anniversary weekend!
We celebrated ONE WHOLE YEAR yesterday and as I posted on twitter- if I'd known anniversaries were so much like birthdays (you DO know I love birthdays, of course), I would have gotten married younger. Not really, I think the Lord's timing was perfect and I really enjoyed my single years, but it was a SUPER fun weekend. Thanks to friends and family who celebrated from afar with us! I know 1 year is merely a milestone before many more, but we still made it special.
R drove us down to the home of my Alma Mater- Gainesville, FL. On our way home to Indian Shores, FL from ATL in the past, I've required a stop-over for sushi or Satchel's, but it's hard to enjoy the subtle delights of a town like Gainesville without investing a little more time. So fortunately for us we had dear friends to stay with- unfortunately they were out of town for the weekend! That did free us up to roam the city and laze around a bit more than we probably would have.
Friday night I introduced R to Pokey Sticks which accounted for 12 of my "freshmen 15". They're basically greesey cheese sticks sold by Gumby's pizza (I would never eat their pizza). I am so glad my eating habits have changed but loved sharing some pokey sticks!
Saturday we woke up to... CABLE TV! ESPN GAMEDAY!! PIONEER WOMAN ON FOOD NETWORK!!! For a moment I wished we had cable, but then I realized it wouldn't be nearly as much of a treat to watch it when we are away if we did have cable. Not to mention not paying a cable bill every month allows us a few extra trips like this.
So we lounged in PJs for most of the morning before heading downtown to check out Volta Coffee- what I will deem the quintessential college coffee shop- complete with flyers for the approaching International Socialist Org's meetings & incredible espresso.
We called this our "pre-game", sitting downtown drinking espresso and reading for a few hours. I enjoyed feeding my introverted side before joining 90,000 of my closest friends at a little stadium known as the Swamp.
Me at Volta- Skeptical of Socialists and Solo shots.
Before heading to the game we grabbed paninis and gelato at a great place called Gelato Company. The wonderful and yet frustrating thing about college towns is that as the students come and go so do the eateries. Most of my favorites from 2000-03 have vanished (Cafe Gardens, 3rd Place Pub & Grille, etc.) but they have been replaced by the new favorites.
Then we headed to campus with a couple hours to spare before game time- I knew R would have lots of people watching to do, being from a small college without NCAA football. The Swamp was just as I remembered it with a couple more National Championship & Heisman trophy banners to boot. The Gators looked good for their first game with a new coach but it's a loooong season.
He even did the chomp! Yes-we were on the top row.
Sunday we overslept and missed church, but enjoyed brunch with some old friends at the Top. I think as a morning person, brunch might be one of my favorite things in life. We then hit the road and headed back to ATL.
Oh but there's more! One of the brilliant things about being married on labor day weekend is that your anniversary falls on...wait for it... labor day weekend! R had pricelined a room in ATL at a secret-to-me hotel. It was perfect and just steps away from Ecco which as it turned out was concluding their own Restaurant Week by offering a reasonably priced 3-course meal. Monday morning we indulged in an hour or 2 of HGTV househunters and made our way home (10 minute drive was great!)
We celebrated our actual anniversary (yesterday) by cashing in on Labor Day sales and purchasing a coffee table. We then made our own roasted asparagus, sweet potatoes and NY Strip Steak. Along with talking through some good and hard memories of the last year. Promise I'll do a 1st year of marriage post with what I think I may have learned and not just a series of restaurant names in places you may never visit.
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