Thirty-One Years

July 24th was my last post? Oh man. Let's do some catching up...

Hubby and I celebrated 31 years of marriage the end of July. I wrote to my hubby on Facebook the day of our anniversary:

Today marks 31 years since I married you. Doofus me forgot to buy you an anniversary card, but if the stack of cards I unpacked a couple of months ago that you've saved over the years are any indication, I'd likely write basically the same stuff: I love you always; Thanks for __ years together: You're a terrific husband; blah blah blah. This year you get a Facebook public card.

Sometimes I am amazed that God created this thing called marriage. How cool is it to get to choose to commit to another person and hang out with for decades doing life together? I am so privileged to get to do that with you. I have loved having the front row seat of watching you grow into the man God wants you to be. I love seeing your confidence in who you are in Christ grow and change who you are. I am honored to walk by your side. I am honored to be your teammate. Our becoming one in this married life, our partnership is one of God's great blessings on us.
How lucky are we (and by lucky I mean an overflow of God's great grace) to have been given those kids of ours? I love us together watching the two of them and their spouses growing together as their own families. God has blessed us abundantly!
And now, Part 3. Empty nest and being Grammy and Pops! Wheee! Let's have a blast together in this part of our lives, okay?
And guess what? I love you always, thank you for 31 years together and you're a terrific husband!
I love you.
Always.

I think he is just the best, if you can't tell.

We always like to celebrate our anniversary in some special way. Sometimes just a dinner out, but the past several years has involved a trip somewhere. This year we headed north and east to the mountains.

Kinda a hazy picture, but I guess there is a reason these are called the Smoky Mountains Or are they the Blue Ridge Mountains here? I better learn my geography a little better.

We found a cute cabin in the North Carolina mountains to spend a few days.  As we were making the reservations online I noticed that we could order a picnic basket for lunch, so I hopped right on that! And was I glad I did! Check out this adorable basket:

 

We spent quite a bit of time driving around those mountains and loving the beautiful scenery.  One day our destination was to the top of Grandfather Mountain:

 At the top of the mountain was a hanging bridge. Yikes! That's what I have to say about that.

 

Hubby walked across the bridge and I went to sit in the car to get out of the rain, but not before I gave him one more kiss. I don't like hanging bridges. Walking across air on something that moves? No thanks.

Thankfully, Hubby made it back all in one piece. Ha.

I loved these wind-blown trees. Just stunning.

In the evenings we snuggled into our cabin (I loved the chaise lounge in our cabin) and watched a couple of old movies. The lodge where we were staying had all sorts of old movies to borrow and watch. We watched two movies of The Thin Man. We were surprised at how good the movies were.

We had a great get-away and are so thankful we have so much beauty nearby to explore.