dinner at eight

Last week my husband and I celebrate our eighth anniversary.  My gift started with inspiration from  these adorable pillow cases!

Since we went to France for our honeymoon and our bedroom is black and white, I knew these would be perfect!  I used the translation "good evening" to put together some items that would ensure that we had a "good" evening. To start with we had dinner at 8:00 at our favorite French restaurant on the Cape.  For the gift I used the pillow cases as the tissue paper (the bronze heart tissue paper that I made kept smudging and I didn't want it to get on the new white pillow cases).  I included the movie "dinner at eight," a new cd by one of my husbands favorite Irish artists, a chocolate "8," and some prosecco that had a bronze foil wrap.  I love that this gift included a lot of meaning for both of us and our evening turned out even better than good, it was fabulous!

that's a wrap

This was a gift for a little girl who turned six right after Valentine's day.  We got her a graphic tee with a heart on it and a best friends necklace.  I wrapped it in some heart paper and attached an acrylic heat frame.  Since the frame was on the front of the gift I tied the ribbon on the side instead.  As I have mentioned in the past I like to attach something small to the outside of the package for fun!  This would be a perfect way to wrap a Valentine or anniversary gift too.

that's a wrap

(photo courtesy of brooks brothers)

I thought for today I would share some of the gifts that I have given to my husband for Valentine's Day.  Before kids we used to take turns (every other year) planning special romantic dinners and nights away for each other.

I had always wanted to have dinner at Tavern on The Green in NYC and one year my husband made reservations for us.  For my gift to him I decided it would be fun to give him a new outfit from head to toe to wear to the restaurant that evening.  I gave him one piece of clothing at a time throughout the day with a quote attached to each one.

With a pair of socks it said, "True love is like a pair of socks.  You gotta have two and they've gotta match"
With the underwear, "Humility is like underwear, essential, but indecent if it shows"
And, for a new sweater the quote said "I have to much money invested in sweaters"  Bob Hope

You get the idea! 

(photo courtesy of black diamond rings)

 Another year we decided to go to Boston for the night.  I thought it would be fun to organize a special scavenger hunt for us.  Some of the things we had to find were:

~ the largest diamond ring at Tiffany's
~ a cup of hot cocoa at a restaurant that had the number 14 in the address
~ a sample of new perfume and cologne and pick one out for each other.
There were many more, but I can't remember them all!  You can make this up for any place that you might be visiting for Valentine's day or a special anniversary.

(photo courtesy of amazon)

 

One last idea I'll share is when I organized a night away at a local bed and breakfast.  I was trying to think of a creative way to tell him about our plans so I gave him some items to use for our night away along with the lyrics that I had rewritten to a love song.

L is for the way you look in red (with a  red bathrobe)
O is for your orange juice in bed (I made him breakfast in bed)
V is very, very romantic with strawberries (I made chocolate covered strawberries)
E is for even more, bath tub time with bubbles galore (I gave him some bubble bath and some truck shaped bath tub toys)......

These days with three small children in the house our Valentines Day's are more like take out and a movie.  But, I wouldn't trade them for anything!!!!  I would love to hear about your plans for Valentine's Day.  Anything special planned?

seven year itch



 ( photo courtesy of Claire Murray)

My husband and I celebrated our seven year wedding anniversary while we were at the Cape.  The traditional gift for seven years is wool.  Perhaps that is how the "seven year itch" originated!  Anyway, I was planning on getting my husband a monogrammed cashmere blanket and a movie, but since we are in the middle of summer here in Connecticut, curling up with a wool blanket was the last thing that I wanted to do.  Instead I thought it would be fun to go pick out our present together while we were on vacation.  Claire Murray makes beautiful rugs and since they are made of wool it seemed like the perfect gift and new addition to our bright yellow kitchen.  This is the rug that we ended up purchasing.  I love it and we were able to get it at a great discount too!  I haven't picked our movie yet if anyone has any suggestions.  I was thinking of something with seven in the title.  "Seven", "Snow white and the seven Dwarfs", "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers".  You get the idea.  If you want to learn more about our anniversary traditon you can read about it here.

anniversary gift basket

For this past weekends wedding I was also asked by the bride to make an Out of Town gift basket for her parents. I thought it would be fun to do a theme based on their own wedding, which was 34 years ago this August. I put in some daisy cookies (she carried a daisy bouquet) and a favorite bottle of wine called "Barefoot" with a post card of Bermuda - their honeymoon destination- on which I wrote... "for memories of walking barefoot in the sand in Bermuda." I included a sangria mix- which they served at their wedding reception and a Cat Stevens CD with "their song" on it. I wrapped the box in cellophane and attached some chocolate numbers to represent the number of years of marriage they will be celebrating on their anniversary in August. This was a very fun basket to put together and an idea that I hope to replicate again in the future.

how sweet it is to be loved by you...

As I mentioned in my previous post the traditional 6th anniversary gift is candy. I decided to give my husband 6 different types of candy that would tell him some of the many reasons why I love him. I packaged them in clear pillow boxes with red and white gingham ribbon and sticker letters. I even found a card that read "I love you more than chocolate." I originally found this idea in a Valentine's Day article and decided it would work perfectly for this occasion too. Some of the candy I used were:

Hershey kisses: for kisses

smarties: for being so smart

almond joy: for bringing such joy to all of our lives

snickers: for always making me laugh

We also took the kids to a penny candy store on the Cape so that they could join in on the fun too. My movie pick this year was Chocolat. We all enjoyed a wonderful day/night of celebrating and I look forward to many more years of celebrating with my husband.

celebrating wedding anniversaries

(This is the hotel in Ireland where I had my wedding reception 6 years ago!)

Next week I will be celebrating my sixth wedding anniversary. I thought I would share with you some ideas from past anniversaries. I like to use the traditional anniversary gift themes and make them my own. Also, since my husband and I both enjoying watching movies- I choose a movie to go with the theme too. For example:

Year 1 is paper. I bought my husband tickets to see Les Miserable on Broadway in NYC. I also bought the movie version so we could watch it over and over again and remember our fun date to the city.

Year 2 is cotton. I gave my husband a monogrammed cotton apron from Williams Sonoma and a gift certificate for a cooking class here. We ended up choosing a class that had a Provencal theme - which was perfect since we went to Provence for our honeymoon. My movie choice was "No Reservations."

Year 3 is leather. I bought my husband a leather bound copy of a Peter Mayle book. While we were on our honeymoon (in Provence and Paris) we read aloud the book "A Good Year" by Peter Mayle which is set in the French countryside. The movie version of a "A Good Year" with Russel Crowe came out around the same time and was a perfect accompaniment for this occasion.

Year 4 is fruit or flowers. Since we are usually on the Cape for our anniversary I decided we would have a picnic on the beach with fruit and flowers. We watched "A Room with A View" which has a great picnic scene in it.

Year 5 is wood. I found a wooden buoy from Pottery Barn with the number 5 on it and gave it to him while we were on the Cape. As a funny coincidence we ended up having dinner at a restaurant that had wooden menus! We watched a Woody Allen movie- but you could also watch anything with Elijah Wood or Woody Harrelson.

This year, for our sixth wedding anniversary, the theme (or traditional gift) is candy. As is tradition, we are leaving for the Cape today. Stay tuned for my gift idea and movie pick- I will post them when I get back next week. I think this year might be my favorite!!!

Date Jar

Looking for an inexpensive gift for your loved one? How about a Date Jar. Decorate any clear jar with coupons of fun things to do together: bake cookies, go for a walk on the beach, have breakfast in bed. This makes a great gift for a first anniversary which is traditionally paper. You don't have to spend a lot of money to tell someone how much you love them.