Good morning! I had this post scheduled to go up yesterday afternoon, but some backend blog issues delayed everything, so it’s coming your way today!
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Other than attending my friend Leah’s beautiful baby shower on Saturday, here are a few other highlights from my whirlwind weekend in Florida:
- Downtime with Girlfriends
After college, nearly all of my girlfriends moved away and now we’re living all over the United States. Whenever we have the change to get together again, we inevitably just want to cuddle up on the couch and talk for hours and hours. I’m so glad we were able to squeeze in lots of quality downtime during such a short trip to Florida. I love these girls so much and whenever we get together, I am only reminded of just how much I miss them when we’re all apart. My friend Krystal’s wedding is coming up in May, so at least we have a countdown in place and know when we’ll all see each other next! (Plus, I get to see my friend Ashley this weekend! Woo!)
- Siesta Key Sunset
After Leah’s baby shower, my friend Cherayne had the brilliant idea to head out to Siesta Key to watch the sunset over the Gulf of Mexico. It was absolutely gorgeous and the weather could not have been more perfect. There was a slight chill in the air but humidity was virtually non-existent. A fantastic Florida night!
- Sunset Bump Pic
When my friend Cherayne took this photo of our friend Leah during the sunset and immediately sent it to our group text, I could not stop looking at it! The photo is absolutely stunning and perfectly highlights Leah’s gorgeous baby bump. Her little boy is due at the end of next month and it was so amazing to feel Theo kick and move around in her belly this weekend. I could not be more thrilled for Leah and Ricky!
- Breakfast with My In-Laws
Since my in-laws live in Sarasota, I definitely wanted to find time to see them while I was in town during my short visit and thankfully was able to squeeze in a breakfast with everyone on Saturday morning before the baby shower! We dug into eggs, homemade biscuits and gravy, fresh fruit and my favorite apple fritters that Ryan’s grandma was kind enough to pick up especially for me from Der Dutchman Amish bakery. It was so great to see them!
- Krystal’s Surprise Bridal Shower
On Sunday morning, before everyone left, we had one more shower to attend, only our friend Krystal didn’t know about it! We were thankfully able to keep word of Krystal’s surprise shower a secret from her all weekend and when she showed up at The Shore to meet a high school friend for brunch, we were all there waiting with her mom and sister! Krystal was absolutely shocked and I’m so glad we were able to celebrate this special time in her life together!
- Celebrating 11 Years with Ryan
I arrived back in Charlotte in the early evening on Sunday with just enough time to head out on a quick date night with Ryan! Sunday was our eleven year dating anniversary! And yes, we absolutely still celebrate our dating anniversary because, according to Ryan, “Those were some good years and I don’t want to lose them!” We went to The Cheesecake Factory for our first date back in college and try our best to return to the restaurant every year on our anniversary (though we did take a three-year hiatus when we lived in Ocala because we didn’t live near a Cheesecake Factory). It felt good to bring this tradition back to life this year now that we live close to a Cheesecake Factory again since it’s always fun to reminisce about our wonderful first date back in 2004!
Questions of the Morning
- Do you still live close to friends from high school or college?
- Married folks: Do you still celebrate your dating anniversary?
I don’t live close to any of my friends from high school or college. If you do, consider yourself lucky because I miss them all like crazy!
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My husband and I got married may 23, 2014 which was our 11 year dating anniversary – the date meant so much to me I always knew I wanted that to be our wedding date as well!
aw, i love this!!
Love the beautiful bump photo! I’m due around the same time and I keep thinking, am I getting in enough pictures?! 🙂
Siesta Key is near my fav place, Longboat Key, <3 <3
My friends and I are all over the place! New York, Texas, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina….the list goes on and on. I do get to see everyone individually, but large meet ups don’t really happen :/ I love your Cheesecake Factory tradition! Ryan makes a good point…dating years are special and should be celebrated!
I don’t really keep up with my friends from HS. I see a couple friends from college occasionally, but everyone has grown up and gone separate ways. I got married while in college so I kind of “moved on” before everyone else. Sad times.
Hi there!
I live in CT and also went to school here so all of my college friends are within the state so it is very easy to see them! My best friends from high school (group of 8 of us) are allll around the U.S. which does not stop us from remaining close! We have a group text that can get a little crazy at times daily (if you arent paying attention, can be over 100 texts to catch up on) but I wouldn’t have it any other way! We are probably the closest we have ever been. We also started a yearly trip together a few years ago which also makes it easy to stay so close! It seems like you have a great group of both college friends and home friends as well 🙂
my college girlfriends and i have a daily group text JUST like that! and yes, coming back to my phone with 100 missed texts is not uncommon! that’s when i usually say, “i give up, someone send me the cliffs notes version of what i missed!”
That picture of you and your girlfriends is such a great pic, definitely a framer! So glad you had such a nice weekend filled with seeing some of your best friends!
Love the pic of you with your girlfriends! That’s some great stuff right there. Happy 11 years to you and Ryan. Yay for celebrating dating traditions. 🙂
That cheesecake looks sinful! We definitely still celebrate our dating anniversary. January 19th was 13 years for us. It just keeps getting better and better, doesn’t it? 🙂 Congrats on your 11th!
absolutely! congrats on 13 years!! <3
I love that I’m not the only one that celebrates a dating anniversary! My hubs and I always return to our first date restaurant on our dating anniversary. Although, last year we passed, because my husband says we have a new anniversary to celebrate. We still celebrate our dating anniversary, but we don’t make the drive back to our restaurant. Now we head back to where we got married to celebrate a new milestone with friends and family that want to return to our new favorite place to eat cake! 🙂
Happy 11 years! Josh and I celebrate our dating anniversary too! It’ll be 5 years this November!
I don’t live close to any of my highschool or college friends and I miss them all like crazy. I’m one of the only married/ settled down ones of my group so it’s fun to live vicariously through them. Getting Snapchats from my highschool friend who lives in Dubai is always a treat. 😀
I still live close to my friends and its wonderful! It looks like you had an amazing weekend!
I’ve only stayed in touch with a few HS friends, and we all moved about 25 miles west of where we grew up and now live in the same neighborhood. We didn’t do it on purpose, but it’s really nice to have friends nearby, especially when your only shower breaks and you need to use someone else’s, or you need someone to watch a pet for a few days. We get together often and run into each other out shopping and whatnot. My college friends are also mostly nearby (within 50 miles), but I don’t see them often because our lives have kind of gone in different directions.
My husband and I celebrate our dating anniversary, engagiversary (what we call it) and our wedding anniversary. Last month, we also celebrated our 25-year anniversary of knowing each other. (I said we should throw a silver-themed party but it didn’t come together. We did go out to dinner for it though.) These are all big moments and we feel they deserve to be celebrated. Mostly we’ll just go out for an inexpensive dinner or something, but for our wedding anniversary we go a little fancier. It’s nice to have celebrations to look forward to!
I live far away from all my high school and college friends, too! It’s such a bummer, but it also makes it really fun when we do get to see each other.
I love the Cheesecake Factory! We are getting one near me this year and I can’t wait.
I went to a really small high school and it just seemed everyone stuck around except for me! Of course we all went to different colleges but everyone moved back, including me. However, I left again to accept a job back where I went to college! So now I am about 3 1/2 hours away from everyone, which really isn’t bad at all.
Dating anniversaries should absolutely be celebrated!! We celebrated our 15 year “dating” anniversary back in December, which is insane…I’ve been with Jay for half of my life. How is that even possible?! 🙂
I love it!! 15 years is amazing!
That sounds like a great weekend! I live back near one of my best friends from high school, but everyone from college is all over the place! And I’m getting married in April and will definitely still be celebrating our dating anniversary 🙂 so sweet!
Kim
http://trendkeeper.me .. Defining my blog
It’s so crazy to see everyone in maxi dresses since it’s February! Oh Florida weather..
We still celebrate our meeting & dating anniversary even though we’re married! I totally agree with Ryan, the dating years are great years and should still be celebrated. Plus, why back out of another excuse to have a nice date night together?
I was just commenting about my college girlfriends on another blog! We all scattered, as well, but we keep in touch, via Facebook, and a special Facebook group, where we can talk about things like we did at our college Dining Hall. I haven’t seen them in about two and a half years, but last time I saw them, it was for a friend’s wedding, which also happened to be my birthday weekend. Getting to see my girls was a great present. It’s amazing how you can just get back together, like no time has passed at all, isn’t it?
Your post made me miss my girlfriends so much! I moved away in the middle of high school and was always afraid we would lose touch. We live all over the map now, but we always make it a point to make it to bridal showers, bachelorette parties, weddings, baby showers, etc. We even play our favorite Ricky Martin song and do our choreographed dance we made up in high school at everyone’s wedding. We are planning our first girls trip this year and hope it can stay an annual tradition! Girlfriends are the best 🙂
Congratulations on your anniversary! 11 years! Wow! I only hope for that in my future 🙂
All of your pictures are so beautiful! Looks like such a fun weekend! Girl time is so important! Enjoy the week!
I just got married in September, but my husband and I literally had this conversation the other day…what do we do on our dating anniversary this year?! I’m glad you guys still celebrate it! I agree with Ryan-those were some great years that I don’t want to forget about! Now we just have two anniversaries!
You did squeeze in a lot during your short trip-impressive! yes, that bump pic is so gorgeous–I love that the sunset outlines the bump.
And yep, we celebrate many of our ‘dates’–meeting anniversary (day we met), dating anniversary, engagement anniversary, and of course our actual wedding anniversary. Usually those first dates we do small things like notes or a little date night, but we always stop to reminisce on those times <3
Our dating anniversary is 2/23… and we just got married last May so this is the first one since we’ve been married. We usually keep Valentines Day low key (we stay in and I always cook some chicken parm!) and then we go out for our anniversary (to avoid the crowds and craziness of the previous weekend), so I could see us continuing that tradition.
Happy 11 Years, wow!
I love that you and Ryan still celebrate your dating anniversary! Mmm banana cream cheesecake at the Cheesecake Factory?!
I think it’s incredible how close you and your friends are, and the amount of effort you put into showers, parties and weddings! In my opinion, friendships are one of the most important things you can have 🙂
I’m getting married in May, but my fiance and I celebrate both our first date AND the day we became “official” by re-creating the dates, and have every intention of keeping that tradition after we’re married. Plus, I can’t help but get butterflies remembering where it all started 🙂
My husband and I celebrate our dating anniversary every year too! I never would have thought about doing it except my parents still celebrate theirs every year for the last few decades. So sweet!
My friends from high school and college live allllll over the country, so we all have to make an effort to see eachother. But luckily we manage to see eachother about every two to three months. Long distance relationship can be hard 🙂
I love that you still celebrate your dating anniversary. You can’t go wrong with the Cheesecake Factory either.
I don’t live near any of my old school friends either!
What a fun weekend for you!
I’m glad to know we’re not the only ones still celebrating our dating anniversary! 23 of ’em under our belts! 😉
We celebrate our dating anniversary! It’s such a good thing to remember. It’s the day after my birthday so it’s easy to celebrate too!
I wish I would have kept up with our dating anniversary, but I usually just post a throwback picture on Instagram of our baby high school selves 🙂 And for your other questions, we moved away from friends TWICE so I’m finally ready to settle down and make some friends in our new home state.
After moving away from each other we all settled back in central NC and I love being closer to a few college friends. I still try and do a little something for our dating anniversary. However, we always do it up big for our wedding anniversary!
I think it’s fun to acknowledge the dating anniversary, but my husband and I are both a little relieved we don’t have to formally “celebrate” the dating one any more now that we are married. It’s definitely a fun day to look back on and reminisce on old pictures and memories though! 🙂
Me and my two best friends from college are just as close today as we were the day we graduated–which i’m so thankful for! One lives in Charlotte, one in Richmond (Va) and I live on the complete opposite end of VA but we all make time every 2-3 months to have a girls weekend. It’s my favorite! And we talk every.single.day. 🙂
Love that sunset pic! I live pretty far from most of my very best friends from college and elementary/high school, but I’m lucky to have a handful of college friends really close which doesn’t make it too bad..plus I love traveling to see them all! I’ve lived all over the country for school, so visiting friends from those periods of my life now gives me a chance to revisit some fav locations. 🙂
Siesta Key has to be my all-time favorite beach that I’ve been to in the world! Soooo calm and pretty. First of all, I don’t live near ANY of my friends either. They are all still in Florida, and I’m in California. Second of all, my husband and I celebrate our “meeting anniversary” every year on the day we met, since we basically started dating then. And we also go to The Cheesecake Factory pretty often. Sorry, not sorry!
I love that you still celebrate your dating anniversary! And I’m with you on all your girlfriends being spread out over the country — it makes you value your time together even more.
Awww I am so glad you had fun in Florida!! We just moved to Charlotte from AZ – so most of my high school friends are still there with the exception of one who lives in California. I miss everyone dearly!! High school friends are one of a kind!!
My husband and I recognize our dating anniversary but we don’t always go out to celebrate it! With kids, it’s sometimes easier to just stay home and celebrate! Cheesecake Factory is my favorite restaurant though, so we usually go there a few times a year just because!
Hope you have a great day!
I dated my husband for 6 years before we got married and we have now been married for 22 years! Yes, we have been together for 28 years! Crazy! Anyway, we do still celebrate our dating anniversary. Even after all those years. We usually go out to dinner and reminisce about our first date so many years ago. We were such babies (in high school) and it’s fun to talk about those old times. Congrats on 11 years…blessings on many more to come. 🙂
We dated for 10 years before our wedding, so I’m on Ryan’s side. NO way am I starting over at 1! haha. Plus, hey, if I can finagle an extra present out of it… 😉
My college friends are the same way. We are spread out all over the country, which I hate, but love at the same time because it makes things like “hey, why don’t we meet up in Vegas?” feasible since traveling is involved either way 🙂
Exactly!! I think that’s why we travel so much for bachelorette parties, etc. We have to travel anyway so we might as well go somewhere fun!!
I love how you guys used the Anthropologie mug as a vase! Also love the black and white picture! So pretty! I still talk to some of my college friends and one high school friend but that’s about it. We live all over the U.S., it’s always so much fun when we get together! Looks like you guys had a blast!
It sounds like you had a perfect weekend. 🙂
My husband and I were engaged a month after we started dating, and were married within 9 months, so while we did celebrate the date of our first date for a couple of years, we haven’t in a loooong time!
I actually made our dating anniversary our wedding anniversary so that way it’s easy to remember how long we have been together! Looks like you had a great time and Im starting to think about making a stop at the Cheesecake Factory soon…
My husband and I were married on the first of August, which is also our dating anniversary! It works out well for us, less dates to remember…. And twice the celebrating!
Ahhh! I absolutely LOVE the Shore. We ate there for dinner the weekend before you came into town! Looks like it was a good weekend. We don’t celebrate our dating anniversary, but hey, if it means another reason to try and get out for a drink, then maybe we should! haha
The Shore was delicious!! Hoping to return again then next time I’m in town!
I don’t keep in contact with many folks from high school, and live about ten hours away from my college buds. Thank goodness for facebook and a car! My hubs and I actually don’t remember the date of our dating anniversary! Which is funny, because it was just three years ago. It was sometime in February, so we just celebrate the whole month. Plus, we get two wedding anniversaries — we eloped at the courthouse, and then had a (fake) ceremony and reception the next day. Pretty killer!
PS: You have the cutest clothing! I envy your style — my clothing consists of running duds, hoodie/swishy pants, and scrubs.
I don’t talk to anyone from high school except through Facebook. 🙁
My husband on the other hand, still has the same group of friends that he has had since MIDDLE school and week still hang out with them most weekends. 🙂
We always remember our dating anniversary 1/5/2010, but we don’t celebrate it. We should! Thank you for the idea!
Aww.. I USED to live close to all my friends… But the past couple years, I have been away because I was stationed on the East Coast. I miss them so much and it’s so hard to coordinate when you’re living on separate coasts!
I still keep in touch with some friends from high school and college but not all of my were friends with each other so we don’t really do the group reunion thing. My friends are all over the country. My best friend moved to Canada this year but she is now physically closer to me than she used to be so that is nice.
My husband and I don’t celebrate our dating anniversary. I know the month we started dating but not the day.