Weekend Getaway

I don't like when my husband works Saturdays.  I don't complain though because it's nice not having to stretch the paycheck as much.   Besides, he's making up for times this winter when work was slow.  He's usually home by 3 or so when he does work on Saturdays so it could be worse, but I still would rather have him home with me!

So a few weeks ago, on a Saturday, when my husband was at work, my doorbell rang and there was this sweet old man handing me a beautiful bouquet of flowers.  I ripped open the note...

I was so thrilled!  I had always thought it was soooo romantic when a husband did this kind of thing for his wife and now my husband was doing it for me.  Totally out of the blue. 

This is my puzzled face.  Definitely not a mad face although looking at it now, I think I look a bit irritated.  But for real, I was puzzled and tickled!

We headed out and made some stops along the way.  One of them to MacDonald's to chill with a mocha frappe....mmmmm.  Then we had to fill our tire with air.  I sat in the car and sipped my frappe while hubby dear did his manly duty and made our chariot ready.

My hubby was determined to keep our destination a secret as long as possible and kept his mouth shut even in the face of true adversity!  As soon as we headed east, I assumed we were headed to Philadelphia or somewhere around there.  It doesn't get much more "east" than that unless you want to drive for a few hours and head northeast or southeast.  Ok..I'm getting off track...We did end up in Philly.  Brad reserved an executive suite at the Crowne Plaza Hotel. 

Brad said that it actually wasn't as great as the website made it seem, but we did have a lovely room!  The executive part meant that we had full access to a 24 hour snack bar on that floor.  We did help ourselves to some goodies and then got bagels and fruit there in the morning for breakfast.

It was such a lovely weekend of refreshment and just enjoying each other.  We watched movies and talked and laughed and dreamed and just enjoyed being together. 

I never dreamed married life could be this good.  It feels so good to have someone love me unconditionally and who challenges me to be my very best.  He shows me in sooo many ways that he loves me.  He empties the dishwasher every morning if it is full.  He tells me every day that I am the most beautiful woman in the world.  He listens when I pour out my heart and holds me when I cry.  He makes me talk when something is bothering me.  He tells me every day that he loves me! 

I am so glad the honeymoon stage doesn't have to end!

I love you babe! : )

33 years young!

I am absolutely awful at keeping things from my husband. That's a good thing most of the time! Buuuuttttt when it comes to birthdays and Christmases and every other time we get each other gifts, it is a very, very bad thing! I think I should start waiting to buy gifts until the day of his birthday so I don't give it to him ahead of time. Sad thing is.. he is no better. We decided we're going to be OK with it...it's kinda our thing!

Gift #1 came a few weeks ago. Each week when my hubby pays the bills and does "bookwork", I watch him write our address in the corner of the envelope. Once I took a stack of blank envelopes and wrote our address in each corner. Most of our bills are paid online but there are a few that still go snail mail. One day the thought came to me that I should get him a stamp for his birthday. So I stopped at Staples and ordered one. It was done in 10 minutes!!! I thought it would take a week or 2, therefore taking care of me wanting to give it to him early! When I got it, I thought it was the coolest thing! I'm surprised I didn't wear it out the first evening, stamping our address on everything in sight! That night in bed after a long conversation where my husband played along with me wanting to give him his gift....I gave it to him. One cannot enjoy the beauty of such a gift at 10:00 at night! He loved it but I didn't think he did because he didn't "jump up and down", and didn't seem that excited about it. Keep in mind this was 10 at night! Poor man....Lesson learned for me!

The 2nd and better gift took a lot more work. My hubby had mentioned quite a few times that he wishes I would put pictures together of before and after pictures of our house. What better time to do this than his birthday? I worked on the book online when we wasn't around, and was careful to hide any e-mails about it! I love Shutterfly and it really didn't take too long!

The package came a week before his birthday. When he called me that afternoon on his break, I told him that I got his birthday present. He proceeded to try and figure out every store I had been in that day and tried to get it out of me what it was! Seriously we have SO much fun together. All of these conversations were full of laughter and joking and teasing and flirting. One of the top things on my "list" of what I wanted in a husband was someone I could laugh with. I have never laughed more than I have with this man!

Of course, being true to tradition, I gave him his gift that night. I just couldn't wait to see his face! But, before I gave it to him I made sure he wasn't tired!!!He loved it and promptly looked at it a few times. The next day when he got home from work the first thing he did (after kissing me ) was look at it again!

Here's to many, many more early birthday gifts!

Happy Yellow Things

Yellow is my mom's favorite color. I'm beginning to realize why. Yellow is the color of all things happy. Smiley faces are simply the best when they are a bright yellow-hands down. It's such a happy color. When we were picking out paint colors for our house, yellow was my top choice for the laundry room. The color we chose was "optomistic yellow". There's something about the first room you walk into and I love walking into a bright cheery room.

Spring is the perfect time for this cheerful color. One of the first flowers popping out of the cold ground are bright yellow daffodils.

Lately this fun color has been popping up all around my house too!

We've got forsythia bushes all around our property and I've been picking them to add a splash of cheerful color all around on the inside. I didn't know until a few days ago that they are called "forsythia". Thanks to doing research for what kind of bushes and shrubs we want in our landscaping project, I now have a name for the "yellow bushes behind the house".

Easter candy would not be right without the classic "PEEP". My favorite are the......yellow ones! Bet ya didn't see that coming!

Every Easter I buy these purely for reminiscing. Ok, I love the marshmallowy gooiness too but the memories are what does it for me. You see, one of the few memories I have of my grandpa was going to his house around Easter and he would always have yellow PEEPS there for us. He died when I was 7 years old and to this day whenever I eat one of these my mind goes back. I'm getting teary eyed just writing this...

Then on Saturday, after we got home from a wedding, I went out to get the mail. There in the stack of mostly junk was a gleaming big yellow envelope.

The handwriting was sooo familiar. I knew right away who it was from. It was an Easter card from none other than my dear husband! Talk about falling in love all over again! He knows how much I LOVE cards and notes from him and he remembered me saying about how it would be fun to get a card in the mail from him like when we were dating. We had read in a book that sending a card in the MAIL is special. I forgot all about it, but my hubby didn't! He stored that little idea away and figured he would use it someday.

Speaking of tucking thoughts away...back when we were dating, in one of our discussions on how we can better make each other feel loved, I had mentioned that he doesn't need to buy me all kinds of flowers. Sure I love roses but if he would stop beside the road and pick a bunch of wildflowers that would mean even more than a big bouquet of roses. Are ya with me ladies? Just the fact that your manly husband would pull beside the road and get out of his vehicle and handpick a bouquet for you....that just makes me melt. Well, he did that a time or 2 when we were dating, and every time it made my heart melt. On Sunday when we were on our way home, we passed a bank full of smiling daffodils. My husband nearly gave me a heart attack when he jammed on the brakes and pulled beside the road. I thought something had happened to the car. I asked him what was wrong using a panicked tone of voice I'm sure! He said nothing, but got out of the car and started doing this... He scampered all over that hill and picked the most lovely bouquet of daffodils for me. Meanwhile, I'm sitting in the car with tears streaming down my face, taking pictures. To say that God has blessed me with such an amazing husband would be an understatement. I never, ever dreamed that marriage could be this good! Brad knows me even better than I know myself. I often tell him that I love the way he loves me. I thank God every day for bringing him into my life.

This week it will be 2 years since he asked me to be his wife. It just keeps getting better and better...