The Crucifixion

Luke 23:33

"When they came to the place called the Skull, there they crucified him, along with the criminals-one on his right, the other on his left. Jesus said, 'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.' "

Look Who Came to Visit

Does everyone remember Alex? He moved in with another family in mid January and he came by to visit us last week. Yoa, his foreign exchange sister, came along with him. It was great to see both of them.

Jamie won at ping pong, but Yoa gave him a run for his money. Great fun!

Quarterly Review #6

This is the last post on quarterly reviews. I would like to thank Danny and Laura for sharing their marriage with all of us. It is our hope that you have found encouragement for your marriage. May God bless you.

Welcome to guests writers Danny and Laura Stiller

OUR FAVORITES & WHY

By Laura Stiller

Laura's Favorite Quarterly Reviews:

Camping at Myrtle Beach - I LOVED this quarterly review because we didn't have a schedule or agenda. Our only goals were to eat, play together on the beach, rent a tandem bicycle and read. In fact, the second day of our quarterly review was spent entirely on the beach playing in the water, reading under an umbrella, talking whenever we felt like it, and eating snacks.

PREP Marriage Video Series - This was a very simple quarterly review. We rented a cabin with a TV and DVD player in "The-Middle-of-No-Where," Oklahoma. We packed all of our own food so we wouldn't have to leave, and we just hung out there for two nights. We watched the PREP dvd series and even took the time to practice the communication techniques they taught. It's alot hard to apply these in real life, in the middle of a fight - but this dvd series gave us communication tools and techniques for working through arguments/differences that we will use for the rest of our lives.

Danny's Favorite Quarterly Reviews:

Christmas Parade in Gatlinburg, TN - Danny likes this quarterly review because it was cold, Christmassy and there was fake snow all over this city and in the Christmas parade! He also enjoyed our drive through the Smokey Mountain National Park and stopping to play in the river.

Kerrville Kayaking - This was just a relaxing camping weekend where Danny enjoyed getting on the river and watching the sunset.To read about all of our quarterly reviews, click here.

Danny and Laura Stiller were married on August 27, 2005. They fell in love while leading an inner city ministry together after college in Bryan, Texas. Two weeks before their wedding, while Laura was busy finalizing wedding plans and dreaming of marital bliss, Danny decided they needed to move to Greenville, SC for a better job opportunity and to pay off debt FASTER. Somehow, during their first two years of marriage, they moved four times, and squeezed there in the middle was a year in Columbia, SC and the Harris' newlywed Sunday School class. They are now half-way through the four years it takes to get a Masters of Theology from Dallas Theological Seminary, and are maintaining their sanity with date nights, quarterly reviews, and lots of hearty "communication." They blog regularly at: thestillers.blogspot.com.

Quarterly Review #5

Welcome guest writers, Danny and Laura Stiller

SPECIFIC QUARTERLY REVIEW IDEAS
by Laura Stiller

Each of our quarter reviews look different (I'll get to specific quarterly review ideas in a minute), but this has kept them fresh and fun for us. Some of our trips have been strictly for play. Any talk of our marriage just flows, it's not structured or planned. Some of our weekend trips have been fully structured complete with an agenda, discussion topics and intentional questions - sometimes even with homework (or books to read BEFORE the quarterly review in preparation for a discussion).We've needed both of these at different times in our marriage. Danny has been stellar at discerning what types of things to plan for our quarterly reviews and deciding what kind of tone our week needs to take.Let me give you a few suggestions. Please keep in mind that each marriage/couple is vastly different, so part of what will make quarterly reviews beneficial for you is how you tweak and customize them to your needs and personalities. Free/Cheap Activities:
tubing
outdoor movie
camp out
find a local event
rent a tandem bicycle
go back to places with memories
watercolor
go site-seeing with your camera - take pictures together (this is on our "to-do" list)

To Foster Deep Conversation:
attend a marriage conference
plan your future together by reverse engineering your life
take & discuss temperament spiritual gifts, leadership and/or personality tests
watch the PREP Marriage Video Seriesexplore career goals/dreams together

Sample Discussion Questions:
What has been the biggest adjustment being married?
What has been the hardest struggle in our marriage?
What have you struggled with personally since getting married?
What has been most unexpected thing about marriage?
What has been the biggest blessing since getting married?
What do you want to focus on/improve next quarter (marriage & personally)?
Things we've learned since getting married. What's your spiritual life been like this quarter? What are some things you've prayed for this quarter?
What are some ways that I have (and maybe currently do) hurt you?
What can I do so that I don't hurt you anymore.
Establish some "Action Steps" for building/maintaining intimacy (in anticipation of a busier semester).
Write down 10 things that make you feel loved.
What are our spiritual, physical, emotional, social and intellectual goals for the next Quarter? What have our challenging/stressful circumstances been this quarter & how can we relieve the stress? (ie: packing lunches, planning menus, doing laundry, etc.)
What are our prayer needs this quarter (because if we don't feel like we need God then we won't go to Him)?
What is the most humanly impossible thing you'll ask God to do this year?
Where are some places we'd like to try to go on future quarterly reviews? (ie: Grand Canyon, West Coast, New Orleans - we dream big folks)
What did we accomplish this quarter that we had set as goals last quarter?
What's improved in our relationship this quarter?
And that, my new friends, is the book The Stillers have written for themselves on Quarterly Reviews since sitting on a worn leather couch the summer of 2005. It is still being written, with many editions to come.

Danny and Laura Stiller were married on August 27, 2005. They fell in love while leading an inner city ministry together after college in Bryan, Texas. Two weeks before their wedding, while Laura was busy finalizing wedding plans and dreaming of marital bliss, Danny decided they needed to move to Greenville, SC for a better job opportunity and to pay off debt FASTER. Somehow, during their first two years of marriage, they moved four times, and squeezed there in the middle was a year in Columbia, SC and the Harris' newlywed Sunday School class. They are now half-way through the four years it takes to get a Masters of Theology from Dallas Theological Seminary, and are maintaining their sanity with date nights, quarterly reviews, and lots of hearty "communication." They blog regularly at: thestillers.blogspot.com.

Kite Flying, Tree Climbing Day

Sunday was a beautiful day. It was cool and a wonderful day to go to church. Although it was a beautiful day, it was quite windy. You know, the kind of wind that makes me walk really fast from the car into the church house because wind blown hair style is not really what I had in mind. After a wonderful Sunday afternoon nap, we headed out to Bobby and Marlene's to visit. Greg and Taylor were in town and we wanted to hangout with them for a little while. The wind was really blowing on the lake and I asked Bobby if he had a kite. He replied, "Why of course I do!" So it became a kite flying day.

The kite flying day became a ......................


Tree climbing day! OPPS.

I was not real thrilled with this little exercise. There were not many limbs for Kynn to wrap his arms around and the wind was really blowing. He assured me he was fine. He used the long yellow pole to cut the limb.


We had our doubts about getting this twisted kite out of the tree.

No slowing down for Bobby. He just got another kite to fly.
And, Marlene got in on the action.

Finally, Kynn was able to cut the limb. Down came the twisted kite.
Greg and Taylor One happy kite rescuer
Back in business

Two pretty kites.

Quarterly Review #3

Welcome guest writer, Laura Stiller (see previous quarterly review posts)

WHY DO QUARTERLY REVIEWS?

by Laura Stiller

After 3 1/2 years of marriage, 14 quarterly reviews and countless date nights, our rendezvous every three months have taken on various shapes and forms. Regardless of where we go or what we plan, each quarterly review is a time for us to get away from the routines of normal, everyday life; spend focused time just with each other; and communicate. Sometimes, when we are in the middle of several particularly stressful or tiring weeks, it's just enough boost to know that we already have the next quarterly review on the calendar. It also helps me to know that if something in our marriage is not functioning just right (our schedule, our jobs, our commitments, our meal planning, whatever) that we have a weekend planned specifically geared towards tweaking and improving things. Quarterly Reviews give me hope that our marriage will not get stuck in a rut. I don't ever want to wake up one morning and ask myself, how did I get here? How did things get this bad in our marriage? Could we get stuck in a quarterly review rut, where they are no longer serving their purpose - of course, but we are praying against any kind of "ruts" in our marriage.

Danny and Laura Stiller were married on August 27, 2005. They fell in love while leading an inner city ministry together after college in Bryan, Texas. Two weeks before their wedding, while Laura was busy finalizing wedding plans and dreaming of marital bliss, Danny decided they needed to move to Greenville, SC for a better job opportunity and to pay off debt FASTER. Somehow, during their first two years of marriage, they moved four times, and squeezed there in the middle was a year in Columbia, SC and the Harris' newlywed Sunday School class. They are now half-way through the four years it takes to get a Masters of Theology from Dallas Theological Seminary, and are maintaining their sanity with date nights, quarterly reviews, and lots of hearty "communication." They blog regularly at: thestillers.blogspot.com

Christopher-Through the Years

My, my, my....where does time go? I could have spent my whole day looking at all the fun, wonderful pictures we have of Christopher. Christopher was born at 1:06PM 20 years ago today. He was such a sweet, content baby and continues to be a joy to be around today.

Christopher, we are so proud of you and love you very much!