My 12 Years of Marriage

Greetings friends and family,

Today marks the 12th trip around the sun as husband and wife.

The first six years were kidless, the second six were as the 4 Webbs.  It is possible to love someone and not be "in love" with them.  I know because I've been in both situations when it comes to loving Kendra.  I loved Kendra for the first few years of marriage, but it took some extraordinarily bad, self-induced circumstances for me to understand what it means to love someone AND be in love with them.  I'm not going to pretend I have this all figured out.  i don't.  All I have are the examples during my life and my own experiences.  Being in love with someone is not the same as lust.  I know those two can be confused because of the world's views of love, but there is a difference between them.

I don't know the day or even year when this switch happened, but somewhere along the way I not only loved Kendra, but I became in love with her.  There is so much more depth to discover about love and about Kendra.  I would be foolish to think i've arrived at some great mountain top of love.  Every long-term couple I've talked to says they love each other more every year.  I agree completely.
Kendra gave me Easton and Layla, the two most precious gifts beyond what I could ever imagine.  However, even without the twins, Kendra is still the love of my life.  My love for Kendra isn't conditionally based on whether she gives me children or not.  They are just the icing on the cake.  Even through 5 years of infertility and the IVF procedure to get the twins I looked at Kendra first as my wife and second as the potential mother of my kids.

Today at dinner Easton asked, "who bought this house? Was it you or Mommy?"  I explained to the twins about how in marriage the two people become one.  Everything I have becomes hers and everything she has becomes mine.  It took several minutes and multiple angles of explanation, but it finally got through to them that WE bought the house and we pay the mortgage.  There is no such thing as my money and her money.  Some (or most?) marriages don't operate their finances like we do and I'm not in a position to say what is right and wrong.  I just know that for us, we both agree on spending or else it doesn't get spent.  We have one checking and one savings and that's it.  Too many couples believe marriage is a 50/50 proposition with his money and her money.  Why pretend and live a lie?  All the money belongs to both spouses whether a couple pretends to keep it all separated or not.  Even the government sees marriage and money this way.  Anyway, I choose to build Easton and Layla's view of normal one example at a time.

We took a two night out of town trip to Northern Arizona for cool weather and good times with a group of friends.  All four of us had an outstanding time.  The tree swing was a big hit with the twins.

See you soon!