8 Years

8 years ago today, Keith and I got married. Finally.

We dated for 4 and a half years before the big day. We're so spontaneous, I'm surprised it hasn't come back to haunt us.

We did things a little different for our wedding day than the usual. Mostly due to the fact that we didn't have a wedding reception. My dad's church at the time did not have a good facility for receptions. 2 years prior to our wedding, my sister got married at the same church and had her reception in their Fellowship Hall. It was a madhouse. The FH at the time was extremely small for such a large church. I was her maid of honor and I never even made it inside the FH much less got a piece of cake at her reception, so I really didn't relish the thought of such chaos for our wedding. And for those of you who know Keith, he's not a big fan of the crowds. (A few years later, that church built a nice, big building with a gym, classrooms, a fancy kitchen and an events room. My brother had his wedding reception there and it was very nice and plenty big.)

Instead we invited all of our family who was in town the night before, to attend our rehearsal dinner (along with the wedding party, of course). So we had a mini-reception the night before our wedding. We had a tiered cake and everything. It was much more low-key and no chaos.

On our wedding day, I picked Keith up from my sister's house and brought him to my parents' for breakfast. (Yes we broke tradition by seeing each other before the wedding.) Then I had to finish packing up all my stuff at my parents' and we loaded it up into Keith's truck. His parents were going to take my things to our apartment while we were on our honeymoon. At some point during that morning, the doorbell rings. I happened to be the closest to the front door so I answered it. It was 2 Jehovah's Witnesses. Once I explained to them that I was getting married that day (I hope they know I was telling the truth and not just throwing excuses at them so they would leave) they talked about how long they had been married, wished us a good marriage, and left.

The perk to being a PK is that when you get married at your dad's church, you get to use his office to get ready for your wedding. Rather than the random SS room or bathroom. For months after our wedding, my wedding dress hung in a closet in his office until I finally took it home. I'm sure he enjoyed looking at it for all that time.

I wish I could recall specific details from the day, but I really can't. I do remember that someone went and got McDonald's at some point for a few people to eat, but I don't think I ate anything. Our wedding was at 2, but I was at the church from 10:30am until after the ceremony.

My dad walked me down the aisle and gave me away. My grandpa (who is also a pastor and was a missionary) did the "Who gives this woman" part and then prayed. For some reason, he got all choked up during his prayer, so I had to let myself drift off to other thoughts in order to avoid getting snotty-nosed and teary-eyed.

My dad performed the actual ceremony and he is the king of the short weddings. Praise the Lord. During the Unity Candle portion, I deliberately chose to have an instrumental piece played in order to avoid standing there, awkwardly, while someone sang the longest song ever and the only thing to do was stand there and stare at Keith. I love Keith and I love staring at him, but not in front of a church full of people. I would have been doubled over laughing (because that's my go-to move when I feel nervous or stressed) if we had to stand that way for very long, so thankfully the pianist faded the song out once we stood there for 30 seconds or so.

And then it was all over. We had a receiving line. Took pictures. Changed clothes. Said good-bye. And left for Florida. I think we were on the road by 4:30pm.

We don't really have any big plans for our anniversary this year. We recently had a sprinkler system installed in our yard along with having our landscaping redone, so we've considered that our "trip to Hawaii". In a couple of years, I hope we'll be able to go someplace fun for our 10th.

Good Eatin'

I read my friend Steve's blog yesterday where he was talking about eating at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse. This got me to thinking about the first (and only) time that I've eaten at this restaurant.

Back in June, Keith and I celebrated our 5th anniversary. Over the past 5 years we haven't really done anything special to celebrate our anniversary, but we thought this was an important one so we decided to go to San Antonio for a couple of days. This was my first time leaving Garrett overnight and I was so ready to get to sleep in for once in the past 2 years! We went to San Antonio and stayed in a nice hotel. When we first got there, the SA Spurs were having a parade down the river in celebration for their NBA championship. It was a little chaotic downtown, but neat to get to see the actual parade from our window.

On our last night in town (we did all the typical tourist stuff while there, Alamo, riverboat tour, mall, etc) we decided we wanted to eat at a really nice place. Keith had been to Ruth's Chris Steakhouse in Chicago, and maybe another city like New York?, and really enjoyed it, so he wanted us to go there while we had the chance. We saw the address where it was located and figured it wasn't but a few blocks past the mall, which was where we had been walking to every day. We figured we could handle that walk and got started. Now, first thing is that this is the month of June, in San Antonio, Texas. At 5:00 pm. It was hot and humid outside. By the time we were halfway to the mall, we're both sweating. Because Ruth's Chris is a nice restaurant, I had called to check on their dress code and learned that I would be fine wearing nice capris. So I ironed mine and Keith's clothes and tried to make us look as nice as possible with what we had brought. By this point in our walking, all of that effort had gone down the drain. I'm sure we looked like someone had thrown us in the pool with our clothes on. Once we got past the mall, we looked ahead a few blocks and see the interstate! Not only is it the interstate, but it also doesn't have sidewalks running underneath it. We cannot see Ruth's Chris on this side, so we assumed it's on the other side of the interstate. Now, we have two options, one, we can hike under the interstate probably walking alongside some homeless people and will be mistaken as one ourselves since we look awful by now, or two, we can get a cab to drive us like 3 blocks. We got a cab. Keith is very familiar with the cab routine, but this was my first cab ride. Thankfully he had the a/c going full blast so we were able to dry ourselves off and fix up as best as possible before arriving at the restaurant. When we walk inside Ruth's Chris, the hostess of course had seen us arrive in a cab. She asks us where we're staying and after we told her the name of the hotel, she says, "Oh, we have a free shuttle that takes our customers to and from the downtown hotels. Be sure to let your waiter know when you're finished with your meal and the shuttle will take you back." Boy, didn't we feel dumb! We could have saved ourselves permenant sweat stains on our clothing had we asked about a shuttle, but who knew? Live and learn.

Seeing as how we arrived at the restaurant around 5:00, we were two of the few people there. I'm sure they thought we were senior citizens in young peoples' bodies, but we were hungry. The food was excellent and the service was outstanding! It is definitely not the place to go for a cheap dinner, but you will get your money's worth. Keith and I both had salads for an appetizer, delicious steaks for the main course along with several side dishes that were outstanding, and then it was followed up with dessert. They also brought us a small loaf of bread while we were waiting for our salads. I cut off slices for the two of us and while we were eating them, the waiter comes over and replaces our loaf with a new one! On the one hand that is so wasteful! I hope someone took that loaf home and ate it because it was good. On the other hand, it's always nice to be treated as if you're someone super important. We would take a sip of our drinks and someone would immediately come to our table to refill them. Impeccible service, most definitely! The final bill wasn't too bad considering how excellent the whole experience was. We paid a little over $100 for everything including a (very generous) tip. Of course that could have been their early bird special. I am definitely ready to go back for more of that great food!