We're TEN!

 One cool thing about God giving you the love of your life when you're a teenager is that you're only 31 when you have your TEN year anniversary!!  We are so blessed to have been together for 12 years and still, God-willing, have so much more life ahead to share.  Chris is a standout dad, sweet husband, incredibly intelligent and shockingly well-read, excelling in his career, well respected, hilariously silly, and has more varied interests than anyone I've ever met.  I love this man. He has made me feel loved and cared for unlike anything I've ever experienced.  And a husband who is excited to take a pottery class on our anniversary?  Really?  I'm super blessed. 

 Our anniversary date was a lot of fun.  God provided a babysitter pretty late in the game (I was trying not to freak out) but she ended up being able to stay with the kids for 12 hours and give us a whole day to play!  And, she contacted me to ask if she could babysit!  After I'd asked almost everyone I know. How often does that happen?  Thanks Lindsey!

 Our first stop was the Baltimore Antiques Show at the convention center where I was offered free tickets when I went to the box office!  Score.  We'd never been to an antiques show but Chris is interested in all things historical and we're both fascinated by intricate handiwork and cool art/furniture.  We walked around for close to 2 hours and saw all kinds of crazy things from a table with 50 different porcelain ring holders to enormous Japanese screens to extremely ornate 3d scenes carved into elephant tusks. One guy tried to sell us an engagement ring which I found hilarious and ironic being our tenth anniversary :-) Random event, but fun to just be together without chasing little children and enjoy the spectacle of strangeness mixed with talent.

 Next we enjoyed a little snack at a cute cafe and then onto our pottery class!  There was one other guy in the class with us and the teacher was awesome!  I totally recommend Charlene at The Clayground in Savage Mill. She was a really good teacher and extremely patient and encouraging and laid back.  We both had a lot of fun getting dirty and spinning that wheel!  In less than two hours we had pretty good looking bowls ready for the kiln!

 

  

After a little Starbucks pick-me-up and some great, deep conversation about future plans for our family, we headed home, put Sadie to bed, and got changed into our "fancy" clothes, and left for dinner!  It made me feel better to nurse Sadie and put her to bed myself rather than worrying she'd wig out and not take a bottle (which happened for Chris' mom last week) so it worked out to make the pit stop at home.

One thing I LOVE about Facebook being so popular right now is that I can ask a question and within minutes have a ton of answers!  We've gotten great advice on what type of mattress to get, where to go with kids in Philly, and this time, a great restaurant recommendation in DC!  We went to Proof and the service and food were great!  The atmosphere was also good but the music playing left something to be desired (it sounded like I should be in the middle of a diner or bar not a classy restaurant-it just didn't jive with the decor/clientele).  I LOVE cheese so Proof's full page cheese selection was a big winner in my book.  They also brought us champagne as soon as we sat down, knowing it was our anniversary. Nice touch!  I am almost always a 1 drink person and we really wanted to order wine so the glass of wine plus the complimentary champagne made for quite the "fun" Corinne at dinner :-)

 And yes, I'm a foodie dork and took pictures of our food.  Chris had duck with sweet potato puree and pomegranate reduction and I had a nut-crusted halibut with a curry sauce and jasmine rice.  Super tasty. 

We also had the tempura fresh veggies with a truffle dipping sauce that was amazing.  We shared a caramel bread pudding with banana ice cream for dessert which was also fabulous.  Lovely meal and wonderful date.  Here's to many, many, many more anniversaries to celebrate!