Happy 5th Anniversary to Us!

We made it 5 years! :-)

I remember waking up on the morning of my wedding and thinking how surreal that moment was. I was laying on my mattress on the floor surrounded by moving boxes and thinking that the day was finally here where I'd say "I do" and create a new family. I only add the moving boxes bit because it was a perfect physical demonstration of how upset my life was at that moment yet how calm I was feeling - Nate had bought our house a few weeks prior and we'd both decided not to move me in until we were officially married - so I was all packed up in my old house, not yet in my new house, trying to keep wedding and honeymoon stuff separate, and it was just a chaotic (yet highly organized) mess yet I was the calm in the storm. :-) Anyhoo, I digress. There I was checking out my wedding apps and realizing that I was about to embark on an amazing journey. Now, five years later I look back and realize how much of a journey our marriage has been. There have been ups and downs but it's like I told Nate the other night...I'd rather experience all of our downs all over again so long as I was with him, rather than experience only the ups with someone else. He's my "person". When there are joys I want to tell him. When there is sadness I want to hug him. When there are even times I want to love on him and bug the heck out of him. :-) He probably thinks I'm a total sap but I cannot imagine how life would be without him. And I'm so, so thankful that he attended that random friend party years ago when we first met.

We wanted to celebrate our five year achievement but life didn't allow for a major Hawaii vacation or an Alaskan cruise as we'd kind of tossed around. Instead, we were a bit more low-key but exactly us. We dropped Abby off with her grandparents and spent a glorious weekend in Portland, alone and with no time table. Alone. No time table. I'm tellin' ya it was a slice of heaven here on Earth!

Sending Abby off for a weekend with her Grandparents with lots of hugs and kisses.

So the plan was that we would all go out together for brunch on Friday morning as a family (Nate, Abby, myself, Nate's Grandpa, and Nate's parents) then we would say our goodbyes and Nate and I would head in one direction with the others in another. Watching Abby drive away was a weird feeling. Since she's been born there have been a handful of weekends where Nate has taken her to visit his parents in Portland and I've stayed behind in the Tri-Cities (scrapbooking weekends mostly) and with Nate's work travels he's gone somewhat frequently. But the two of us being gone from her together rarely happens. In fact, in her four years of life there have been three times that she's been out of both of our company for more than a few hours and that's typically a 4pm drop off at Grandma's/Aunt Katie's house and then an 11am pick-up the next day. So a little more than 12 hours, but that's it. So facing 48 hours without her having either of us was a little scary (would she be okay?), weird (not having her around is just unusual), and exciting (just us adults - really?).

I imagine our first conversation after leaving the family was quite comical. I think we must have said "it's just us", "we can talk without interruption", "there's no place where we have to be any time soon", and "this is just so weird" over and over again on our drive to our first activity. :-) When we'd figured out that spending a weekend in Portland is what we wanted to do Nate's first request was that we go on a hike like we used to do on our drives before small child. (Almost every visit to his parents would have us taking a hike, following one of the Historic Highway roads, or seeing a sight -- it wasn't until after Abby was born and our trips became a race to see if she would nap long enough for us to arrive at the front door without fussing that we realized how much we missed those jaunts.) So our first stop was to hike Angel's Rest.

Our "We're free!" selfie at the start of the hike.

Spring is almost here. These pretty flowers were just starting to announce their arrival.

Someone is trying to get in trouble. No splashing!

Uh oh. Are those rain clouds?

We were about a third of the way up when it lightly started to rain. Being near Cascade Locks a little rain is expected. But as the rain started to downpour we rested under a tree and contemplated turning around as we weren't sure how much longer the trail to the top was (no maps! yeah, that's how we roll without kids!), the rain was actually getting more intense not less, and my jacket was not rain resistant at all. I am so, so happy that Nate convinced me to go on just a little bit further and then we could see how we were feeling. As we continued I realized just how much my life is run by a schedule. With a little one food, quiet time, preschool, etc all has to be done at certain times for our lives to run smoothly. Have breakfast late and there's cranky pants. Late to preschool and we're rude to her teacher. Skip quiet time and there goes our happy afternoon. Oh, and Abby gets a little affected as well. :-) Walking with Nate and talking about everything and nothing I realized that I'd been getting anxious about the hike earlier because I felt like we had to be someplace else. The rain didn't bother me (living in a desert climate I love, love, love the rain) but the feeling like we were taking too long, needed to be elsewhere, etc was overwhelming. It wasn't until I talked it out for a bit that I realized we could hike for hours and it wouldn't matter. So long as we were having fun with what we were doing then we were accomplishing what we should. With that realization we were making it to the top or else!

I love that we're wet, hair is soaked, but we're having So. Much. Fun!

When we made it to the top of the mountain I was blown away by how pretty the view was. And not five minutes after we were up there the sun peaked out and a rainbow appeared. Talk about a magical moment.

Our view.

I am so lucky to have this guy in my life.

And then even more awesomeness as we soon were looking at a Double Rainbow!

At the top of the mountain we opened up our celebratory Beeritas (a beer/margarita drink) and toasted our marriage and our future. Being up there was like a breath of fresh air. We'd just finished an activity that we hadn't done in (literally) years, and just being with Nate and able to focus on us for so long was something I will cherish for a long time. But alas, this was only the first stop on a weekend of fun. We made it back down the hike in hardly any time at at all (total trip was three hours with it taking us two or so to go up) and were starving. After a quick trip back to our hotel to clean up we headed out to our favorite steak house, Saylor's Country Kitchen, to have dinner All. By. Ourselves. Normally when we visit this steak house there's a bunch of people and it's kind of a zoo. So being able to easily move from one course to another (onion ring appetizers, veggies, salad, bread, steak, and finally ice cream) without keeping multiple people happy was nice. Add in a few new cocktails to try and it was a nice and happy dinner. :-)

The next morning we slept in late (well, we're parents so we both woke up super early, realized what time it was, then went back to sleep but our get out of bed time was late so it counts!) and had brunch at a new to us place, the Country Cat. The reviews mentioned getting the Cinnamon Roll but we wanted to lick the plate of Biscuits and Gravy. Mmmm. It was so yummy! And again the wait time wasn't a bother. I think we were finally starting to settle into "no kids" time management as a 20 minute wait to be seated, another 15 to get drinks, and another 20 for food was no biggie. It was just us and our conversation.

After breakfast we went to Powell's Bookstore. Now, when I told my sister what we were up to this weekend the look she gave me was so "How are you my sister?". Hee. I know it might sound a bit weird to go to a bookstore on your anniversary trip, but it was right up our alley. Nate headed off to the technical section to look for some nuclear engineering books (and found three!) and I wandered about among the Children's section, Catholic/religious section, and finally the Parenting section picking up a few books myself. After all that brain exertion we decided to get a beer for Nate and a pop for me. So that's how we found ourselves at Rogue Brewery witnessing the bartender make a Voodoo Bloody Mary. What's that you ask? It's this.

See that beer stein with the hamburger and other items on top. That's the Voodoo Bloody Mary.

A Voodoo Bloody Mary is a drink and a meal and then some for $66.66. It includes:

• Bacon Maple Vodka
• Tomato Juice
• Fresh Lemon & Lime Juice
• Seasoned & Spiced
• Garnishments:
• Dirtoir Sausage
• Kobe Blue Balls
• Bacon Maple Bar (donut)
• Celery Sticks
• Bacon-wrapped Tots
• Bacon
• Traditional Fixins

I was amazed at all that went into that item. And so were others as there was a crowd around the drink taking pictures. I was sitting at the bar so my picture taking was obviously not as noticeable. :-)

After having our fill of drinks we headed back to the hotel to get ready for dinner. I was super excited when we found out that we were able to get reservations at a Brazilian restaurant. Nate has mentioned more than once his enjoyment of their pineapple dessert and I've been wanting to taste it for a while now. Add in that I've never had Brazilian and I was looking forward to the culinary adventure. And what a wonderfully tasting adventure it was, too! There was a salad bar that included lots of different types of veggies, bread, and cheeses and then the Chefs themselves walked around with their assigned meat to offer it to you at your table. So someone would come around with a skewer of Filet Mignon and would cut off a piece at your table were you so inclined. And since the Chef themselves were the ones serving you, you could ask them all sorts of questions about their item. It was really neat. I know there was Filet Mignon, Flank Steak, another type of beef, chicken legs, pork sausages, and then combinations (bacon wrapped chicken wrapped sausage for example). They also had a super, super yummy cocktail called Caipirinha. Imagine a Mojito but without the mint. It was yummy enough that Nate and I are going to try and recreate it at home. Light and refreshing but with a nice kick to it. After dinner we headed back to our hotel and then promptly passed out. It's hard work doing what you want, when you want. :-)

The next morning we were both wanting to hold onto the last moments of anniversary celebration but were really looking forward to seeing Abby again. So we stopped off for a "quickly served" brunch and then went to Nate's parent's house to check in on Abby. I could not hold her enough when I finally did get to hug her. :-) She talked a bunch about all the fun she and the grandparents had had (baking cupcakes at midnight as the dreaded 5pm falling asleep in the car threw off her sleep cycle, shopping at Dollar Tree, and playing with the chickens among the big winners) and just loved on the two of us.

As we drove home later that day both Nate and I expressed how wonderful our weekend of us was, but how we were both glad it wasn't longer as we missed our Abby. But we also mentioned that come our 10 year anniversary Abby will be older and we might be able to leave her for a bit longer. :-)

Happy 5 years anniversary, Nate! I'm looking forward to the next five wonderful years!!!