It all started...

When Bry was in Chicago and a bouquet of chocolate-covered strawberries was delivered to our door. I had been sitting at my computer, watching as the truck pulled up and the delivery man walked by with something covered in cellophane. I thought to myself that it'd be fun if he were to knock at my door. Then he did... was he at the wrong door? What was the occasion? Our anniversary wasn't for another week or so. I glanced at the card, they were from Bryan wishing me a happy 4th anniversary. Too sweet :0) (That night he told me that they were suppose to have delivered them the following Monday--the night that we were going to celebrate our anniversary--but no worries. There's nothing wrong with getting chocolate a few days early ;0)) Apparently great minds think alike because I had bought dipping chocolate and strawberries for our anniversary. I bagged my idea and ended up saving them til Bry got home on Friday...all weekend we whittled away at them. Yum.

Instead of doing a typical getaway for our anniversary our friends (the Gublers) were SO awesome to take Brie for us (6:30 PM-11:30 AM). She was overjoyed to have a "sleepover" at Peter & Sam's house and we did a staycation at our place. (They offered to watch Alex too, but he's gotten into the habit of getting up 1 to 2x/night so we decided to keep him with us. Thankfully he went down at 6:30 and didn't get up til 1 AM!)

We had decided that it'd be fun to make dinner together so we came up with a menu, shopped for the items and spent the early part of the evening cooking and grilling. (The majority of the recipes came from Cooking Light magazines. I joked that we could have said that our meal was brought to you tonight by Cooking Light and our Weber Grill ;0)) Bry set the table and put the finishing touches on dinner while I showered and then we enjoyed a romantic candle-lit dinner, with Michael Bublé playing in the background. Throughout the evening we'd spontaneously slow dance around the house to some of our favorite songs. It was delightful.

The Menu:
(Click on the menu items to see the online Cooking Light recipes.)

Raspberry Lemonade
Black Bean Hummus with Toasted Pita
Grilled Romaine with a Creamy Herb Dressing
Grilled Corn on the Cob
Parmigiano-crumbed Zucchini
Sirloin Steak (with a homemade steak sauce)
Pina Colada Sorbet with Chocolate-dipped Cookies

The next morning we slept in as long as Alex would let us then made breakfast together. Just as Alex was ready to go down for a morning nap, breakfast was ready to be served. Perfect!

We had Smoked Gruyère Ciabatta-stuffed French Toast. It was definitely not your typical french toast, but we really liked it...shallots, gruyère and all. We'd definitely make it again for another special occasion.

After breakfast we planned, schemed, dreamed, reviewed our past year and set goals for this coming year. Four years down many more to go! Every day I feel blessed to have married Bryan. He is the perfect match for me. Je t'aime mon amour!