Saying mahola to Kauai

My top 16 favorite Kauai memories upon mine and Nate's 16 days of marriage. Grin.

1) Seeing double rainbows right from the view of our cottage porch. Neither of us had ever seen anything like this particular set, for they landed right smack in the depths of the ocean. Nate stood behind me, arms wrapped around me, and we remained silent except for the name of Jesus coming from our lips a few times. It was breathtaking. He is breathtaking.
2) Not wearing make-up during my time here. I never even broke out my set of curlers y'all. Praise Jesus Nate still thinks I'm beautiful without the beauty products. Bless him...
3) Waking up beside my husband. I love it if I manage to wake up before him so I can see him still asleep; this is a rare occasion however :)
4) Sitting inside our cottage, doors open, reading my book. I allow my focus to be easily interrupted to take in two things: the amazing ocean view Jesus gave us, and watching my man paint. I love the look he gets on his face when he is so wrapped up in it. I can only imagine the look of delight on the Heavenly Father's face so wrapped up in Nate praising Him one paint stroke at a time.
5) Getting mad for a brief moment at Nate during our kayak'ing trip. And then laughing at myself for how stupid I was acting (he did nothing wrong...) And then, he and I cracking up over another couple who was yelling at each other; you could hear them even when we passed them. Nate and I decided that if we ever did marriage training, we were going to make couples take a similar kayak'ing trip. The trip is worth a post in itself, and I haven't made the time for such yet, so I'll get back to it once we return to Nashville and I can attach pictures.
6) Piddling in a number of towns here. Our favorites: Hanalei, Koloa, and Ka'paa. With that, visiting numerous art galleries and watching Nate become mesmerized. I too became mesmerized, just in a different gallery. Well, more like a display of delights. Well, not a gallery at all really. But our discovery of Lapparts - an amazing coffee and dessert place - was quite the beautiful display to me. Hehe
7) Sleeping in, and waking up with absolutely nothing to do, except that which we wanted to do.
8) Cell phones turned off!
9) Reading our Bibles separately, but often in the same space...I felt the Spirit just invade our room with His Presence. I could weep over this one, so I'm moving on...
10) Continuously cracking up when out-of-the-blue I would realize I'm married, and married to Nate at that! We'd grin at each other, shake our heads, and remind the other we were husband and wife. I'm still very much in transition. I asked Nate if it felt so weird (in a good way) and unusual to him as well. His response: "Well....kinda. (Pause) I mean...yea. (Pause) But not really. It feels so natural. Like the way it's supposed to be. The way it's always been." Oh! Be still my heart...
11) Deciding to walk like roosters when we were out walking one day. There are so many of them here, and I jokingly and rhetorically asked Nate, 'What if we walked like that?!' So he did. And so I did....Neither of us caring about any passerby.
12) Discovering that the strawberry pancake I had ordered for breakfast one morning was really more like strawberry shortcake in disguise. Delicious....
13) Taking in the landscape of Kauai: ocean, mountain, and lush tropical foliage. We paused along one of our walks today and I tried to wrap my finite mind around the fact that God 'spoke, and it was so...' (Gen. 3). By His very Word, the Universe was formed. How on Earth (no pun intended) could you and I not believe with every part of our being that His written Word is that true and that bound for fulfillment through Him...It is ours girlfriends. How I long that we walk in obedience to His Truth.
14) Being able to celebrate Nate's birthday here in Kauai, four days after we got married.
15) The praise Jesus hand flings we did in the Jacksonville, FL and Dallas, TX airports on our way here. We realized the day before we were supposed to leave that my tickets were booked as Shelly Griffin, but that we had no copy of our marriage certificate as they were to mail it. And I had no other form of ID that showed Griffin. Y'all, one of the guys got distracted talking to us at 7 in the morning, and dropped my ticket. He picked it back up and just passed us on. I just flashed the other security guard in the following airport the best smile I could manage, and God granted us favor on that round too. You better believe we knew God's favor was on us.

16) How well Nate loves me, even in our inexperienced marriage days totaling only sixteen. That imperfect man loves me so so well...I am thrilled with the privilege to learn how to do life with him as we return to Nashville.
Mahola. Grin.