When does your baby stop being a baby?
I know it's officially way back in the toddler period, but seriously. It's hard to let go of the "little" mentality you have when it's your last child. Because you love having him little.
This week, my "baby" will graduate Kindergarten.
And while my husband says Kindergarten graduation is ridiculous, because they're only moving across the hallway, it still holds some sentimentality. After all, this is the last graduation until probably high school. And I'm definitely not ready to go there yet.

Can you remember the last romantic gesture you received? How about the one before that? In all honesty, a lot of us probably can't go back too far in remembering. And yet, the romance is still there, even if it's not in the forefronts of our mind. So what makes our love lasting? Guest author, Iola Goulton, is chatting today about her relationship with her husband, and what takes it from the red-hot romances to lasting love. Read on!

​I am an avid reader, and romance is my favourite genre. Yet ask me my what my favourite book is, and my answer is likely to be the Bible (always a good choice). Why? Because every novel I’ve ever read mysteriously vanishes from my memory the minute I’m asked the fateful question.
 
I have the same difficulty with romance, romantic moments, and romantic memories.
 
Despite reading one hundred or more romance novels a year and being married for almost thirty years, ask me to write a blog post about something in real life that I found romantic, and thirty years of chocolates and flowers and fun days with my husband vanish from my memory. It’s not that he never does anything romantic, and it’s not that I have a bad memory (honest!). 

If you've followed me for long, you know I've moved quite a bit. Honestly? I've never lived anywhere longer than six years. Ever. Once we pass July here, it will be the longest I've lived anywhere because we'll start our seventh year. It's exciting. But it also comes with a twist I wasn't thinking about.
We moved here with the expectation of staying. Seriously putting down roots, digging in, finding a church family to grow with and let our children grow up in, you get the idea. And we really do feel we've done that, for the most part. But you see that picture above? The one with my daughter and one of her friends? It probably won't ever happen again.
Why?
Because that friend is moving away this summer.

Even on the other side of a painful situation, the pains of the ordeal can linger.
It's been eight and a half years since my daughter was born. In some ways it feels like forever and in others, only moments. I'm sure it's that way for most parents. 
But that also means it's been over nine years since I dealt with infertility problems. Almost a decade. So what brought them to my mind again now?
Bills.
No, I'm not still getting bills from way back then, although it wouldn't necessarily surprise me, considering how long it sometimes takes doctors to bill for things. I found some bills buried in old tax paperwork.

I adore musicals. But I had never seen "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolored Dreamcoat" until after I married my husband. It's his favorite, by the way.
He grew to love it by watching the Donnie Osmond version on VHS growing up. (Did I just age us?)
Since we've been married, we've seen it live several times. Once at the Orpheum in Memphis. Once in Tyler, Texas by a local group.
And last weekend.
​Which might have been the most fun of all.

See that picture? I definitely felt like that several times over the last month.
It was my first time to work tax season. And I survived. Although I think my house almost didn't. It was pretty rough by the time everything was said and done.
I'm definitely grateful for a husband who stepped in and did dishes and laundry several times while I sat at my computer, entering information into the tax program and trying to make sure everyone signed in time for us to get them filed. Whew!
On this side of it, the twitch in my eye has calmed down. And I feel a bit more like I can breathe. Sure, there's still more work to do. We filed tons of extensions, after all. But it's not quite as urgent for the moment.