Four Year Favorites

Hey hey!

Tomorrow is our four year anniversary.  Four!  A fun number of years to be married, and 2.5 before that of dating.  That means that in 6 months we'll hit our first 7 year itch, is that how that works?

Let's not talk about it.  

Today!  Some of our favorites.  Things to do, stores, restaurants, recipes, all of it.  We really enjoy outdoor things that Beck can enjoy, and have a few restaurants that we'll go back to faithfully no matter what.  We are very Stepbrothers-ish in that we love SO MANY ACTIVITIES, and we can do them a lot right now because we don't have older kids with homework and sports and activities of their own.   There are a few kid products listed here because our kid is a huge focus of ours, but some of these things are things that we love doing just the two of us.  

• On Fridays in the summer, we love going downtown to hear live music.  There is something to listen to outside every Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, and lots of times we find even more stuff on the weekends.  We rarely do dinners out anymore if Beck is with us because she goes to bed so early, so one of our favorite things to do after the music is to grab takeout from Sushi Murasaki or order delivery from 864togo - Handi Indian is our preferred order from that site, and saved us when I had just had Beck. 
• If we aren't downtown for the music on Fridays we lovelovelove Community Tap, a local wine/beer shop that carries a few fancy foods and chocolate, and often has food trucks outside.  We do a few drinks, chat with anyone we run into that we know, get takeout, and head home.  Ellada Kouzina and Automatic Taco are our two favorite food trucks in all of Greenville, hands down. 
• Don't feel sad for us that our favorite weekend nights involve early bedtimes, takeout, and TV, by the way.  We love it, and it makes nights out feel extra fancy and special when they do happen.  Currently we're working our way through Fargo, House of Cards, Glow, and Friends from College.  We're dying with anticipation at Last Man on Earth coming back in the fall, and are almost done with Fargo so in need of something new in the crime drama arena.  Any suggestions?  
• Of course we cook at home for fun as well as for the magazine and blog.  Salmon of any kind is a staple at least once per week, and I use this method for cooking it and change the flavor each time based on what else I need to use up in the fridge.  We love quick dinners with pasta from Naked Pasta owned by our friends Chris and Brett, and if you ever have a chance to get their ground beef ravioli PLEASE do, it's anything but basic.  
• On weeknights when we're all home Jay usually gives Beck a bath while I work, read the interwebz, and/or start dinner. This octopus is our current favorite bath toy, and it makes me happy because it doesn't have a hole so it can't mold on the inside like so many bath toys.  Gross.  Beck's current favorite game is this bowling set that I found at TJMaxx, and she demands that we set up the pins over and over only to knock them down one by one by barely tapping the bowling ball on the top of each one.  It is painstaking. 
• At home we try to keep down on the Smell of All The Spices with Modern Forestry candles, a local maker that ships all over the world.  Check them out on Etsy and definitely make an order - they have great sales about once per month that I'm obsessed with.  I'm also all about finding more excuses to purchase anything Le Creuset for the kitchen, and am thinking that an anniversary is a perfect time for something new, riiiiight? Right. 
• Our current favorite Greenville restaurants are White Duck Taco, Golden Llama, and Kitchen Sync, hands down, all the time.  I might never cook if I could afford to eat at these places more often.  Send gift cards!
• We do our yoga at 90 Degrees Yoga and even though I work there I can't imagine practicing anywhere else.  It feels like home and I love it so much.  If you hate hot yoga, we're starting to offer non-heated classes this fall!  
• We've been doing lots of hiking recently, mostly with Beck which means we're kind of limited to 2 hour or less hikes for Jay's back (I'm not sure I could carry her for very long anymore) and Beck's attention span.  We love love LOVE Paris Mountain and both hike in Keens because of course we do.  Matching boots make marriage work is what the therapy books say. 
• Also new for us this year is a membership to Biltmore in Asheville.  Visiting the house is wonderful, but our passes let us in year round so we don't see the house every time we go.  We like to try all of the different restaurants, walk on the trails, see the petting zoo and hit the playground, and CLEARLY the free wine tasting is something we don't like to miss out on.  Because it's a free wine tasting.  Asheville is only about an hour and a half away from us so we like to make a day of it and find things on the property that are fun for us and fun for Beck.  Visiting Biltmore is pretty expensive, but we got our annual passes for less than it would cost to visit two times, so we went for it.  It's been a great thing to have so far! 

Reading back over this, it makes me smile because none of it is particularly special, but it combines to make a very lovely life, one that Jay and I have created together over the last several years.  I love the small things that we happen to love, and I love knowing that we'll create more of these favorites over the next million decades together. None of this is sponsored, because no one knows who I am.  I love reading about other people's favorites and maybe you do too!  

The end.  Happy anniversary to us!