a weekend to remember

i promised to write about my weekend alone with bret and here i am, one month later. just long enough, for me to wish i could have another one just like it. where do i begin???

please don't be offended, but to write this may require me to be mushy and sentimental. if you think it might offend you, then please, just stop reading now. it won't bother me. i don't know who reads and who does not anyway unless you respond.

one of the most important things bret and i lost in our move to texas was time alone as a couple. we had no family or youth group members to watch our kids for us long enough to steal away for an evening alone. we went 5 months after our move before we left our children with anyone except nursery staff at church. even more time passed by before we did it again. when rebekah was born, we had to just take a leap of faith and pray there would be someone who could help with them. Our friend, Lesli, offered to stay with them that night and take them to church. she and the kimberlins brought micah and anna to see bret, bekah, and me at the hospital that afternoon. the hawkins agreed to keep micah and anna sunday night, so bret could stay with me. it was almost a haunting experience to have just had a baby and have no family there to welcome her into this world. especially since our entire families had been present for our first two births. i know i would not have made it without bret there for moral support. he could not have been there with out the hawkins gracious gift of watching our children. the bartosh girls watched them twice and morgan watched them once. anne jones kept them (micah and anna) over night for the praise team retreat last march. bret's family watched them in july of last year so bret and i could celebrate our 8th anniversary. my mom and dad watched them in october one night so i could go to the zoe conference with bret. i know, you are probably thinking, "honey, that's par for the course when you have kids." well, i know that, believe me, but keeping a marriage together takes time. keeping a good marriage takes even more. we don't want just any ole marriage, we want a great one. thankfully we have one. but you can really tell when it has a been a while between times alone. we just need each other's undivided attetion periodically.
that's why the gift that ryan and lesli, scott and tricia, and john and crysty gave bret for his birthday was so wonderful. they gave us one weekend from friday night till sunday morning alone as a couple. they split up time with our kids. the kids had a blast. they were talking about their experiences for days afterwards. it was such a blessing.
friday night bret took me to Saltgrass Steakhouse. it was kinda an awkward feeling. it seems when you actually get an opportunity to be romantic it never comes as easily as the times when you want to be and can't . neither of us felt like being "affectionate"-- at first. our waiter figured out i was the control freak of the relationship by the way i ordered my meal. just because i wanted my dressing and potato toppings on the side, he deemed from some psychology training that i was a control freak. bret, kept silent on the matter. :-) well, at first i was terribly offended, but it was food for thought. i thought about it most of the night while trying not to be a control freak. after our dinner, we went to our hotel. we stayed at the double tree near the galleria. i had won that as a door prize at our women's retreat just two weekends before. it was nice. we had a fancy room. we were very tired and soon fell asleep. we slept till 9:30 before cracking open an eye. it was heavenly. we had complimentary breakfast the next morning. it, too, was nice. we were now off to our day of being together. it had rained and was very cold with mixed precipitation coming down as we drove. we decided to go to grapevine mills. we shopped there for a while and thought about seeing a movie and several other things, but what we really wanted to do was just be together and talk-- about....anything, nothing, whatever came about. so we decided to leave the mall and we went for a late lunch early supper at Rockfish where we used a $10 gift card and a free appitizer card to eat. it was really good. when we were through we stopped by a Starbucks/Barnes and Noble for me to get some coffee (since it was cold and it was a day for treating ourselves) and bret had a gift card to spend at Barnes and Noble. he ended up getting a texas hold 'em game set. we took it to our other hotel. bret had a free voucher for the rennaissance hotel of richardson for singing there one time. they really fixed us up. we had a suite facing downtown dallas. the entire front wall was windows. it was the nicest room i've ever stayed in. we played cards all night, talking and being silly. it was pure heaven. the next morning we woke to the sun coming in our room. we slept with the curtains fully opened so we could see the night lights and have the sunrise wake us up sunday morning.
it was not florida beaches or some fantasy like place or event. it was much better. it was time being together listening to one anohter and laughing till the wee hours of the morning. it was perfect. even though the weather was not, it made it that much more special. we could not be distracted by anything. the day was meant for staying in and being together. we did just that.
so thank you ryan ,lesli, scott, tricia, john, and crysty. what you gave us was priceless. we owe you all big time!!!!!
and thank you bret for being the most wonderful friend and husband in the world. i love you and adore you!!! you are the best thing about my life!!
summer