Eleven

Today, Beau and I celebrate eleven years of marriage.  Eleven years.  Yesterday, on my last day of summer without the kids at home, we declared it a day date.  We golfed 18 holes together on a hot afternoon, cruised our little golf cart around the greens, and laughed at our pretty terrible skills.  We both used the pitching wedge so much that we started asking for it in British-esque accents, a trait that made me smile because random voices seems to be our thing.  After we picked up the kids, Brenda came to hang with the kids and we got all fancied up.  We ate Italian nachos and Chicken Marsala at Figaro Figaro, walked our pretty Main Street, picked up some fancy chocolates at Stam, and ended the night outside at State Street Brewing, where Beau beat me at Scrabble for the millionth time, and we played Twenty Questions until 10:00 hit and we decided it was late enough to go home.  We both declared it was one of our most fun date nights we've had in a while, that board games at bars are brilliant and performance singing at restaurants isn't really our thing.  

There isn't a whole lot to say other than I'm thankful for another year with my best friend.  When I think back to eleven years ago, we were so young, so in love, and so clueless of what we were getting into!  But I'm proud of how much we've learned and how far we've come in that first decade!  We've learned to work as a team, communicate through the struggles, and give and take when we're called.  We've leaned on each other, brought the best out in each other, and learned to work hard and celebrate the little things well.  I love Beau more every day and am blessed by who he is and how much he loves me and our family.

I'm usually the one with all the words, but this morning, I found a letter in the bathroom sink he must have written before bed.  And he took all my words.  I don't think he'd mind me putting a little of them here:

"Anniversaries are just another marker in another year.  Just another day to wake up next to the same person.  Unless, of course, you get to wake up next to the person you love, and that person is a little better every day, and that inspires you to be a better person...

Then anniversaries are a celebration.  And I will never have enough celebrations of us."  

That's it.  Celebrating love and the life we get to live together.  Celebrating the journey, the dreams, all that was, and all that is to come.  I pray for another decade, and then another sixty.  Then we'll get our picture on The Today Show and our kids will throw us a card party. :)

Happy Anniversary, babe.  I love you!