The importance of being us…

….even if that means without the little guys!

This weekend was one of our reward weekends.  Big Aaron and I have been working really hard at a lot of things. Like, a lot of things.  And, sometimes that gets hard.  We work on loving each other well, loving our children well, squaring away our backwards finances, trying to get control of our health, etc…A lot of our work I have tried to chronicle in this blog.  And, I have said many, MANY times that I need rewards and treats to have the perseverance to keep striving for the better.  So began our twenty four hour reward, three months in the making.

It started on a high.  10 weeks ago, we began a weight loss challenge.  We are using it to kick start a healthier us, so that we can be good, healthy parents for our children.  We stopped buying junk, stopped eating out, stopped drinking soda (oh, how I have missed you soda) and began exercising.  This week was weigh in week. DRUM ROLL please…Aaron lost 34 lbs and I lost 14.  We were really proud of ourselves and psyched to see results.  We also decided that this weekend, all bets were off.  And off they were.  We REALLY indulged this weekend.  It was awesome.

Before I get into the sweetical sweetness of our almost 24 hour date. I have a funny story.  Well, tragic and funny at the same time.  While getting ready to leave on our date, I could not find anything to wear.  I have a closet full of things, but this "two pregnancies later" bangin’ body still appears to be very much with child, even though the last child left my bangin’ body 4 months ago.  When we got in the car to leave, I was actually crying. This is a little personal, but for me, it is a very weird thing to feel so insecure about myself.  I have never been ‘thin’ but I have never been bothered by it.  But these babies have shifted my body in ways I don’t dig, and sometimes I struggle.  So anyway, back to my crying. I was basically throwing a complete temper tantrum on our way to the date. I started crying and telling Aaron things like, ‘you have no idea what it is like to see your body change and to not have any clothes that fit right’.  As I got more and more worked up (because the husband wasn’t exactly executing an understanding attitude) I finally screamed, ‘I LOOK LIKE I AM STILL SEVEN MONTHS PREGNANT!  THAT IS MY PROBLEM’. The husband paused a moment and said, ‘look at it this way, 10 weeks ago, you would have looked 8 months pregnant’.  Ahhh…well played Wilkerson. I started laughing.  And my stinky attitude passed.

First, we went and saw the movie Breaking Dawn. Now, I know within the Catholic world, there is some debate as to whether or not this book/movie series was a good thing. I will continue to hold on to the fact that it is an EXCELLENT series (albeit, cheesy).  A popular series for teens, where the two main characters choose NOT to sleep together, and do it for the possibility that something higher might be calling them to a better life is a-okay by me.  Even if it takes vampires to get that message acrossJ  Anyway, the movie was FABULOUS in my opinion. The surprise ending had me upset/frustrated and then completely joyful!  Well done.  We saw the movie in a crowded theater at the RenCen and the crowd was off the hook.  At one point there was so much cheering, it was more like a sporting event then a movie.

From there, we went to the very tip top of the building on the glass elevator that makes you feel like you are flying up to the clouds (correct me if I am wrong, but it is more than 70 floors up).  We had the most delicious dinner. And guess freaking what?!?!  Aaron Rodgers ate at table four down from us.  Now, if you know me (and my blog friend Jenna-click here to start reading her blog) proximity to famous people makes me pretty much famous.  SO, not only did I get to see a great movie, have a delicious dinner, but I pretty much became famous again by seeing a famous quarterback!  Dinner started with lobster corndogs, lobster and crab bisque, and a ceaser salad.  Aaron had filet mignon and I had pasta topped with shrimp scampi.  We ate lots and lots of bread.  This was a cheat weekend, and we owned it.  For dessert, we rode the people mover to Aaron’s favorite bakery called ‘Astoria’.  He ordered tiramisu (his favorite) and I ordered strawberry cheesecake.  The amount of delicious is hard to describe. 

I thought we were going to stay at a hotel near the airport (thank you grandparents for pretty much making our lives and taking the kiddos overnight so we could sleep, I cannot tell you how much I needed sleep), but the best.husband.ever struck again.  He took us to this hotel called ‘The Henry’ that was all sorts of fancy and modern and had really really cool rooms. My husband knows that I ADORE hotel rooms, and this one was perfect.  We ate our desserts while cuddled on a huge king bed and watching the end of an exciting day in college football.  Perfect maybe? I think so.

In the morning, we woke up to order breakfast in bed (yes, I told you, we balled out this weekend) and watched the newest batman which I had yet to see.  BTW- I did NOT like that movie.  Which is weird, because I love movies like that.  Any movie that I need a study guide to understand is a movie that is not for me.  But, by the end I found it acceptable (how cute was the robin part?  And the French café part)?   Overall though, I did not dig the confusion of the first 1.5 hours.  

It was 11:00 am and time to take off the glass slippers and head home.  The husband went and got the boys, while I went to give a talk.  When I finally got to see my little guys it was around 3:00 pm.  Nothin’ better than lil’ A’s face to greet me with a wide smile at the front door.

Here’s the thing blogosphere.  The best part of the weekend?  Just being with my husband.  We had a chance to talk about some important things, we had a chance to snuggle and hold hands.  We laughed and enjoyed each other.  We talked about real things, love things, where we have been already and where we are headed.  We talked about concerns, and goals.  We talked about what we want our lives to look like and how we can learn from the good and bad of other couples.  It was so nice to just talk to him.  I have said this before, but the hubs and I are pretty committed to always figuring out a way to date at least once a month and go away at least every 6 months- 1 year. I think it is so important. Especially since we had kids right away.  It is essential that we give our kids the gift of being in love with each other.  And, because we fight so much and pretty much are drastically different and don’t place nice together (true story) for us, date nights like this are essential. 

I say it all the time, and I haven’t lost sight of it yet, but I am desperately in love with my husband.  He is a good man and a man that truly I just like hangin’ around with.  And, this weekend, it was really good to hang around.  J