Married for almost 9 decades

     While browsing around on the Internet, I stumbled upon something extraordinary. I have to share it. The articles that I came across are dated toward the end of last year so I'll share the data according to that time frame.

Wu Sognshi pictured to the left and Wu Conghan pictured to the right.

     The couple you see in the above photograph are from China and have been married for 88 years as of last year. 88 years... 88 years of marriage...

Let that sink in for a moment...

That is crazy awesome! 

At the ages of 13 and 15, the couple married in 1924. They are now [as of last year] 101 (Wu Conghan) and 103 (Wu Sognshi) years old. I feel like this story is extraordinary in so many ways. The obvious reason is the fact that they have been married for 88 years; they have both surpassed 100 years in age; and they had the opportunity to finally have a cherished "wedding" photo almost a decade after their wedding day.

     The reason this couple came into the spotlight was for wedding pictures they were never able to take. Cameras were hard to come by in the early 1900s, especially in China. So, this couple was unable to ever have wedding photographs taken of them. Recently some photographers have volunteered to take "wedding" photos of those couples that never had the chance to get theirs on that special day. This precious couple was one of the lucky, and more than deserving, ones to get their picture taken. They both dressed for the occasion and smiled for the camera.

     I more than commend those photographers for giving these couples a chance to have such a cherished photograph.

Sources:
     http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/09/husband-and-wife-ages-101_n_2090119.html
     http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2012/11/couple-gets-wedding-photo-nearly-90-years-later/

Kaitlyn and Ryan

     I first stumbled upon Kaitlyn in December of 2012, when looking for a no-sew fleece blanket tutorial. I wanted to make my boyfriend one for Christmas. I found the perfect tutorial on her Wifessionals. It makes a great gift and anyone can do one. It was my first no-sew blanket and I think it turned out pretty well. So, I was looking to do another one for my mom and ended up back on her page again. I spent a little more time on her page this time and found where she had written about her love story. So naturally, I messaged her and asked if she would let me share the story. Thankfully she was totally okay with it. 

     It is extremely touching and a wonderful example of not settling until you have found "your one." She experienced so much heartache and spent many nights, where she cried herself to sleep. However, she prayed and held onto hope. At one of the most unexpected times, she met the love of her life. They are now married and expecting their first bundle of joy. 

     The following story comes directly from Kaitlyn's page, with her permission:

"This is our story and excerpts from the letter
I wrote Ryan on our wedding day.

I remember lying in my room when I was in high school and writing in a journal to my future husband. I’d write all sorts of notes and questions and things I’d wonder or ask this man when I eventually met him. I would wonder where he was and what he was doing and if he was thinking about me too. It has always been such a strong desire in my heart to find a wonderful Christian man to marry – someone who would love me and cherish me and appreciate me for the person I am. I always thought I would get married right out of college, just like my parents, so when that plan didn’t work out, I started to get discouraged. How was I going to meet someone after college?

As time kept passing I started getting really frustrated with God. I had worked a year and a half in Orlando when I got the job offer to move to Atlanta. At that time, I still was battling Lyme disease, I had a broken heart, and I didn’t know a single person in Atlanta. I remember standing in my shower, the day after Christmas in 2010, and crying my eyes out. I was sobbing and asking God why I felt like my whole life was NOTHING like what I thought it would be by that point. I promised myself in that moment, a moment so filled with hurt and longing for a life I desperately wanted, that I would remember it a year from then. I would look back and see how much my life had changed.

I moved to Atlanta a few weeks later. I laid in bed at night for the first two months, crying myself to sleep and asking myself why the heck I moved in the first place. I missed my family, I felt completely alone, and I was still single.  I would say, “Well, you did this to yourself…you put in for this job and now look at you. You’re miserable and sad and you have no one to blame but you.” That was such a precious time in my life. The only person that was with me in those moments was God. I would pray and pray and pray that He would help me understand why I was supposed to have moved. As the year wore on, I fell in love with Atlanta. I made friends and established a life and I grew so much as a person. By the Fall, I looked back at the year and realized that moving was one of the best decisions I had ever made – it was one of the hardest, but I was so proud of myself for doing it and God had blessed me by giving me a new life in Atlanta, which I had grown to love.

Then in September my manager called me one afternoon and told me I needed to be open to moving again. Despite it being completely unprofessional, I burst out crying and told him I just couldn’t see moving again. I had just moved 9 months prior and I liked my life. He tried to talk me into it for 2 hours, but I stayed resistant. A week or so after, he approached me again. I had been praying a lot and I knew at that moment that I had to move. Worst case scenario, if I absolutely hated it, I could move back in a year. I asked for the list of states that I could choose from…and eventually Tennessee popped up. I prayed and prayed, but finally decided that Nashville would be my best option.

My parents have always wanted to retire there and it was only 3 hours from Atlanta. Maybe God was having me move so that my future life would finally start to fall into place. I still found myself single, and by this point I was so sick of dating people and it never going anywhere. I began praying that God would not bring anyone into my life unless it was “the one”. I would rather be alone, than continuously waste my time in pointless relationships and I was tired of having my heart broken. I took a leap of faith and I started the process of moving again. Honestly, once I decided to move, doing it the second time was much easier than the first. By December I was excited to get a new life again – to have new adventures.

The weekend of my 25^th birthday, I decided to go to Nashville to find a place to live. I figured since work was paying for it, that I could just turn it into a fun trip, bringing some girlfriends and also celebrating my birthday while we were there. I drove up on Thursday with J, my girlfriend from work, and we went to dinner and then out to Broadway. It was a horrible experience. (I didn’t know at the time that I was not in the best atmosphere for people my age) By midnight, I was back in the hotel room, crying and telling J I was moving to hell.

I rang in my 25^th birthday in true “quarter life crisis” mode. I fell asleep saying over and over that I just wanted to find someone and settle down – I did not want to be 25 and single! My other friends showed up the next day, but we ended up just staying in the hotel that night because I didn’t even feel like going out after the night before. Saturday we decided to go explore Nashville and grab some lunch. Afterwards, we headed back to the hotel and the girls convinced me to go to dinner and go out…after all, it was our last night there. Reluctantly, I walked downstairs with them to the Embassy Suites’ free happy hour.

As I waited in line for wine, I saw a guy, our age, standing behind us and texting on his phone. We grabbed our drinks and sat down at a table. We noticed the guy from in line was sitting a few tables away, alone, so we decided to ask him to join us. His name was M and he explained to us that he had a bunch of friends coming down from Clarksville for the night. He was in the Army and so were all his friends. Well, I pretty much wrote him off after that. I figured he could be some fun entertainment for the night, but I was not interested in getting involved with anyone in the military – no thank you. His friends started showing up and we talked to them all for awhile, but eventually we went upstairs to change and go to dinner. We told the guys we would meet up with them later.

After dinner, we found out that the boys were at Tavern, so we walked the few blocks to meet them. I wasn’t really impressed with them, but again tried to be a good sport and told M I just wanted to see as many bars as possible so I knew of some good places to go once I moved. We started hopping from bar to bar. At the third bar, they had a photobooth, so I grabbed E, my roomie, and ran to take pictures. The night was turning out to be more fun than I had expected, and I was glad we had gone out after all. After the pictures, we ventured back to the group, just as everyone was deciding to head to the next bar. I looked over towards M and realized there was a boy with him that I hadn’t seen before. I sarcastically called out to M as we walked out, “Bring your friend Dimples.”

Once we got out of the bar and started walking, “Dimples” and I fell away from the group and just started talking. He told me he was from New Jersey, to which I said “You’re the whitest person from NJ I’ve ever seen!” (My prior education on the subject was from the TV show Jersey Shore) I found out he grew up in a Christian home and he also told me he was planning to get out of the Army that spring (he didn't end up doing that, obvi). I remember sitting in a booth at a bar, getting kind of excited that I was somehow paired off with this guy. He could have ended up with any of my friends, but I was the lucky girl who got to be with the only good looking boy from the group. He also seemed to have a lot of qualities that I found extremely attractive.

We all went back to the hotel to eat and hang out. He volunteered to put on some music and went to plug in his iPod…and out came Skrillex. That was the icing on the cake. Not many people like dubstep…namely, my sister and I were basically the only two people I knew who appreciated it. This sounds like such a silly thing to care about, but my biggest complaint with guys was that I could never find a good Christian man who loved God, but who also loved the same everyday things that I did. I felt like I was going to have to just settle for one or the other: A strong Christian who was boring or someone who loved doing everything I did and was cool, but not the strongest Christian.

I looked at him and said, “You know who Skrillex is?!?!” His face looked as shocked as mine. We hung out until about 4 or 5 in the morning and then all of us girls headed to bed. Before he left he looked at me, took my face in his hands and said “I’ll see you again.” He kissed my forehead and left.

The next month we talked constantly through text messages and then on the phone. He made plans to come to Atlanta to meet me for New Years Eve. The day after Christmas 2011, I was at my house, and I remembered that painful moment in the shower one year prior. I stood there, thanking God that he reminded me of it and smiled because I had come so far in the past year. I was excited to go back to Atlanta and to see this boy again. I was hopeful that maybe we would even start dating once I moved to Nashville. Did I think this was my future husband? No, not necessarily. But I did remember my prayers to God that He wouldn’t place anyone in my life until it was “the one”.

The boy did meet up with me for New Years, and a few days later, he helped me move all my stuff up to Nashville. In March he proposed and we were married in June.

 

God's plan was not my own - it was so, so much better (:

"Where you are right now is God's place for you. Live and obey and love and believe right there. God, not your marital status, defines your life."
-1 Corinthians 7:17"

I feel like her story says everything perfectly, 

especially the last quote of 1 Corinthians 7:17. 

 Definitely check out her blog. She has a ton of great info 

ranging from recipes to preparing for a baby (which she is just starting). 

http://www.wifessionals.com/

The Browns

     I have been following a story on Facebook for a while now. It is a sad story, but I feel like this story is a prime example of a husband's great love for his wife and son. I do not personally know the Browns. The story that I am posting comes directly from "Bringing Home the Browns" Facebook. I just want to share this story in hopes that others will see it and lift this family up. If I am not mistaken, this was written in September of 2012.

These photographs were taken from the Browns Facebook.
I take no credit. It's just nice to put  faces with names.

"Once upon a time there was a boy and a girl. The boy loved hunting and the girl loved shoes and they fell in love and got married. They bought a little house in a little Texas town, and the boy went to work everyday protecting that little town. He was a police officer, and he loved his job and that sleepy little town. The boy also love his country, and became a soldier in the National Guard. Life was good, and they were happy, but something was missing. They began to pray for a baby. Time went on, days turned to months, and months to years. 7 years to be exact. And then the news came. That boy and that girl were having a boy of their own. 

This is the part of the story where you come in...

On September 15, 2012, at 34 weeks, while her husband Sean was serving our country in Afghanistan, Heather Brown went to the hospital with back pain and a headache. After arriving at the hospital, Heather began having seizures caused by a massive brain bleed. The baby, John Michael Thomas Brown, was taken by emergency C-section. Heather slipped into a coma. The baby was rushed to a neighboring hospital with a NICU. 

It took 72 hours to bring our first Brown home from Afghanistan. The longest 3 days of his life. Flights that were hours on end with no communication. Not knowing how his wife and son were doing. Upon arrival at Tyler Pounds Field, Sean was given a police escort to the hospital, where his tiny newborn son was. That guy may be little, but he is strong like his daddy and the doctors and nurses say he is going to be okay, and soon, this little Brown will come home too.

After seeing his son, Sean went to his wife's side, where he has been constantly for the last month. Heather is still in a coma, and the doctor's tell us she may never come out. But we know our God is in the business of miracles. We believe through the power of prayer, Heather will wake up, and we believe this Brown is coming home, too.

This family needs all the prayer, encouragement and support they can get. That can't happen without people like you. Friends like you. Please follow this story. Share this story. Please put them on your church prayer list. Please join us in this journey as God creates an amazing testimony of "Bringing Home the Browns"."

     Baby Brown, also known as Baby John, currently spends a lot of time with his Daddy. Heather is currently still in the hospital. They spend as much time as they can visiting Heather and hoping for better news each day. I am sure they cannot wait until the day they can all be home and healthy together. I pray they receive their miracle and Heather is able to see her bundle of joy and husband again.  This is just a small piece of the Browns story.

If you read this, please take some time to check 

out more of the Browns on their Facebook, 

https://www.facebook.com/BringingHomeTheBrowns. 

They continually give updates and have way more information if 

you want to send them mail or stay updated with their story.

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p.s. If you have not already, check out My 1st Story!