Top Ten Reasons My Husband is Awesome

Do I need a reason to shower my husband with praise? I think not. Here it is, in no particular order.

1. Commitment to our marriage. I’ve been known to be super a little emotional and crazy from time to time–probably making the corner of our roof look like a pretty good home. However, when I don’t make sense, he just tries harder to understand me.
2. Commitment to work. Dexter has had four jobs in the past eleven years. He’s had more cars than that. The only reason he left any of them was because he moved to another town. He’s blessed right now to work with two of his best friends. Sometimes, working with friends might make it harder, because it’s easy to take things personally when they come from people you know personally. However, he’s humbled himself, compromised, forgiven, and been forgiven, and stuck it out like he has in the tougher times of our marriage, while also enjoying the blessing.
3. Graduated from college. Maybe this doesn’t seem like a big deal, but Dexter could’ve gotten just a 2-year degree in his field. But, because him having a college degree made me feel more secure (and probably made my parents agree more readily to our marriage), he graduated with honors with a BFA in Art/Graphic Design. Even though that meant he had to take four semesters of torture Spanish.
4. Sense of humor. The man makes me laugh. My favorite thing to laugh at? When he sees something funny on TV or online and cracks up till he cries.
5. Spiritual growth. Like me, Dexter is not content to hang a cross on the wall and call himself saved. He’s pursuing a real relationship with Christ. In the past six months, I think he’s grown more than I’ve ever seen him grow before. And there’s nothing more attractive than a man who’s becoming more like Christ.
6. Protector and defender. Most of Dexter’s favorite movies are about men fighting for their families. (Unfortunately, their families usually die at the beginning of the films. I’m trying to get over that.) Dexter has a strong desire to protect those who need protecting.  Whether it’s farm animals, child slaves on chocolate farms, or people at work who need standing up for, he doesn’t hesitate about whether to step up or step back.
7. Gift-giving excitement. My birthday is October 3. Dexter’s not a huge planner, so he used to start thinking about what to get me for my birthday at the beginning of October…and two days isn’t a lot of time to shop. I realized that might have been for the best. This year, for my birthday, Dexter started planning in early September, and two weeks before my birthday, there was paper-wrapped sphere sitting on our fireplace. He asked me every day if I wanted to open it, and told me, “It’s a bowling ball,” about every half hour so he wouldn’t blurt out what it really was. Finally, when I was having a really bad day, I caved and opened it early. It would have been great to open an iPod on my actual birthday, but opening it a little early made him SO happy.
8. He’s proud of me. He tells me all the time how cool it is that I’m a teacher, how he appreciates the food I made, how much he likes my blog. I’ve never been the cool girl in any social situation, but Dexter makes me feel like I am.
9. Story-telling. Our kids are going to have the best bedtime stories. Dexter has an awesome imagination and is working on writing out a story he’s been mulling over for years. During our last car trip, Dexter described what he was writing and I’m pretty sure that man is fit for Hollywood. I’m so excited he’s finally taking the time to write so his ideas don’t go to waste.
10. He’s a good driver. A few weeks ago, I joked to Dexter that some day was the best day of his life because of some silly reason. He looked into my eyes and said, “No, the best day of my life was when…you told me I was a better driver than you–I mean, when we got married.” Dexter is a very careful driver and has driven me safely back and forth between our home and my parents’ home many times in some really bad weather. I’m a little bit of a perfectionist, so sometimes I don’t like to admit that other people can do things better than I can. I’m a good driver (in my opinion), so it would have been easy for me never to admit what I knew was true to Dexter. But, because I love him soooooooo much, I told him anyway.

Find more Top Ten Tuesday posts at OhAmanda.