Happy Birthday Andy!

Today is my husband's 28th birthday.

Us celebrating his birthday together (a day late) 5 years ago

I have been incredibly blessed with this wonderful man in my life. In honor of his birthday I am going to share 6 things (not sure why 6, but let's go with it), that I love about my husband (in no particular order). (I seem to really be into parentheses today).

1) He is a Christian
When I met Andy, he was not a Christian, but rather looking for answers. I shared the gospel with him and over the course of a few months of talking and praying, he surrendered his life to Christ. Since then, he has grown so much in his faith, even taking the big step of sharing the gospel with his mom recently. His transformation in Christ has been awe-inspiring to watch.

2) He is extremely smart
I always prided myself on my brain. School was always too easy for me, and I enjoyed being "the smart one". Then I met Andy, and I am not ashamed to say he is way more intelligent than me. He is an engineer, so he has me on the math stuff (although that was one of my best subjects in school), and he is incredibly quick-witted and sharp. I have learned to trust in his evaluation of situations, as he tends to look at things very logically. Can I admit that he usually is right?

a fuzzy photo of him beating me at yet another game (chinese checkers)

3) He is tenacious
Andy is good at a lot of things, but he doesn't come by it all naturally. If he isn't good at something, he will work and work and work until he becomes good at it. He beats me at pretty much every game we own. The only ones I could ever win were word games or trivia games (I am known for the crazy amount of nearly-useless facts I store in my brain. Did you know a group of hippos is called a crash?). Well, he insisted we play word games like bananagrams over and over again every night for weeks until he could consistently beat me. I love that quality: being able to see your shortcomings as challenges to overcome rather than insurmountable peaks to avoid.

He admitted I was the better cross country skiier, but he still tried his best!

4) He is funny
Andy is often the quieter one in the group, but I always refer to it as "confident quiet". He will sit back and let everyone else talk until he has something good to say. And when he has something to say, it is almost always insightful, witty, or incredibly funny (or all 3!). Nobody can get me laughing like Andy can.

5) He is hard working
Not just at work, either. He goes to the gym multiple times a week because he feels lazy if he doesn't. He likes to spend his free time learning foreign languages (He is currently learning to read and write Polish, which he already speaks via his parents, who immigrated from Poland. He is also learning Russian "on the side"). He told me the other day he wants to build a computer as a hobby. Building a computer is definitely not high on my list of things to do to have a good time, but I know that he enjoys having projects and purpose to the things he spends his time on.

He looks just like his grandpa in Poland

6) He is loyal
I don't know anyone on the planet more loyal than Andy (and really, is that not one of the most important characteristics to have in a friend and spouse?). He is always there for the people he cares about, and is always trustworthy.

Have I made him out to be perfect? He's not. But he is definitely perfect for me :) 

Happy Birthday Andy!