Anniversary Staycation!

So for our one year anniversary we had many different plans and ideas jumping around of things we wanted to do. Everything from the beach-to a weekend Chattanooga get away-to finally settling with a staycation.

So instead...we made a list in my phone to be sure we could plan our time so that we actually did everything. We had quite a list...

We were off Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday.

Thursday afternoon Brandon picked me up from work and we went Strawberry pickin' out at H&S Farms!

The strawberry patch out there is huge and they had tons of berries! We got 3 gallons. Two fresh picked for us and 1 gallon for mom as a part of her Mother's Day gift!

Fun times! My first time ever pickin'!

We ended the day at home watching some tv and making a homemade pizza. It was delicious-as usual!

Friday morning we got up-went to the gym-ate breakfast-then headed to the Nashville Zoo!

We actually happened to hit senior citizen day. That was interesting. Non the less we had the best time together! For a treat for snack we got Dippin Dots. It has been years since I ate Dippin dots so it really was a treat! Brandon wanted to go in the 'petting zoo' part and got to pet a camel. Luckily-he didn't spit on him. Reminded me of Aladdin. :)

In the Bamboo Trail! 

Note: $2.00 Navy & White striped Levi skirt from the Goodwill ;)

Meerkats! Tons of little Timon's running around.

Elephants. Man, these things are HUGE!

A red panda. My goodness. This was the sweetest thing I have ever seen in my life! I stood here and watched him sleep for 5 minutes. Then finally Brandon dragged me away. Look at that thing! I want one so bad. I think him and Jax would play great together! Putting it on my birthday list!

We finally found the giraffes! The things I wanted to see the most were the last thing we came across! They are so tall! There was a baby, a momma, and a daddy. It's so funny how they stand there and like and eat the bark on a tree... Haha!

After the Zoo we wanted to make a day of being up in Nashville, so we decided to go to Opry Mills Mall now that it's back open from the flood. We went to walk around a grab a bite to eat. Unfortunately not all of the restaurants are open yet, so we weren't able to go to our favorite TGIFriday's but did get introduced to a yummy new restaurant: Chuy's! The atmosphere was just what we were looking for and the food was amazing! And we got to sit outside and enjoy the pretty weather :)

Stawberry & Mango 'Swirl & Dot' Margarita

Chuy's Texan Martini

Chips & Salsa! 

I got the 'lite plate' of a chicken taco and a chicken chalupa and Brandon got his usual-the giant burrito that I like to say has the entire Mexican restaurant in it. Yum, yum! It was delicious!

We finished out the day walking around the gigantic mall and checking out the new and old stores.

Drove back home and ended the day grilling out and hanging out at home with Jax. :)

Saturday morning we woke up to a cloudy day-that was one and off rainy. 

 For breakfast I cooked some protein pancakes. This time I made them with buckwheat flour, honey, oats, flax seed, and a scoop of protein powder. They were tasty!

 We decided to skip the gym and fit in some cardio time with Jax at the Greenway. We ran a full three miles and Jax did so great! It had been a while since we ran him.

After our run we went to a friends house and took Jaxon over to play with their dog, which is a Australian Shepherd and they played so well together! Jaxon was definitely wore out after the run and his play date!

We spent Saturday night at Jazz on the Lawn with some friends from our Community Group!  Our local winery has a band come out every other Saturday from May-October and everyone brings chairs and snacks and hangs out! It's so fun!

Since it was rainy-lots of people people show-but those that did had jackets and umbrellas. We came prepared, though, with our giant canopy! When the rain started, the guys popped it up for us, and we stayed dry! We definitely had a blast :)

Sunday was Mother's Day. My first Mother's Day!

It started out with Brandon saying, "Jaxon says Happy Mother's Day Momma", which definitely made me smile, but then once I got out of bed and went into the kitchen there was a card on the table!!

It was so sweet and I was soooo excited! That Jax is so thoughtful!

The card says: Happy Mother's Day to my playmate, my snuggler, my 'mom'.

I'm one lucky dog to have you! Then he wrote... 'Thanks for loving me, and walking me, and feeding me, and training me, and giving me treats, and giving me bones, and thanks for being the best mom in the world! I love love love love you! -Jax

We headed to church and then out to eat lunch with mom at Ruby Tuesday's! Love that place. The salad bar is definitely the best there is!

My sister made and brought a delicious key lime pie!

After lunch we went and visited both of my grandparents to wish them a happy mother's day as well-then went to mom's for a lazy afternoon on the couch. We watched, We Bought A Zoo.

AWESOME movie! I love a good family movie, especially when it's based on a true story!

Someone fell asleep... shocker!

Monday, May 14th was our actual anniversary. One year. Wow.

It was so awesome to look at the clock and think of all the madness that was going on exactly one year ago... like this.. this was about 12:15.

So, we woke up on Monday to, believe it or not-the same weather we had on our wedding day! Misty and party cloudy! First thing we did was gifts! 

I made Brandon this card. It was so neat to see it come to life. I saw it on Pinterest and had to steal the idea. A lot of it though, I came up with on my own. He LOVED it! I was so thrilled :)

Brandon got me a super mushy card ;) and 25 'love coupons'. Each coupon is different. They vary from date nights in, local wine tasting, one day road trip, exploring in Nashville, TWO house cleanings {I counted those!!}, and many more! It was such a thoughtful gift and I can't wait to start using them!

We headed out for brunch at Cracker Barrel. I got hot chocolate, like a kid, to warm up! I usually get the Yogurt Parfait n' Muffin with egg whites and turkey sausage-but they currently have some whole wheat and grain pancakes so I got those with egg whites and turkey sausage and YUM! Those pancakes were amazing. I made a good choice! Brandon got the steak and eggs with everything else on the menu.. piggy. :)

After that we went home, changed to pjs, and laid around on the couch. It was nice and relaxing!

We watched The Vow-so sweet! Some people said they didn't like the ending, but I found it very realistic! 

Yeah, we are weirdos and this was our snack. Haha It was good!

 After our weird snack and movie we went right up the road to a junior college and got our couples massage.

Can't beat an hour couples massage for $60! It was awesome :)

After the massage we came home and ordered Chinese! About 20 minutes after we ordered the door bell rang like 500 times. Brandon is like, 'That's a rude Chinese guy!' We went to the door to find this, while watching a white Fusion speed off down the road...

We unwrapped it...

A bottle of wine, two wine glasses, animal crackers, baby wipes, a baseball and bat, a princess wand, junk food, animal crackers, and a card... all in a wagon.

No, I'm not pregnant and yes my parents have grand-baby fever.

After all that crazyness...the Chinese food was delivered, we pigged out, and watched The Bachelorette!

 Not to mention-we finally ate our cake!

It was surprisingly delicious. Almond flavored. Yum, yum!

For our last staycation day together we started it off at the gym and then went out to Port Royal to go to this oh so famous little whole in the wall Mexican restaurant!

It was so pretty out we got to sit outside!

I got the chicken fajitas and Brandon got the carne asada! It was pretty good!!

 Donuts have been haunting us for weeks...

Again, something else that I haven't had in years, which was why it was on the list! We got a dozen and split a little bit of all of them with each other. The pink one with the sprinkles was definitely mine and my favorite!

Then we laid around a little bit and then got ready to head out to get some dinner! 

Me and my handsome :)

 We checked off the one last final thing and got pretzels and beer cheese dip. Amazing!

Even though we didn't go to some extravagant location or spend bookoos of money-we had much needed intentional quality time with each other and enjoyed each others company for a solid five days! And checked off tons of things that we've been wanting to do! When you both work full time-one of which is definitely over full time and isn't always at home-time off is precious and I'm so thankful for every second.