Happy Birthday to my Nathan

Twenty eight years ago today, my favorite person was born. He was the first son born to Karen and George Buchan, the first of four sons. They named him Nathan, which means "gift from God." Little did they know that what they thought was their gift from God would turn out to be God's greatest gift to me besides His precious Son. I thank the Lord for the blessing of my husband. We have been through a lot together, and through the years I have known him, and loved him, I have come to see him more and more as God sees him; precious, endeavoring to do what is right, faithfully commited to what he feels called to. For a long time, I was blinded by my own selfish desire for perfection, and all I could see were the negatives. All I could see were his failures and his shortcomings. Then, through a series of lessons from the Lord, through some circumstances I never would have wished for but ultimately thank God for, I had to choose to love my husband. I chose to accept and love and strive to honor the man that the Lord had created me for, and at the time that I made the decision, all of his failures and shortcomings and imperfections were in stark display. But, the Lord gave strength to make the right choice, and you know what happened? When I decided to love my husband, not based upon him, or me, but based upon what the Lord had commanded, then I started to see what an incredible blessing, what a wonderful man, what an amazing person my Nathan really is. He is the person who can always be depended upon to work his hardest, to go above and beyond, to try his best to do a better job. He is the man that makes me laugh, that holds me tight, that wants to be with me even when I don't want to be with myself. He is the man that gave me my children, that always provides for us, protects us, and loves us. He is the one that is in so many wonderful memories, of tears in his eyes asking me to be his wife, of his hand in mine when God joined us in marriage, of our first anniversary on the beach :), of holding me through pain and sorrow and hopelessness, then of catching our first son as he came into the world, and of a million more ways that I fell in love with him when I saw him with our child, with all our children. Memories of tears together, of hearts breaking, of being reknit together by the Lord. He fulfills all my earthly desires and it strikes me speechless sometimes to reflect upon the blessing of being called to love him and be his helpmeet. Today, I celebrate him, my love, my Nathan. I wish I could give him a gift that would begin to compare with all he has given me.

Nathan is in bed right now. I know, you're thinking, why aren't you in bed with him, "celebrating?" ;P Well, he has a head cold, and feels terrible. He looked so pathetic and all he wanted to do was go to bed. :( We didn't really do anything much for his birthday today, his party is on Saturday. I did make him a cake, and gave him his card, (which I didn't want him opening at his party anyway:P). Then we went to sign the contract and put down earnest money on our new house. I am so happy that he is getting excited about this now, too. I think once we move in (in three weeks!!!) he will be even more excited about it. I hope Nate enjoys his party on Saturday, I feel like he didn't have a very special day today, but hopefully his "birthday week" will get better. I love that man so much, he deserves all the happiness in the world. :)