above and beyond blessing

If you don't know me very well, I'm here to tell ya that I am a football fan. I love watching the game; but more than that, I love being with friends, relaxing, cheering on my team, AND eating wings. Love the wings... AND nachos... Basically any game-day food really. OK, maybe I am more of a game-day-food-fan than a football fan, but that's ok, right?!

So, moving on now, Josiah (my hubby) and I got these AhhhhhhMazing tickets to the home opener game of US Bank Stadium in MN --- Vikings v. Green Bay Packers.

This is us sitting above the 45 yard line, behind the Packers bench, FRONT ROW. You read that right. Freaking FRONT row! Can I insert a holy S*** here? Is swearing ok when you are using it for a really exciting, awesome, good, heart melting moment? If not, then I mean hot dog! Score - big time. You might be wondering about how, how could we possibly score so big. I'll tell ya. Long story short, Josiah has this personality where he can talk to people, learn things about them, and basically get them to spill their guts. SO, using these amazing skills he found out a person he banks for was not going to use their tickets... AND... we used them. I mean, paid for them. :-) Totally worth it.

I came prepared. Full day of rest Friday, another full day of rest Saturday, and morning of rest Sunday. Basically banking all the energy I could to be prepared to last the entire game. There's a lot for me to work through and it isn't exactly easy for my brain to handle it all. So I prepared. And, this new stadium is LOUD! I mean really loud. Ear plug necessary kind of loud. But totally worth it, in my opinion, to put my brain through for a few hours. I brought sunglasses and wore them for bits of the game. And, Josiah, as always, did a great job guiding me where to go so that I didn't have to use my brain for anything except watching. Totally great man I have here. Seriously. Don't know how I got so blessed to have such a wonderful friend for a hubby. Can you tell he is excited in this pic?

This blog today is just to let you know that through all the struggles I have had --- being in that terrible car accident, breaking my T12, (ouch very painful), bruising my lung, and having a brain injury (seriously sucks), BUT, I will NEVER let them get me down and not be able to enjoy parts of life that I previously LOVED. I just have to go about those things differently by making accommodations before, during, and after. I pay a price for doing some of those things, and I have to decide if it is worth the cost. Hmmmm... Yes, this was totally worth the headache and 12 hours of sleep to recover. Totally worth it. Totally worth the nachos too. :-)

I will also tell you, Josiah and I prayed on the way home a very thankful prayer that we were able to go. So much of life has been different for us, but we were absolutely not going to take for granted that we got to have such a wonderful, amazing, cheer-filled night together. We are blessed. Blessed to have each other, blessed to have our wonder families, blessed to have our awesome friends, and more than anything, blessed to have Jesus.

I pray for blessings on you, my awesome reader. Thank you for taking the time to hear my heart. I hope that no matter what challenges you face, that you take time to be grateful for the moments that are what make life so great. Maybe it's not a Packers game. Maybe it is something else. But take a moment, breathe in, breathe out, and appreciate it.

Psalm 34:8

"Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him."