Our 4 Year Anniversary Staycation!

12.21.2012

Hart planned out a great 4 year anniversary for us! We started our day at the zoo spending some time together as a family! 
Then, we ate together as a family at Moe's before dropping Cai off at his MiMi & Pop's house for a "sleepover".

We went back home and Hart told me what to pack in my bag. At this point I still had no idea what we were really doing. After we left home, he told me that it started with a "C". So literally every "C" I saw from our house to where we went I asked if that's what we were doing!

We stayed at the Inn at Claussen's, a historic hotel that used to be Claussen's bakery, in 5 Points here in Columbia, SC. It's a "B&B on steroids" as they like to say. It was REALLY nice. Our room was a loft style room with a spiral staircase to a bed/bath in the loft.

It was so quiet and relaxing. I was able to sleep in until almost 9 am! What a birthday present to not hear a 2 year old knocking on the door "I'm stuck, mommy!" when he wakes up and wants out of his room at 7:30 am!  Haha!

We went to the Blue Marlin in the Vista for a delicious dinner, and during dinner Hart completely pulled one over one me.... I'll let him explain in his own words:

Had an awesome time celebrating with Vanessa our 4th year of marriage. My parents kept Cai and Abe, and we stayed the night at the Inn at Clausens over on the edge of USC and 5pts. And through the generosity of a dear family friend we were given 2 tickets to go see West Side Story. I think my absolute favorite memory from this anniversary was how I surprised Vanessa with the tickets to West Side Story. Some background info is needed before I go any further. Vanessa's mom owns a dance studio and is an instructor, so Vanessa grew up around dance and really likes dance and musicals, etc. I think it was for her birthday during our first year of marriage, I took Vanessa to see the Nutcracker. That ended up being a flop because it wasn't the "good" dance company...so I was bored the whole time as was Vanessa because these dancers were not professional and she has an eye for that kind of stuff. So fast forward to yesterday. I asked Vanessa what she thought we were going to do and she said "I hope we're not going to see the Nutcracker". I played it off like she guessed it. So she felt horrible about it the rest of the day. Then last night at dinner I handed her an envelope with a note inside that said we were going to West Side Story. She opened it up expecting it to be tickets to the Nutcracker and so was completely shocked to realize I had tricked her. My wife is a very good detective. So you really don't know how happy and how much I enjoyed surprising her like that!
Really, you have no idea, how much I believed that Hart was really taking me to the Nutcracker. I was trying to be excited, but it just wasn't happening! It took me a bit before I realized he'd completely tricked me! It was pretty funny!

We really enjoyed West Side Story... (except how sad that ending is...gets ya every time!) I just loved all the partner dancing, and the costumes and the twirling skirts, the lifts and choreography!

Perhaps my favorite thing about the Inn at Claussen's is that you get room service included in your stay for breakfast.
Coffee, juices, milk, croissants, bagels, yogurt parfaits, muffins, and fruit were the items to choose from, so just enough, but to have it delivered and just set it back outside.... it was marvelous!
After breakfast, we got ready and since we were so close to USC's campus and the students were out for break, we grabbed some Starbucks and enjoyed a chilly/windy walk across campus to the Horseshoe. It was really fun walking together there, since we have so many college memories there from when we were dating!

It really wast the most perfect staycation I could have asked for and I'm so glad we found this Inn, because it's on our list of "future staycations". I loved getting to sleep in on my birthday, and the sweet time with just my husband to focus on our marriage!

Of course, we were ready to get our little punky bruster baby boy back! We were grateful for Hart's parents who took care of him & Abe for us! My husband did SUCH a great job surprising me, and it was the perfect little getaway in our own city! It really was fun & funny at the same time to be able to act like tourists where we live, haha!!!! Here's to praying for many, many, many more to come! 

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.