I love the month of May! For the beautiful weather, yes; but also because it’s proved to be an important month in my life. God has given me some really good reasons to celebrate the month of May.

One of them is my sister, Julia. You can wish her a happy birthday on the 16th. 🙂 There are more, but the ones I’m thinking of especially, are my Dad and my husband. I don’t know what it is about May 14, but it sure produced two of the sweetest men I know!

 Since Daddy was in my life a whole 20 years before Cory came on the scene, I will first tell you about him, and why I think I had and still have the best Daddy ever.

Daddy is a hard working man, and by example, taught his children to work hard also. He worked along with us, and encouraged us to work willingly and well. When I’m tempted to do a job halfway, I can still hear him saying: “Take some pride in your work!” By giving me responsibility in the turkey house, and trusting me to do it right, he taught me to love turkey farming, and now we’re blessed to be owners of our own turkey farm.

If his duties called him elsewhere and he couldn’t help us with a particularly nasty job, we could almost always count on him going to the store and getting us each our favorite soda to drink. We didn’t have those often, so it was always a treat.

Daddy didn’t want us to feel entitled to being paid for working, so he didn’t use money as bait to get the regular chores done. But if we did an extra good job or finished in record time,on the bigger jobs-like power washing or wood cutting- he would often reward us with some money, an icecream sandwich or a candy bar.

In Daddy we saw an example of how a good husband treats his wife. (If my little brother follows in his footsteps, as I believe he will, then his fiance can plan on being truly cherished as his wife.) Daddy respected our mom, and taught us to do the same. I wonder how many times in my teenage years, I heard him say: “Respect your mother!” He always had her back and we all knew it.

Always thoughtful, Daddy knew that Sunday mornings were mornings of near panic for Mom, with four little heads of hair to braid, and a little boy to get ready, too. So almost every Saturday evening, he would go to the store and buy a bag or two of donuts, so Mom didn’t have to cook breakfast. The little white powdered sugar coated ones, you know? I still get hungry for those donuts! Precious memories…

This I think is the cutest thing ever: along with the real flowers he would buy Mom on Valentines day, he would buy her some artificial ones that she could keep. Unless he discontinued that in the past few years, I imagine she has one for every year!

From Daddy I learned the importance of generosity and helping others. So many times, when someone we knew needed help, Daddy was there, freely giving his time and what money he could spare to help them through.

He believed in the importance of playing with his children, and oh the games of softball we played in the big front yard at home! He joined in our water battles and in our races. Not one of us could run faster than Daddy. The man can run like a chicken!

We have lovely memories of him playing in the snow with us. Pulling us in a train of sleds, with the lawn mower as a locomotive, and helping us build giant snowmen, he had as much fun as we did.

That is when he wasn’t busy plowing driveways for all the old people of Clover Hill. (The little old ladies would start ringing the phone if he didn’t show up soon enough.) Giving, helping, sharing… If there was ever a man whose heart is pure gold, it’s my Daddy…Our Daddy. (I share him with four amazing siblings.)

And then I grew up and met the guy I would spend my life with. When I met him I remember being impressed that he was a true country boy, yet such a gentleman…like Daddy.

 I liked that he had a deep desire to serve God…like Daddy. 

Then I found out his birthday was May 14…like Daddy! I was a goner! 🙂

Six and a half years later, he’s my husband and my best friend. The self proclaimed “total unromantic” who remembered on his own that yesterday was May 5, the 6 year anniversary of when he asked me to be his girlfriend. To celebrate, he took me out to eat. (Ahem…) to the hotdog stand where his brother works. 😉But hey, he remembered! and that hotdog was delicious.

He’s not the same kind of romantic as my dad, but I’ll let you decide, does a totally unromantic person buy his wife her favorite flowers on Valentines day? Even asking to be sure that they are, indeed daisies? Should it verify his “unromantic-ness” if he assures me “they’re not for Valentines day, but just for being a good wife” ? Oh, and there’s that perpetual calendar on his desk…If I remember correctly it has been set on our anniversary for the last almost 5 years. And the whole time we were dating, it was set on the 5th of May. Hmmm.

In many ways, Cory is much like Daddy. In personality, no. Daddy is more the big, sweet teddy bear type, while Cory carefully tries to keep his “teddy bear” hidden under a more bristly exterior that’s just cute, ’cause everyone can see right through it. 🙂

He and Daddy are both great fathers. Seeing Cory with our daughter reminds me of Daddy over and over. She has him wrapped securely around her finger. And like Daddy, whose family is his world, he loves every minute he can spend with her.

I would say giving gifts is a dominant love language for both, but where Daddy carefully remembers all the milestones and holidays with his gifting, Cory likes to keep me guessing. 

He doesn’t like buying presents when they are expected, so at Christmas time I know not to expect a thing. I don’t mind, because he continually surprises me with random, useful gifts all year. Garden tools, attachments for my Kitchen-aid mixer, a ladder… all very “Cory-ish” gifts. Painfully practical, which suits me fine, as I don’t like useless clutter. (For the record, Cory is not the only person in the family known for his practical gifts. 😉 Ask my Mom.)

Its just like my “total unromantic” to march right past my birthday as though it weren’t even there, but then surprise me by giving me a beautiful old truck out of the blue. My favorite color, and built in my birth-year… wait… did I just call it old? 😉 Thanks again, Honey!

What’s so great about May? Well, there’s my dad and my hubby, both born in May, we have May 5th, when we started dating, and then theres one more. This one barely made it in the month of May, but on May 31, 2012, one year and 26 days after asking me out, he asked me to be his wife!

Less than 2 months later, I
WAS his wife, and it has been a wonderful 5 years! Not perfect, but wonderful. I wouldn’t trade my Cory for anything. And I wouldn’t trade our life for the whole wide world. (I know it’s awful but this picture is our most recent family picture. It’s almost a year old but it will have to do.)

I’ll stop soon, but first,this…
One of our very dear friends – you know who you are- once described us as being “one of the weirdest couples she knows.” 😂 Recently it came up again in conversation, and we think it’s hilarious. See, there’s this quote that we adopted as “our quote,” early in our relationship…Some people have a song- we have a quote!

And here it is, just for you-compliments of Dr. Suess:

“We’re all a little weird, and life’s a little weird. And when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with our own, we join up with them, and fall in a state of mutual weirdness and call it Love.”

There you have it. Us in a nutshell. If you are with our friend in thinking us a little weird, don’t feel bad, we think so too. 🙂And we love it.

Happy May!

PS. Mom, I didn’t forget the important Sunday in May that involves you. Its just that this post is already too long 🙂 -stay tuned.