causing us to miss our flight from ATL to FL) we finally made it to ATL. The airline put us up in a hotel and we caught a few hours of sleep before heading back to the airport to catch our flight home.

We this picture was taken we had been waiting for 4 hours for our flight.

Finally in FL with our families!!

Even the doggies were happy to see me!

Playing rocket ship with my nephew James.

Catching up with my niece Katie Joy.

Sista Amber

Brother Dave

The girls

Dinner at the Ivy House

Since both of our families live in the same town Ethan and I split up so we could spend time with both families. Some of the time we were with each others family and other times we were not. It seemed to go smooth and we were both able to see and spend quality time with family!

Hanging out with some of the youth from our home church! Love these guys!

Ethan was given the opportunity to preach at our home church. He did a great job and I am honestly proud!

My only request while home was to see the ocean and we did! It was fantastic!

KJ was a little windblown!

Yes, we took a minivan on the beach...yes it got stuck in the soft sand....and yes we successfully got it out :) Never a dull moment and also not my idea to take the minivan on the beach!