Celebrating One Year of Marriage

We had a lovely anniversary yesterday. We stayed at home and worked on house stuff for most of the day, and then went out to celebrate in the evening.

Obligatory anniversary photo...

We had dinner at a lovely seafood restaurant on Lake Houston. Delicious shrimp and catfish and hush puppies, and a beautiful sunset view!

This is the restaurant...

This is the view from our table (we sat inside because it was just SO hot - tomorrow's high is 108* F!)

The restaurant has a little pier to walk out on...

This is proof of just how bad the drought is here in Texas - that boat slip is supposed to be able to lower the boat into the water, but the water's nowhere near up to the boat!

There are few things as beautiful as a sunset over a lake...

We stopped by Culver's on a whim on the way home to grab some frozen custard (yum!):

Flavor of the Day: Chocolate-covered strawberry!

As for gifts, I gave Jeff this arrangement of annual photos from our years together:

The photos start in 2005 (when we were "just friends") and go through today. We actually knew each other in 2004 (and a little in 2003), but we didn't take any photos together until 2005.

Here's a close-up of each photo:

At a high school dance in 2005

At my Senior Homecoming in 2006

My high school graduation in 2007

At a sorority party in 2008

The night of our engagement in 2009

Our wedding in 2010

With our new house in 2011

I just bought a bunch of 4x6 frames, cut matching scrapbook papers to 4x6 inches, then made the borders and year markers out of white cardstock and cut the photos to fit. I included a few blank ones for the next fews years (two of which are hanging to balance out the rows and columns). We hung them in our bathroom next to our closet, and I think they'll make us smile in the mornings.

Because the traditional first anniversary gift is paper (and because I totally didn't even realize that those frames already included PAPER... duh), I got an extra paper gift - tickets to a behind-the-scenes tour of the Houston Astros' stadium, Minute Maid Park! Since the Astros never win anymore (and are trying their hardest to trade all of our good players to ensure that they never win again...), I thought that would be more fun than tickets to another game. We get to see the dugout, the press boxes, the luxury suites, etc. I'm excited!

Jeff gets bonus points for doing research beyond the traditional anniversary gifts and finding out that the traditional first anniversary gemstone is freshwater pearls. Look what I got!!

Pretty!

We had a wonderful first anniversary... I can't wait to see what the years ahead bring!