Dear Younger self,
I want to remind you that what is is front of you is not always the most important. Remeber your faith, don’t be too caught up in yourself to live it out! Be bold. Go for it and don’t back down. Study harder. Keep in touch with those you know better in the future, and marry Jon Malko! He is the best!
~Brooke
Thanks for getting me to think about it http://chocolatecovereddaydreams.blogspot.com
This is Jon and I waiting for our reservation at Bonefish Grill on Valentines Day…
I kept teasing Jon that he was getting me a Dog, so in my present was a beautiful bracelet (that matched the necklace I was wearing). It was around the neck of a little Stuffed Yorkie puppy – the kind of puppy that is appropriate for us right now 
I got Jon a pair of Sperry Top Siders! They are so cute and boaty! Jon looks adorable in them 
This is our dessert on our 1 year @ the Melting Pot – YUMMY!
Our waiter took our picture! It was such a great night! Neither one of us had been to the melting pot before! It was such a fun experience!
These are the floers that are still beautiful on my desk! Jon surprised me with them on Valentine’s day! When I came out of our Thursday Morning Creative Planning Meeting they were on my desk with a sweet card
I am so excited about this weekend! It is a special weekend for Jon and I. Not only is today Valentine’s Day, but on Sunday it is the celebration of Jon and I being together for 1 year! It is crazy to me… because as much as I want to say the time has flown, and it has, I also feel like the Lord has drawn Jon and I so close together that I can’t imagine what it would be like to go back to what my life was before we were together.
It really is amazing how God prepares you for marriage! The love that I have for Jon is different than anything I could have imagined love to be like. I always just imagined that one day we would get married and everything would change. But it seems to me that as God prepares us both to be wed to one another, we become more and more “married” every day, in a sense that every day I feel more prepared to be Jon’s wife.
Marriage as a picture of Christ and the church is more of a blessing to us than I ever knew, and I am certain that each and every day I will see more clearly how unique and amazing this union that God has created will be!
I love you Jon
Last night at Midnight Jon and I arrived back in Fort Myers from our trip home to Louisville! What a great Christmas that we had! I cannot even explain how nice it was to be home with my family for more than 3 day! As much as I love living close to the beach and my job it is still extremely hard leaving your family for months at a time! But right now this is where the Lord has me, and I am satisfied! I must admit it was nice walking out in the sun this morning, even though it was only 50 degrees the sun has a way of warming your face here that it just doesn’t have in Kentucky!
The more plans that are made for the wedding, the more exciting it becomes! While we were home Jon and I picked out our cake, our flowers, or food, music for the wedding, and several things for our new home! My parents were so generous to us! My mom had several pillows and and bedskirt made for our bedroom, and the purchased our Bed for us as a Christmas gift! (There is a picture of it below!) I love it so much! As much as I am looking forward to our wedding, the excitment of being the wife of Jonathan Derek Malko far outweighs that! Praise the Lord for a man who is so loving and patient and leads me with honor and humility! He is such a servant, and yet so strong at the same time! It is true that only the Lord can temper a man the way the Lord has tempered Jon!
Well, the holidays are over, and now it is back to work! A little routine won’t be so bad!
I LOVE Christmas! I love the season, the togetherness, the sense of family, thinking of gifts to give, and most of all the reason for the celebration, JESUS! I attended the pageant at my church on Saturday night, along with Jon, his grandparents, and his mom and step dad. We are unsure about the salvation of his family, and the gospel was presented beautifully! Please continue to pray for his family and our opportunity to minister to them!
I also really love Christmas shopping. It gives me so much joy to choose the perfect gift! I love choosing wrapping paper that coordinates and tying perfect little (or big) bows on each one! Last night Jon and I spent 3 hours wrapping gifts and drinking chocolate milkshakes and watching “The Holiday” on DVD! (Yes, I said chocolate milk shakes – I live in Southwest Florida! It is 80 on Christmas!) I will post pictures of our presents later!
I would love to know what everyone’s favorite part about Christmas is!
1. What is your favorite part of Christmas
2. What is the best gift you purchased this year!
Making wedding plans is stressful, OR, it can be! I have to admit I have been kind of on edge about it, but over the past few days I have really calmed down! I got some great advice from an even greater friend (thanks Kristin!), to remember that this wedding is not about me, but that it is a worship service to the Lord! As humbling as that is, it puts into perspective! No matter how intricate, or how beautiful, or how expensive, if a wedding and the planning are not about serving our Lord and bringing glory to Him, it is all worthless! My prayer is that I will be reminded of this daily, and that my attitude will be reflective of a desire to magnify Christ! Please join Jon and I in praying that our wedding can honor the Lord, and point everyone there towards Christ! Jon has many family members who are not believers, so pray specifically for them! Thank you so much for walking this journey with us!
Ok, so I guess it is about time I write this story! This past Wednesday was family fest, and I had to work from 9am until 9:30pm because we had a festival as a Halloween alternative. It rained on and off all day and the weather was yucky and the day was exhausting! I was excited though because my mom was arriving the next morning to celebrate my Birthday, or so I thought. That night Jon said that he wanted to give me the 1st part of my birthday present, and I agreed with one stipulation – no pictures! I mean I had been outside the the mist that we called rain all night! Jon brought in a beautifully wrapped box that weighed quite a lot. When I opened it I found a computer hard-drive that served as the weight since the envelope inside didn’t weigh very much! I opened the envelope, and found our flight itinerary for the next day! Jon was taking me home to Louisville! I screamed and celebrated and then Jon and I parted ways due to our 5am wake-up in order to catch the plane!
We departed the next morning from Fort Myers, and arrived in Louisville around 2. Once we picked up our bags Jon blindfolded me, and a “mystery” driver (who turned out to be my mom in the end) picked us up to go to a “mystery location”. We arrived, and I being still blindfolded, was led by Jon to the back of a beautiful estate home in Louisville called White Hall. The grounds there is lovely, covered in Ivy and stone, and beautifully landscaped! There Jon took my blindfold off and my cousin Courtney was there. He explained to me that he wanted us to have some nice pictures together, so Courtney was going to take some. She began taking pictures, and after about 5 or 10 minuted she said she would be back , she had to run to the car to get her other battery.
Needless to say, this was planned, but at this point I was clueless. Jon then asked me if I wanted my 3rd gift. When I heard this question I got a little nervous, I thought that maybe he would propose to me, so I said “Do you want me to have it”. He finally gave me the gift, first a card. I opened the card and it said “On your birthday I want you to know how much I love you”, except that word love was crossed out and “like” was written in its place. You see, Jon and I had never told one another that we loved each other. We had decided when we first began dating that those were words meant for the one we marry, so we agreed to wait until we were promised to one another to say them! At this point I thought, no, he isn’t going to ask me. I proceeded to open the card (which opened 3 times to become quite large), and on the inside it said “I LOVE YOU” in HUGE letters, and Jon had written in tiny letters “Brooke, I love you” around (estimated of course) 200 times! I turned around, and the most handsome man I have ever known was on one knee where the most precious words poured out of his sweet lips. He told me that he ever since he met me he knew he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me, that he was glad I had finally come to my senses and decided to return the affection! He told me why he wanted be with me, how he thought I was lovely, and that my love for the Lord stood out the most, and for the first time Jon spoke the words “I love you” to me! He then asked me to be his wife. Of course I was ecstatic! YES! was the answer, and only after the yes he showed me the most beautiful ring I have ever seen, picked out completely by him (we never even looked)!
It was the best day of my life! We, later that day went out to dinner with my family, and when we arrived home 25-30 of some of my very closest friends and family were there to surprise ME for my birthday, to their surprise, I had a surprise of my own! In a little over 6 months I will be Mrs. Jonathan Malko! Praise the Lord for His faithfulness in bringing Jon and I together! I am amazed more and more every day at the Christ like love that Jon shows to me, and am anxious to tell our story to anyone who will hear, and pray that it can be a picture of Christ and the church to all!
So, I have some news…. but it is a long story…. so right now I will just let you laugh at this hilarious video! My nanny is the BEST!
I have never been really good at keeping a journal, at least that is what I think. Over the years I have kept several, prayer journals, personal journals, diaries, bible study journals, online journals. I have started and stopped been consistent and inconsistent, and overall I felt defeated. FELT! Until last night.
Sometimes I feel so dull in my relationship with Christ, like I am going through a routine. Last night before I went to sleep one of my old journals caught my eye. I didn’t want to pick it up, because I knew that I needed rest, but I just couldn’t resist. I started on the first page, from February 19th, 2002. My senior year in high school. As I began to thumb through the pages I read line after line of Christ’s faithfulness to me! Prayers that after many years had been answered, strength that had been given, opportunity that has come! I began to worship the Lord through my reading of these tattered pages. God is so faithful to us!
Not only is God’s faithfulness proven to us through Scripture, it is so personal too – it is written all over our lives!
The simple reading of this old journal took my faith and sharpened it, it covered it with a fresh coat of paint and as always, God renewed me! I woke up fresh and excited about trusting the Lord because he had proven to me yet again that He is so trustworthy! Praise God, in the most unlikely ways he brings us back to Himself! What a joy to be pursued by One you can never shake – the lover of our souls, and the who truly writes the story of our lives!
This past Friday, 3 of the 4 girls from my 10th grade small group graced me with their presence and we went to blackhawk for coffee and then shopped around at Belltower for a little bit! They are too much fun! I am really looking forward to spending more time with them and really getting to see what the Lord is going to do in their lives this year!! THey are fantastic! We were sad that Niza couldn’t join us, but there will definately be plenty of fun to come!! Love you girls!!!
Brooke drawing a whipped cream mustache on Tori:
Sarah and Tori:
Bringin the surprise face to southwest Florida!
