24 years ago...

We celebrated our 24th Wedding Anniversary earlier this week. We were married in my local parish.
We met 25 years ago in London. I was working in a pub, as most Aussies did when they took up a working Visa in the UK. Dermot was a London resident.
We met the first week I arrived. My heart skipped a beat.
We eventually spent more and more time together. We would take long walk in the park, enjoy Covent gardens, all those things couples do. I would leave work and he was there at the back, with his wink waiting to drop me home.
Fairly quickly we realised that we were meant to be together.
Within three weeks we were talking Marriage, the name of our children, how many children do you think we would be Blessed with?
Then the big decision were to live? I could get UK residency. That was not an issue, but was this the right place to start our life together?
Dermot decided that he would emigrate to Australia. This process took quite some time.
The Australian Embassy was quite slow at processing Dermot's forms.
We had a couple of hiccups. The Australian Government was only interested in Legal and people with 3 A levels. Dermot had neither. So we chose to apply for a fiance' visa.
This still took many months but at least if I stayed in the UK, He was more assured of being successful in his application. So we kept busy working and enjoying life together. By this stage I was a live out Nanny.
In the mean time, We needed to tell Dermots parents. They were not amused at all, and I was not the most popular person.
Eventually they knew it was inevitable and we would be leaving the shores of the UK with a destination of Australia.
The go ahead was given, and we needed to choose a date, it was governed by our marriage date, so the 5th June was our exit date. If you have a Fiance' visa, a 90 day period is givenfor you to Marry. So with my Parents assistance and the documents supplied by the Parish Priest we were to be married some 90 days later.
So our day arrived. I was late arriving at the church. The photographer held us up.
I looked at the invited guests. I said to my Dad, "There aren't many people". He said, "don't worry about that". It was a big arc shaped church, so it does hold a large congregation....The rest for another day.
So 24 years ago Dermot & I were married. I feel like the most Blessed women in the world. He is so adorable and he tries so hard to love me like I would like to be loved.

So Little Brid put a lovely request on the radio. "walking her home". Its all about the journey of a married couples life. I hope and pray we are able to walk each other home, even to our Lord. What a Blessed life we have loving each other. That is the  witness our world needs. Married couples loving each other through every good and difficult time.

I love you my Love, my best friend.  

To love & to hold.

Every month a lovely bunch of homeschool mums gets together to share about different topics. This Month was all about How has Homeschooling affected your Marriage.
Well my initial reaction is: It hasn't. Our Marriage has seen enormous stresses and homeschooling would have to be the least.
I was asked to share my tip, that morning of the gathering. As my friend and I were chatting we decided I should talk about the most effective life changing event that has happened in our marriage.
I immediately began to write my words down and I was very excited about sharing, but....I didn't want to take the night over, so I shared on Coffee time... This was the beginning of really sharing together.
I  would like to share my thoughts on our marriage changing event.
One Sunday morning while sitting in our pew at church toward the end of Mass, with our children getting restless, a young couple were asked to share about a mariage weekend. We watched them walk up the aisle, with there 5 children in tow. The lady was expecting her 6th. They shared there story. Dermot leaned over to me...'we are doing that weekend'... Dermot doesn't remember saying it..
The invitation was to a marriage enrichment weekend. This was instrumental in leading us into a deeper understanding of ourselves and each other. How God really fits into our lives as a couple raising our family.
We realised we were keeping him out of areas of our relationship. The sharings over the weekend challenged us in so many ways, but we were determined to love and understand each other better.
It gave us the tools to help us in hard times and a community to fit into for support.
This was our couple conversion. It was when we said "yes" to God in a meaningful way. We allowed God into every part of our marriage, even the mud.
So how can we keep the flame alive? Well there's a little secret.
Once a month there is ongoing  support in the way of Gathering evenings, in couples homes. The Gathering groups are easy. We run a Gathering group in our home, and we have done so close on 8 years, give or take a break or two.
These couples are like minded and we share life and support each other. So what do we do on these nights? Firstly we Pray. 'Notes' have been downloaded from the website, we take turns to read them aloud, questions discussed and shared only with your spouse. Supper is shared afterwards. Often this is where the real sharing begins as Couples feel comfortable to share with trusted Friends.
This Community we are involved in also reaches out to the engaged, mentoring them through a one on one program called Embrace.
So the tools we are given from celebrate love weekend are:
Praying for Passion in our marriage and all marriages
" I feel" statements rather than accusing statements. "I feel hurts when  this happened".
We have also taken tools from the Embrace model as well. Connect Kiss- 10 seconds at least. Connect Hug- Hug until you melt, Affirm your spouse every day, and let him know what you appreciate about him daily.
So Celebrate Love has opened us to what God wants for our marriage, not what the world says we should have.
Even in our darkest times and hardest struggles, God is our strength and guide.  We call to him for comfort. We were deeply tested in the last few years with a very nasty incident, which shook us to the core of our being, and really it could have ripped us apart, but we both clung to God and he was there. We know, we felt his presence and peace.
Every ministry we do in our church is as a couple, every decision is together.
The gatherings and our coffee times give us time to discuss Gods word, any issues unfolding in our childrens lives, and we are united and that's couple power.

 Would you like to share your secrets to your marriage?

Protect Traditional Marriage

To all Aussie Families, I urge you to write to your Local MP and defend traditional marriage.
On Friday, 3rd December, Bishop Michael Malone sent the following request to the Maitland Newcastle Diocesan Clergy.

“On the 15th November 2010, a motion was tabled in the House of Representatives by the Greens Party member, Adam Bandt.
This was successfully amended by the Government member, Mr S P Jones, as follows:
‘this House calls on all parliamentarians, consistent with their duties as representatives, to gauge their constituents’ views on ways to achieve equal treatment for same sex couples including marriage.’
The Catholic Bishops of Australia request that all parishioners be encouraged to sign a petition or send a personal letter to their local Federal Member of Parliament using this suggested wording:
Since Parliamentarians have been asked “to gauge their constituents’ views on ways to achieve equal treatment for same sex couples including marriage” it would be remiss of us not to give our views.
I would appreciate your urgent attention to this very important matter.
The following link will assist in determining Federal electorates and the applicable member: http://apps.aec.gov.au/esearch/Default.aspx”
You are encouraged to write to your Federal Member or print and send the attached petition to your local Federal Member by Monday, 20 December. Please change the petition wording to suit your relevant parish or Christian group. The Greens will be relying on our apathy to win this debate – we must make our views known to our parliamentarians now.
You may also like to consider joining the Australian Family Association to help stay abreast of this and other important topics related to marriage and family. For $40 per year you can subscribe to the best in pro-family reading, including six issues of the Family Update and three issues of the 48 page journal, The Australian Family, invitations to special events and access to regional meetings.
You can contact the NSW office at 32 Rickard Rd, Warrimoo NSW 2774 or PH 4753 6097 or email nsw@family.org.au.
In the current issue of Family Update supporters are asked to write to the PM to tell her you oppose changing the meaning of marriage. That marriage is the basic unit of society and bears most of the cost and effort of caring for those who are dependent (i.e. the young, the elderly and the sick) and is the healthiest and safest environment to rear children. It should be protected and promoted not redefined out of existence. You are also encouraged to write to your sitting MP or visit them to put your position to them.
Another useful website is http://www.lifemarriagefamily.org.au/
You can subscribe to their newsletter for free.

I would encourage you to write and Defend and protect the natural definition of Marriage, and maintain the marriage act in its current form.

Marriage Weekend

Last weekend, we were immersed and assisting in a marriage enrichment weekend attended by a large number of couples. It was the first weekend in 3 years that had been held in Newcastle area.
The scene was set, the venue was the grounds of the Sacred Heart Cathedral Hamilton- suburb on Newcatle. 15 couples booked and all the team- of previous atendances were assembled and gathered to play there part. Other couples, who couldn't help out physically supported the weekend by prayer.
Some couples were nervous, some were excited, others were just curious, but all were being prayed for and arrived to a beautiful late breakfast/ morning tea. it was a way of making them feel at ease before entering the flow of the weekend.
Many couples who attend are so ill informed about our catholic faith, so it is a great time to re educate and rejuvernate there marriages.  It was a lovely experience and one that is well presented by the Newcastle team.
We attended our weekend around 9 years ago, and it has enriched our marriage and has been the greatest influence on our marriage. It was also were we experienced our couple conversion and were able to re-ignite the fire of love we have for each other.
Since then we have either supported this community through hospitality for the weekend, running gathering  groups monthly in our home, for couples after they have attended the weekend, or mentor engaged couples through  there Embrace program. We run it is our home as we need to. So it is one on one. Couple to couple.
For many couples this program is the first contact, after getting married in the church, that they have with a community, so the theology behind the weekend, is not watered down, but is tailored and smart enough to entice them to know more.
They are then able to deepen their Faith and learn more about God and what a beautiful message, he has for the marriage and their family.
It certainly did this with us. We learnt and deepened our relationship, but it also took us on a journey of discovery of who God was in our lives. As we grew deeper in love, so did our love for God, and so then our desire to want to know God and all about this church deepened as well. We developed a deeper relationship with God.
The flood gates flew open and we were ready to say 'yes' to God as a couple, and as individuals.

If you get the chance, say Yes and attend the weekend. It will be a blessing in your already wondeful marriage. The link above, has links to the New Zealand, UK and USA, as well.

Marriage

Recently Dermot & I went on a Marriage enrichment weekend. As we are part of the Celebrate Love community within the Catholic Church, we were excited to see what we could bring into our marriage from this weekend.
The Weekend was run by Family Life today at resort that was an old Convent, attached was a Catholic nursing home and a Church. All on the same grounds. We were excited. We prayed for openness to receive what ever gifts God was wanting for our marriage.
We willingly participated and enjoyed much of the content.
Since this weekend, we have really been able to minister to each other and celebrate in our differences. This weekend was truly a God-given gift for us.