Scrolling around on Pinterest one day I found this idea to do a Year of Dates as a gift for my husband. This was my Valentine's gift to him last year. The idea is that I plan out a year of dates--different activities every month. I write the date plan on a card then seal it in an envelope with the month written on the front. On the first of every month, James opens the envelope to see what the date will be and then we plan it and line up a babysitter. We've now completed our first Year of Dates and it was so much fun! It has now become my "go to" Valentine's gift. We did so many fun activities last year and created great memories together. Since the date was already technically planned, we were also much more likely to commit to it and make it happen somehow in the month. We didn't let one month go by without doing a date. I documented a lot of it on Instagram so we could remember all that we did. I'm going to document here on the blog as well.
So here's the 2015-2016 Year of Dates:
March: Our Early Years
- Night out in Wallingford (where we lived before we were married): dinner at Cantinetta, visited Durn Good grocery store (the amazing mini grocery store across from James' apt. building that without fail had whatever we needed every time we went there), and gelato at Fainting Goat
- Monet Water Lilies painting class at Palettes and Pairings in Kirkland
- drinks at Barca Lounge, dinner at Palomino
June: The Great Outdoors
- The initial plan for the date was supposed to be doing a hike and gonig on a picnic, but it was insanely hot in the PNW in June of 2015 so we bagged the outside idea and went to a lovely air conditioned movie theater instead to see Inside Out :)
- Mariners game together and it was Fireworks Night which made it even better!
- Golfing at Mt. Si Golf Course and sushi for dinner at Trapper's
September: Love Among the Vines
- Wine tasting afternoon in Woodinville and dinner at The Commons. Wineries included Longshadows, Fidelitas, and A Maurice
- We did this date for my birthday and had an amazing italian meal at Spinasse in Capitol Hill
- We were ok reverting back to our date "norm" on this one because Nov and Dec are usually when the really good movies come out. Yummy dinner at Burgermaster and saw the movie Spotlight
- Christmas shopping at Toys R Us, REI and downtown Seattle, happy hour dinner at The Brooklyn, and visited the Star Wars themed gingerbread houses at the Sheraton
January: New Year Adventure
- Skiing at Alpental
February: I Have a "Crush" on You
- The original plan was to go to a nice Valentine's dinner at one of our favorite restaurants in Seattle--Crush. But when I went to make reservations, I was so sad to find out that the restuarant closed the prior summer! What? So instead we booked a lovely, romantic Valentine's Dinner the weekend before Valentine's Day at Gian Franco--one of our favorite little Italian restaurants in Snoqualmie. Then we actually went back home to rent The Martian movie before we picked up the kids from school where they had Parents Night Out
Whew! What a fun year. I like looking back on it all at one time. And now we're already on to Year of Dates 2016-2017. Our first date is in two weekends. James has no idea what's in store. :) I'll document all of it again a year from now. Stay tuned....
