Thank you, thank you, thank you for your responses to last week’s posts. I loved reading the comments and emails and was so touched by you sharing pieces of your life and thoughts with me. Thank you! You are all awesome!
Andrew and I spent our 9th anniversary well. The night before, I snuck around the house after Andrew had already gone upstairs and hid 9 little gifts (mostly inside jokes) along with clues leading to the next gift. It was a lot of fun to do and even more fun the next morning hearing him (he wakes up at 4:30 every morning, that crazy guy!) quietly tiptoeing around the house finding the gifts. That night, he took me out to dinner at Cielo at the Four Seasons in downtown St. Louis. I requested fancy, and man was it fancy! Plus, the view of the city was gorgeous. So romantic!
The food was amazing. A real treat. We capped the night off by binge watching The Office on Netflix, ha ha! But really, it took us back to the days before kids so we reminisced in such a sweet way.
And speaking of sweet… these two in a rare loving embrace: 
… not to be overshadowed by this ham, who now jumps in front of the camera whenever he gets the chance.
Saturday morning we rewarded Emil’s good behavior with a new babysitter (yes, we had to reward good babysitter behavior… obviously a funny story behind that one) with a trip to the fire station! He was completely star struck. Now he really has the firefighter bug!
It was a beautiful, special weekend, and made me so look forward to more beautiful warm days. This summer is going to be amazing!
I’ve been wanting to do numerous silly little gifts for my partner as well, but I always think to do it for his birthday until I realize I need 30+ gifts, then I quit! Haha. Perhaps an anniversary thing like this is in order.
Every Father’s Day I gift Alex with the basement fridge full of his favorite beers. Its such a hit why reinvent the wheel? Though, I will admit we are TERRIBLE about celebrating our anniversary and I’m always stumped about his birthday. This Father’s Day we will be traveling back from the Bahamas *cough, cough with you* so I may just fill it ahead of time. Didn’t you used to do Father’s Day gift idea posts?
What a great idea, Maggie! I think it’s the little things that mean a lot — a fridge full of beer is a very special thing indeed! I didn’t realize that we would be traveling for Father’s Day… now I have some planning to do!
Also, yes! I will do another Father’s Day gift guide this year. They are so much fun to put together!
Jane, that’s so funny. I know, 30+ gifts may be a little much… I started to struggle with 9! Anniversaries are so much fun, though. And some of the gifts I found were very little, like chocolate truffles or a bag of his favorite coffee… it doesn’t have to be crazy, just thoughtful!
Love that gift idea. We write letters to each other, which is a nice tradition. When we were first dating we lived in different cities (pre-cell phone calling plans), so we wrote long letters to one another almost daily. We don’t write as much anymore, so it’s nice to be reminded to do so.
Dinner looks delish. And the weather this weekend was A++++
This past Christmas I started a new gift tradition that I plan to keep up. I took a photo of each girl from the previous year that seemed like they would be a favorite of his, and I commissioned paintings of them. They aren’t huge, but my hope is to do that each year with different artists (there are so many great ones in the area!) and slowly fill a portrait wall with them. I might even tackle them one year on my own! And I just remembered that I meant to feature the first ones in a post, and never did. Typical!
Happy Anniversary, babes!
I’ve been reading through your entries for the past couple of months, and can I just say that I LOVE your stories, your photos, these slices of your life that you offer up. So different from my own, so special. Thank you for this blog. You rule!
Happy 9th Anniversary!
I just started following you recently when I saw your piece about kids going barefoot.
I always loved being barefoot as much as I could, and I encouraged it with my son when he was small… he’s 17 now.
I do so enjoy your posts.
Kids are a wonder and blessing at every age.
And… I love seeing your fresh clippings of whatever is blooming, next to that beautiful mirror!
You guys just could not be any cuter. What a fun and special way to celebrate, you both look so happy. (and I thought Ruby was the only human who enjoyed waking up at 4:30am… why?!). 😉
Susan, welcome! So glad you found us here. I love that you go barefoot often. During the winter, I’m all about my shoes — boots, clogs, even heels, but in the spring and summer, the bottoms of my feet are pretty much permanently black. It’s totally worth it!
Lilly, I know! I can NOT function at that hour without feeling physically ill. But Andrew has been that way since grad school. To be fair, he is asleep by 8pm most nights, ha ha!
That is a gorgeous picture of you two!!
Thank you, Lilly and Erika!