An Anniversary to Remember

Being a military family, my husband and I spend as many anniversaries apart as we do together, so we try to make them count. I joke that I’m lucky he was able to make it to our wedding at all. Truthfully, that’s not really a far stretch. He arrived in only days before the wedding. Eight years of marriage has brought us 2 beautiful children, too much time apart, and some unique experiences through it all. When we don’t get to spend our anniversary together, we usually exchange gifts and cards like most couples do, but when we’re together its far better to just spend the evening without the kids. Don’t get me wrong, our kids are awesome, but a night without any tears over petty things is pure bliss! Nothing is better than when my own personal knight in shining camo can sweep me off my feet and whisk me away to a fantasy place where I don’t have to cook and clean or listen to shrieking squeals of terror over the horrifying utterance of the word “no”. This year we took the kids to a hibachi grill thinking that if they were entertained perhaps we could forgo a sitter and still be able to enjoy a peaceful night. Ha ha! That was a good joke. The youngest skipped her nap that day, and decided that she would only sit if she could hold me in a chokehold (literally) through the cooking and the meal. (I didn’t really get to eat). Then the 7 year old decided the fire was just too terrifying and covered his face for most of dinner. Guess you can’t win them all right. We gave it another shot the next day after helping my neighbor dig up the roots of an old tree that died in her yard (this was no small feat for the two of us), my husband asked me what I wanted to do. Exhausted and tired from waking up early to help my neighbor, I had the grand Idea to go rock climbing.

We call the sitter to ensure our night will be a carefree one, but life was just having too much fun messing with us to just let it be. We drive into Oklahoma City and once we exit the highway we’re immediately stopped by Saturday nights downtown traffic, but oh yeah, they’re also doing road construction and you have to take a roundabout way to get to the rock gym (which doesn’t show up on the GPS). Then, before finding our way, we’re immediately slammed with the art festival going on. If there weren’t enough streets blocked off already, they had the Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon going on as well. This only goes to show that sometimes my spontaneous nature really does get the best of things. We finally arrived at the rock gym with a whole hour before they closed the doors. Alas, we got to have some fun though. We definitely made the most of it by bouldering on some of the more difficult routs and tapping into our competitive nature. It’s rare that we get to spend an evening without chasing down a two year old or having to hold hands and kiss boo-boos all night. I forgot what it’s like to be able to let go and enjoy something without the thought of ensuring someone else isn’t about to bleed out from a paper cut or get a concussion from jumping on the bed. As an added bonus, the kids were in bed by the time we made it home. I guess life decided to stop laughing at us and give us back a little peace of mind. Sometimes life can really get the best of us and we may forget to stop and take a breath. My kids make me laugh just as much as they drive me crazy sometimes, but everything is always to the extreme with them. It was such a relief to step away and have a chance to breathe again. On the plus side we also discovered that they're building a zombie paitball arena in downtown Oklahoma City. I think I know what we're doing for our next date night. ;)