If you saw THIS post yesterday, then you know yesterday, June 11th, was our one year wedding anniversary.
In true newlywed fashion, we aren't really the wealthiest people. We're poor. We're saving as much as humanly possible. So we agreed to go cheap. We agreed no gifts. We agreed no trip (we had thought about a weekend in Destin, FL.)
Just a simple anniversary. That was the agreement.
We had made plans to spend the day at the beach down at NAS Pensacola, on the beach where dogs are allowed. I mean, who doesn't love the beach? And then celebrate out to dinner.
But if you've been watching the News lately, (doesn't matter what city, apparently it's made News everywhere), we've had quite a bit of rain in Pensacola. And yesterday's forecast was proving to be just the same.
I'll admit, I was really upset. The beach was our only plan. I didn't really want to sit inside all day. It's what we do any other day of the week. And Pensacola has nothing else to offer other than the beach and restaurants.
But then I realized I should be thankful. It's no shock we're a military family. But this inevitably means that Nick and I will not always be together for our anniversary. More often than not, he'll miss more than he'll be home for. So even if we just sit on the couch and do the same thing we do everyday, I need to cherish that time. It's better than no time. As soon as I realized this reality, my sadness vanished and I just couldn't wait to spend the day with him, doing whatever it was.
About a week and a half before our anniversary, I was sleeping in the bedroom. I awoke to the doorbell and the dogs barking. When I got up, I asked Nick who it was. He said UPS, and I asked what it was. He gave him his signature grin and response of "don't worry about it." I knew it was an anniversary gift and I was upset/mad. We had agreed no gifts/no spending money. I reminded him of this but he didn't care.
Now I will admit, I was planning on giving him a gift. But I was going to MAKE my gift and stay true to tradition.
The traditional first wedding anniversary is known as the "Paper Anniversary". I had a few plans up my sleeve but all of them would cost me less than $10 or would be free because we had everything I needed. But now I felt I needed to get Nick a gift. But what? Did he get me something expensive? How much should I spend? I don't want to look like an ass and be given a super nice, expensive gift and give him something that cost a whole $5. But I also didn't want to spend a lot and his gift end up being simple and very inexpensive and then cause a fight for spending too much. Talk about a dilemma!
I decided to just stay with my original plan. It was Nick's fault for going against our agreement anyway.
So now we get to the actual day of our anniversary.
We woke up and lounged around in bed for a long time. It was nice to just lay there in his arms. Not a care in the world. (this was, however, after he got back from work and climbed back in bed after a canceled flight).
Then we got up and just lounged around in the living room, watching television.
That afternoon we decided to exchange gifts.
First we opened each others' cards.
Sticking with the paper theme, in Nick's card was a 7-page typed Love Letter =)
Then he opened his gift first.
Nick absolutely LOVES puzzles! He also likes to frame them once they are finished. I decided to make a puzzle out of one of our wedding photos. I didn't necessarily want a puzzle framed in our living room, but our office (and one day, our basement) is St. Louis Cardinals themed. So I chose a wedding photo of us and our entire wedding party in front of Busch Stadium. This way, we can frame it, put it in the office, and it will fit perfectly! (We already have a framed puzzle of Busch Stadium in there). Nick loved the puzzle and I was super happy. AND it was sticking to the "Paper Anniversary" tradition =)
Then it was my turn and Nick gave me the most amazing gift ever. It's safe to say his gift was a million times better than mine.
This is a photo of the night sky on our wedding night!!!!!! How amazing is that?! It's beautiful!
Nick personalized it and under the picture it says:
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Our Wedding Night Sky Saturday, June 11, 2011 - The wonderful beginning to our happily ever after. |
The picture shows the moon, stars, and planets all on that night. It also came with a starmap.
The starmap names the major stars and constellations. There is a red line that arcs across the starmap marking the ecliptic. This is the path the sun, moon, and planets follow as they travel across the sky. The constellations of the zodiac are found along the ecliptic as well.
It is an absolutely perfect gift, not to mention a fantastic first anniversary gift. It's paper, it's personal, it's unique, and it's sentimental. Nicholas knows me too well! I cannot wait until we go to Hobby Lobby to buy a frame and hang it!
(If you want to steal this idea, and I think you should, Nick used Indigo Night....click HERE to go to the website.)
Then I told Nick about another....uh, gift?...project?...I wanted to do together. We're going to buy a scrapbook and start an "Anniversary Scrapbook". For each anniversary, we will document how we celebrated, complete with the story, pictures, and any momentos from that day. Along with that, we will also include "Today in History" type facts, such as the headlines from that day. We'll include the weather, our location (since we'll be moving so much with the military), the gas price, etc. We brainstormed a lot of things we want to add to it. We think it will be great to look back on, especially 10+ years from now, to see how much we have changed, times have changed, etc. I cannot wait to start this together!
While exchanging gifts, we realized there was a lull in the weather and the sun had actually come out! I found a fun idea on Pinterest that Nick and I both wanted to do while at the beach but figured we'd have to transition the idea to dinner that night because of all the rain.
The idea is take a picture of us holding one of our wedding photos. And each year on our anniversary, take a photo of us holding the previous years photo.
But we took full advantage of this break in weather so Nick called up his friend (HUGE thank you to CK...and to Mother Nature for providing this break for us to make this possible). We wanted to take our picture at a specific beach. It's a beach that holds quite a bit of meaning for us (the first beach we visited here, where Nick took me to watch the sunrise, etc) and it just happened to be down the street from CK. So we picked him up, headed to the beach, and snapped a few photos of us. (and by a few I mean like 50! Thank you!!!...I just copied the first and last photo on the memory card for this blog lol)
After we dropped CK back off at his house, we went out to dinner. Now, Nick and I are not the classiest of people. Okay, it's not that we aren't classy. We do like to get really dressed up and go out to nice dinners...on occasion. But the reality is that we're simple people with simple pallets. We love pizza and burgers and just typical "bar" type food. I have never been to Mellow Mushroom and Nick has been wanting to take me there for quite some time. My little belly had been craving pizza so I asked if that's where we could go out to eat. Sure, not very fancy for a First Anniversary but it's what we wanted, and this day is about US!
We returned home that evening and decided to put the puzzle together. With both of us, it took about an hour to put together! Now we just need to frame it!
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| (look at that face of concentration!) |
Then we continued to celebrate. We received a bottle of champagne from Nick's "uncle" at our engagement party (back in December 2009). We had been saving it for a special occasion and this night seemed perfect. We broke out our engraved Mikasa (LOVE Mikasa...collecting all of their barware) champagne flutes and poured some champagne, cut our beyond delicious chocolate cake we bought for our anniversary and indulged!
We then cuddled up on the couch with our champagne, cake, and watched our entire Wedding dvd =)
I am sooooo happy we decided to get a videographer. Having photos is amazing but also seeing our wedding in action is amazing. To hear each other saying our vows was so moving. I was brought to tears a few times throughout the video (thank goodness Nick didn't notice because he would have been sure to laugh at me...heartless man). It was amazing to relive the most amazing day of my life. And then to laugh and laugh at the most amazingly fun party ever! (I might be biased but I've lost track of how many people told us they absolutely LOVED our reception and said it was the most fun one they had ever been to).
I could not have asked for a better First Wedding Anniversary. It went much better than I thought and I'm happy we've started two "traditions" of taking the photo and adding to our Anniversary Scrapbook each year. I am beyond blessed and cannot wait to see what all the years ahead will hold and how we will celebrate each anniversary in the years to come.
Thank you to our wonderful Parents, Grandparents, Aunts/Uncles/Cousins and friends that sent cards in the mail, emailed, text, and called to wish us a Happy Anniversary. I hope you all know we love you dearly and our relationship and marriage would not be as great as it is without your love and support behind us, not just this past year, but in the entire 5 years we've been together. Thank you!!!
Nicholas, I Love You!
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