Day 150: Our Valentine’s Date

On Saturday, I took you whale watching by helicopter for our date. (What’s up now, Ben Flajnik?) This was the first time we’d been on a date since the baby was born in August and the second time we’d been out alone! It blessed us so much and renewed our relationship.

Before we left, I watched the girls so you could get ready. When you were done, you came downstairs looking stunning in the dress I bought you. I’m honored to be married to you–a woman incredibly beautiful in body and soul.

At 11, your mom and sisters arrived, having graciously agreed to watch our three girls so we could gallivant around (and above) the countryside. After kissing our girls goodbye, we left on our date. First, we stopped by Trader Joe’s so I could buy you a single, red rose (the purpose of which is explained below). Then we went to Joe’s Crab Shack in Ventura for lunch:

The view from Joe's Crab Shack

Our appetizer, with you so nicely modeling proper dipping procedure.

Our gargantuan entrees, along with your rose

You ate there a decade or so ago with some friends and you’ve asked me to take you back since we’ve known each other. It’s about time I listened to you.

After our amazing lunch, we drove to the airport in Oxnard where we hopped on a helicopter for our tour. Initially, I planned on taking you on the most basic tour (as our budget allowed) over the beach, but our generous tour guide upgraded us to the whale watching tour for nearly the same price! We were both unbelievably excited: I’d never seen whales in the wild before and neither of us had been on a helicopter.

Before we took off, you thought you might be terrified of the flight. But you ended up being more excited than scared, in spite of your death grip on my hand (which still hurts, thank you). When we got out over the ocean, we sighted at least six humpback whales. Here are a couple:

The flight was beautiful and meaningful. I’ll never forget it:

As for the rose, in the spirit of The Bachelor, I intended to give it to you if you impressed me on the date. 😉 As you know, if a girl on The Bachelor is denied a rose on a one-on-one date, she takes a limo home. And the bachelor might send someone home for any reason. This one’s too emotional. Limo ride home. That one lives in Houston. Limo ride home. This one’s plain annoying. Limo ride home, limo ride home, lonely limo ride home. I’m not saying I blame the guy–he has to narrow down his options somehow (though I might blame him for going on the show in the first place).

But what about you? Did you get the rose? Or did I send you on a lonely minivan limo ride home? Well . . . [CUE SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] you got the rose. And, you’ll always get a rose. For better or worse, as long as I live, you’ll never ride that limo alone. (Give me grace for that, O God!)

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Day 149: Your Valentine’s Rose

My act of love for Friday will happen today–I’m getting you a single stem rose for our date.

Yesterday, I took our oldest daughter on her Valentine’s date. We went to Starbucks, ordered some drinks, then sat and talked and played games. I even gave her a Valentine’s card in which I asked her to be my Valentine. She blushed and said, “Yes,” with the cutest grin on her face. That’s one date down. After yours, I only have one more to go (the littlest is too young for a date, though our daughters insist that I take her on one).

Day 147: Your Valentine’s Dress

Yesterday you received a dress from Amazon that I secretly ordered for you for Saturday’s Valentine’s date. I was curious to see your reaction because you almost never like the clothes I pick for you. You opened the package, pulled out the dress, and shrieked with delight. So far, so good. But—and this unnerved me—you smiled nervously when you tried it on. “Do you like it?” I asked. “Yeah,” you replied hesitantly. “Oh, man. I wonder if Amazon does returns,” I thought. “Tell me the truth. Do you like it?” “No.” So, we sent the dress back having found that Amazon does returns and ordered the dress of your choosing with two-day shipping (thanks, Amazon Prime!). Here’s the one you chose:

I’m not putting up a picture of the dress I originally bought in case it’s truly hideous.

Ideally, I wanted to surprise you by showing you the original dress for the first time on Saturday. But that seemed too risky: I knew that you’d wear the dress whether you liked it or not if I gave it to you then. And I didn’t want that. Oh, well. The date’s still going to be great!

Day 139: Valentine’s Day

Our Valentine’s Day was pretty laid back because we decided to postpone our official Valentine’s date until the 25^th. That was the only day your parents could watch our kids.

On Valentine’s morning, you made us bacon and pink, heart-shaped pancakes. You set out roses for each of our girls and candy at each of our pink, heart-shaped plates. Thanks for going through the trouble to make us that breakfast. We all felt pretty special.

As for me, I kept things simple. I gave you a dozen roses and a pound of See’s chocolate truffles, then I wished you a happy Valentine’s Day a bunch of times throughout the day and gave you several hugs. I may have kept things a little too simple, though, because you seemed surprised (disappointed?) that I didn’t do more. Perhaps 365’s got you spoiled.

I have one more thing to say about my desires/intentions for this blog, then I think I’ve pretty much exhausted that topic. When you find out about this blog, I don’t want you to feel any obligation to reciprocate. If you want to, that’s fine with me, but that’s not one of my purposes for doing this blog. I simply want 365 and each of my loving acts to be my free gift to you, no strings attached.