Half-iversay

Today marks 18 months since our wedding day, 2 years since the day we got engaged, and just over 11 1/2 years since our first date! On March 23, we celebrate our anniversary, and on September 23, our half-iversary. I am nothing if not the queen of made up holidays (birthdaykkah!), so no one should be surprised by this.

Last night, we went to one of our favorite restaurants in Norfolk that we rarely go to, Todd Jurich's. They do a lot of creative dishes (last night Harris had goat curry!), and everything is always amazing! We celebrated our recent news with a little bubbly (Prosecco for Harris, and sparkling water for me!), Harris gave me a beautiful sterling silver fleur de lis necklace that he had made by a local jeweler, and we reflected on the past year and a half, and talked about the excitement we have for our future. It was just a really nice moment in time to remember to celebrate all the good, and be thankful for all that we are fortunate enough to be blessed with.

I am so incredibly lucky to have spent the last 11 years, 6 months, and 2 days with this amazing man. It's incredible that I always think I couldn't possibly love him more, and find that I somehow fall more in love with him with each passing day. It is so important to us, as we prepare to bring new life into our family, to keep our marriage as the cornerstone of our family. Celebrating our relationship with both these big and little moments is something that I hope we continue to do for the rest of our lives.

I love you, Harris. Thank you for being my husband, my best friend, the love of my life, and the father of my children. Thank you for all the moments we have shared thus far, and for all the ones to come.

Anniversary Weekend!

Sunday, Harris and I celebrated one year of marriage! While it seems absolutely crazy that already a year has passed since we exchanged vows in beautiful Playa Mujeres, it is even crazier to think that this past Friday was the 11th anniversary of our first date! To top it off, we also got some really exciting news on Friday - Harris got a promotion! Now, I know, I know, he just got a promotion a few months ago, but, some changes happened a bit unexpectedly, and he will be moving into a new role, leading a new team with some pretty high-profile business. I am so proud of him, and I know he will do such a great job! It was a weekend of celebration, indeed!

Friday evening we met up with our friends Clay & Whitley and a few other people to try out Vintage Tavern in Suffolk since it was restaurant week. We had such a blast with everyone, and, the food was pretty great too. It had some room for improvement (felt like the pureed butter bean soup - yes, butter bean soup! - was a little salty, among a few small other things), but I would definitely want to go back! Their cheese plate was one of the best I have had in this area, and the creme brulee was ah-mazing!

I was reminded during our jaunt over to Suffolk how much I really enjoy city living. While it was nice to see the wide open spaces (Suffolk is a little bit country, folks), I really do enjoy having most things within walking distance of our condo. I guess it is a give and take, though - we get to have the convenience of having our favorite restaurants, the movies, the mall, and so on, literally, right outside our front door, but we forsake things like a yard and a grill, and space between us and our neighbors. While those latter things are definitely nice, I think we really enjoy the convenience so much more than we would those other things. Plus, without having a commute for Harris, we get to see each other loads more than we would if we were living out in Virginia Beach, or one of the other burbs. Perk!

After hanging with the friends Friday night, we decided to spend Saturday doing things in Norfolk we hadn't done yet, which mostly involved spending a gloriously sunny day flitting in and out of various shops and stores, and walking streets in the Ghent neighborhood. We popped into one of the local bakeries over there and shared the most delicious slice of cake - it was banana, chocolate, something or other, and I swear it was like the best parts of a chocolate cake mated with the best parts of a banana pudding and made this perfect little cake for our enjoyment. Now, of course Harris didn't know this at the time, but we ended up eating a lot of cake over the weekend! Since we couldn't bring back the top tier of our wedding cake from Mexico last year, I had a local bakery recreate it for us to enjoy! While it wasn't quite as delectable as the original, it was still a darn good cake!

Now, I don't know if you know this or not, but the first year anniversary present is, traditionally, supposed to be paper. I don't know why, but I have always wanted to find some creative way to honor this tradition, and, because of this, have had Harris' anniversary present planned for months! I decided to get us Sunday season tickets to the Norfolk Tides baseball games! I knew he would love it because 1. he loves baseball, and 2. it would be a fun activity for us to do together. There are 11 Sunday games, plus we get vouchers for 2 more games. This seemed much more reasonable than the 72-game full-season tickets! I mean, seriously, that is a commitment! As expected, he loved his gift. Now, for my anniversary present...we are still in suspense over here! With the whole Lucy situation that has been going on lately, we decided to postpone making any serious plans for our anniversary, but, unbeknownst to me, the hubs already has some surprise trip planned, and apparently my gift shall not be given till that time...I love it! He did, however, get me a few little things over the weekend, because he is just nice like that!

Our actual anniversary day was a rainy, yucky, cold mess of a day. So, it was the perfect day for laying in bed, watching our wedding video, snuggling, watching tv, and ordering takeout! No complaints from Team Ligon on that one.

This week has already gotten off with a bang. Yesterday morning, bright and early, Harris took off for a business trip to Mexico! He will be back on Thursday, and Lucy and I miss him desperately, but know he is having a blast. I am writing up a storm, which is great, and I am getting so many things checked off my to-do list. Lucy had a recheck with the ophthalmologist  this morning - her graft is completely healed, but she has had a bit of retinal degeneration because of all the inflammation in her eye. But, we will keep giving drops for the next couple months, and hoping for the best! Overall, she is really doing great, though! I also gave her a totally botched homemade haircut the other day / finished up and gave her a bath today. She looks ridiculous, but I am a nervous Nellie about sending her to the groomers right now, and she needed a little help (although, I am not sure if I helped or hurt, but whatever). She was actually pretty good about the whole thing (and dangit, I just remembered I never gave her a treat when I finished! This is why she is poorly trained - all my fault!), but she probably does hate me a little more than usual now. Ah well.

Off to do some more writing, and try to not let this cold gloominess take over my soul. And by take over my soul I mean coerce me into taking a nap.

Taking Care of Lucy

Well, as someone who officially works from home 100% of the time nowadays, and does not have to travel, and writes for the livelihood of their family, I have been complete rubbish at actually writing on the blog! Since my last update, things have been hectic and a little bit crazy in the old Ligon household.

You might remember me mentioning the Lucy-pup having a corneal ulcer in my last post. Well, the morning after writing that post, we had a recheck with our regular vet. Dr. C took one look at Lucy's eye and said that she was going to go give an animal ophthalmologist a call. The ophthalmologist wanted us to bring her in right away, so off we went to the eye doctor. Upon examining Lucy's eye with special opthalmology equipment, it was determined that the original ulcer had gotten infected and had eaten away 99% of Lucy's cornea (where the ulcer was located). The doc said that while this condition can be treated medically, given Lucy's aversion to eye drops (which he couldn't blame her for because he said she was in a lot of pain..very sad face), and the fact that there was such a microscopic level of cornea remaining, surgery would be the best option. The surgery would create a corneal graft (taking tissue from her conjunctiva and placing it over the ulcer), which would, obviously close help heal the ulcer, as well as bring blood supply to the area, meaning we could give her both oral medication and eye drops. Long story short, we had surgery the next day and have spent the past two weeks in and out of the ER, vet's office, and opthalmology office - hence my absence. Fortunately, though, our little pup is healing very well! We had a 2-week recheck earlier today, and we are definitely up on the upward trend of things! Needless to say, it was a very stressful and scary time for us with her, and we hated seeing her in pain. Luckily, we pulled through well, are no longer functioning in a sleep-deprived stupor, and Lucy's spirits are wonderful!

Other than the Lucy saga, everything else has been going relatively smoothly! The new career-situation has been more wonderful than I could have imagined! It is so nice to have complete control over my schedule, time, so on and so forth! As I told Lynda (my old boss/friend, who is now just a dear friend!), if I needed one more reason to be grateful for this opportunity, I got it in Lucy's surgery - with my old job, I was supposed to be in San Diego the week everything went down, and would, of course, be facing the pressures of customers and travel and all of that. This move has been more of a blessing than I ever could have realized, and I am so thankful for that. In addition to getting to write loads of fun things, I am also taking on some editorial management of certain pieces, which has been great for that organizational piece of my brain / personality!

Harris is still working incredibly hard, but, thankfully, things seem to have calmed down to a dull roar, for the moment, at least! We have really worked as such a team the past couple weeks, and I am so thankful for all of his support and effort on top of everything he has to do at work. Totally gushing, but I am okay with that :)

I can't believe our one-year anniversary is in 11 days! It is crazy to think that a year has already flown by, but it has been a really, really great year, and I am so lucky to have that man by  my side every day. We are going to postpone any potential big anniversary plans until we have Lu at 100%, but I am just excited to celebrate our first year as husband and wife!

Now, it is time for me to go finish up dinner (we're having Thai Red Curry Lentils!) before the hubs gets home!

Weekend Recap: Tuesday Edition

Well, since yesterday's post was a special one, I decided to reserve the little weekend update for today. It was quite the epic weekend for us, so I didn't dare not share! As you may recall, I shared last week that Harris had made a hair appointment for me, and that I was contemplating some major (for me) changes in the hair department. I did, in fact, make some changes - I got bangs cut and ombred my hair!

In addition to the hair appointment, Harris also scheduled a mani/pedi for me - isn't he the best? It was so nice to get a little pampering and a new look. At any rate, the pampering was brought on as part of a grand scheme of Harris' to celebrate our 6 month wedding anniversary. After the pampering session, I came home to find these beautiful autumn flowers all over the house:

Harris then surprised me with dinner at this one restaurant called Todd Jurich's Bistro that we have been waiting to try. It was absolutely incredible! Everything we had was amazing! We started with a pork and shrimp spring roll (delicious!) then had a pumpkin and crab soup (omg!) then Caesar salad (somehow this was the best Caesar I have ever had!), and finally our entrees - filet with some kind of polenta and spinach for Harris and scallops over squash risotto for me (I can't even). I am so glad we finally tried this little gem (and learned they have some great happy hour specials). As wonderful as our dinner was, Harris was not quite done with the surprises. After our delicious meal, Harris and I strolled through downtown - our destination unbeknownst to me - until we arrived at the Virginia Stage Company! I hadn't really paid attention as we were walking past, so it wasn't until we got inside, and they had a basket of flowers with a card "for your own Daisy" that I realized we were going to see The Great Gatsby! Not only that, but it was also opening night and we had a private box! It was amazing! The set, the characters, everything was just so well done. My sweet hubs knows me so well, and I am so thankful for his thoughtfulness in planning such a wonderful evening!

Blurry shot of the set

Somewhat dark pic of the hubs in our box!

Afterwards - the bangs went up fast.

Saturday we had big plans to go to the Citadel alumni tailgate and then the Citadel vs. ODU football game! We met up with Harris' friend Clay (another Citadel grad), and his parents (his Dad being yet another Citadel grad) and had a great time at the tailgate where I was so hungry I had a BBQ sandwich with baked beans and coleslaw. If you know me at all, you know this really is a big deal because 1. BBQ is not my favorite food in the world (although I do like pulled pork a good deal, so this is probably a moot point after all), 2. I do not like baked beans, and 3. I do not like coleslaw, so there it is. Big deal. After the tailgate, we headed over to the game where we had a blast sitting in the Citadel section. 

I will say about the Citadel alum they are proud (as they should be) and they are intense football fans! The game was crazy! I have never seen a college football team pull the kind of antics that ODU pulled the other night. No disrespect or anything, but I think they knew their defense wasn't up to snuff, so they wouldn't give us back the ball, and still they only ended up winning 59-58. It was intense up until the last play, and it was so much fun! On the way home, we stopped for milkshakes at cookout and I finally, after 6 years, tried a milkshake that did not end in cheesecake (you know chocolate chip cheesecake, blueberry cheesecake, and so on). It was delightful.

Sunday morning, Lucy woke me up entirely too early, and I was a bit grumpy with her for a good 10 minutes, but then I got over it. After hitting up the grocery store, Harris and I prepared our usual Sunday fare of homemade pizzas (him being responsible for the yummy sauce, and me being responsible for crusts), and then watched football games and monitored our fantasy scores. We also managed to squeeze in a late-afternoon nap, which made me quite happy.

As you can see, it was a wonderful weekend! We are so thankful for these times, and feel so blessed to be living in such a great place that gives us these fun opportunities. Keep it up, Norfolk, we approve!

Special Moments

Today is a special day for us Ligons. 10 years, 6 months, and 2 days ago, we had our very first date. 1 year ago today, Harris proposed. 6 months today ago we got married!

I wish I had a snapshot from our very first date to share with you, but this was before the era of smartphones, or even camera phones (it was the era of these phones), so you will have to settle for one very old picture of the two of us. For perspective, our very first date was quite typical for teenagers growing up along the Carolina coast. We hopped in the car, threw a blanket in the back, and headed over to the beach to sit in the sand and talk about all the worldly things two teenagers could talk about.

And here is a picture from our engagement day. We spent a wonderful weekend in western Virginia last fall (who knew shortly after our engagement we would be moving to Virginia - serendipitous.) where we hiked in the Shenandoah National Forest, drank pumpkin martinis (okay, okay I drank pumpkin martinis, Harris drank beer, maybe pumpkin though!) at a magnificent Public House, and, then, on a beautiful farm in the middle of nowhere, cast up into the heavens where Harris asked me to be his wife. A most wonderful weekend indeed.

Finally, here is one of my favorites from our wedding day! Getting married in Mexico was one of the best decisions we could have made. Not only was it a virtually stress-free, seamless wedding planning process, but the whole experience was wonderfully fun, and every little detail was amazingly beautiful. At the end of the day, all I cared about was marrying this man, whom I had loved for so many years. As they say, everything else was just icing.

Harris, I love you more every single day.

Thank you for making the last 10 years, 6 months, and 2 days the very best days of my life.
I can't wait to see what forever holds for us.