multi-hyphenated-me

Happy 13th Anniversary to my husband and me!  A Baker’s Dozen sounds much better than the Dirty Dozen we celebrated last year.  I didn’t post last night because I couldn’t find the photo that I wanted to post.  Grr.  The photo was from our family trip to Palm Springs.  We rented a house, left Jess and the boys and went to dinner at Johanne’s.  We had one of the best meals of our lives for anniversary #12. This is a photo from 2011, we spent our 11th anniversary going to the gym (before we started dating, we were workout buddies), getting facials (which explains my shiny no makeup face – Vince grew up with 3 sisters, he is spa savvy), eating sushi and going to the OC Fair.

This is one of my favorite photos from our wedding (photo credit:  Mark Beat).  We were married at the Ritz Carlton, Dana Point in a buddhist ceremony (see my buddhist prayer beads on my hand) on an incredibly hot, still day.

Jessica was 4 years old and our beautiful flower girl.  My mom made her dress, my sister arranged all the flowers.

We’re not sure what we’re doing tonight.  The boys have had lots of ideas all weekend. Andre suggested we leave immediately on a cruise, dropping them off at the airport so Trace and Niko can fly to their friends, Kyle and Ryan’s house and he would fly to his friend Lachlan’s house.  Bon Voyage!  Niko, a traditionalist, suggested dinner and a movie.  Trace had no recommendations but loves to tell our engagement story, which he finds hilarious.

We met Vince’s sister and brother-in-law in San Francisco.  They were flying home from Oahu, Hawaii with an extended layover in San Francisco.  His brother-in-law had never been to San Francisco and we gave them a full tour. Vince and I spent many (at least 10) weekends in San Francisco in the two years prior as I worked with the San Francisco Starbucks Development team.  My Monday morning meetings conveniently created weekend trips to San Francisco.  Our trips were budget conscience is boutique hotels.  This trip we all stayed at the incredibly stunning, historic Palace Hotel. That night, at dinner at a restaurant I can’t remember the name, we clinked our wine glasses in a toast and I, naturally, dropped my full glass of cabernet on the table.  The glass shattered and the entire contents spilled on to Vince’s sister’s lap.  I was mortified!  She, thankful to be wearing black, took the disaster in stride, mopped up the mess and we continued with dinner. Christening his sister must have been the nudge Vince needed, he proposed that night.

Vince’s family flew home and we continued our travels to Seattle to celebrate our engagement.

Here we are, thirteen years later, in love.