Ironing takes my mind back in time.

I know that quite a few people don't enjoy ironing. A friend of mine once labeled it as his "lot in life," and not in a good way. I like ironing, because it reminds me of my old apartment. Not my first apartment ever, because I’m pretty sure that I didn’t even own an iron back then, but my first apartment here in Texas. It was my first home with Andy. Back then he was a vet tech, and I always ironed his scrubs. He also liked starched shirts tucked in with a belt. Oh, how times change!

Courtney was still just a puppy when we moved in. She could fly up the stairs in a few great bounds. I used to walk her three or four times a day, along the main driveway in the grass where the tall pine trees cast great pools of shade. I found a lot of fallen bird nests for my collection there.

Both my boys were born during the time that we lived in that apartment. I hauled them up and down the stairs. I spent countless hours with them on the floor, and rocking them in the night. We read books and made block towers.

We walked to nearby parks and strolled among the houses in the surrounding neighborhoods, dreaming of the day when we would buy a house of our own.

We painted the living room and the second bedroom. The cheap, flat, beige paint that was standard in most apartments has never appealed to me. It shows every smudge and speck of dirt, which is not the best when you have a big dog and small children. So I painted it with two gallons of returned Martha Stuart paint that I bought at Sears for $2 a can. And I loved it.

At Christmas, I found the perfect artificial tree. It was 7 ½ feet tall and skinny, probably only around 3 feet in diameter at it widest part. I made a skirt out of a plaid table cloth, and bought an angel and some new plastic ornaments to accompany my collection of old sentimental ones.

Now My Love likes some of his shirts ironed, but not all of them, and almost never starched. No more scrubs. My sweet Courtney is an old lady dog. She just had a birthday last week, putting her in the neighborhood of 100 in dog years. I don’t think she could take those stairs if she tried. My baby boys are so big, and I’m quite sure that they have no recollection of our beloved apartment.

I’m thankful for the home that we now share. Our neighborhood is far beyond all of our expectations, and it is so clear that we were meant to live here. I hope that we spend many more years in this place, watching the children and the oak trees grow. When it is time for us to move on, I know that we and our boys will have many fond memories of this house and all that God has done for us here.

And every time I iron, no matter where I am, I will think of that old apartment and smile.