March 2014 Date of the Month and Anniversary Weekend

Dustin's first official date of the month planned on his own!

Brianne,

Off with the "training" wheels! Our marriage is on the right "track".

Love,

Dustin

March's date of the month took us to the Oregon Rail Heritage Center for a train ride down to the Sellwood area.

All Aboard!

Views of the Willamette River

It was a beautiful day and it was nice to see so many families biking or walking along the trail.  They all liked to wave as the train went by.

Dustin wanted a picture with the big train wheel.  It was really big.

After the Railroad, we picked up gluten free cupcakes as anniversary treats from New Cascadia Traditional Bakery.  They were delish!

The next part of our date wasn't really train related, but we wanted to visit Multnomah Falls and have dinner at the Lodge for our anniversary.

 We hiked up to the bridge and had to stop because the bridge had a huge chunk missing.  A rock fell or something due to the snowmaggedon.  Crazy!

Happy 5 year anniversary!

The date ended at home watching the movie Unstoppable.  What a great train movie!
I can't believe how fast the past 5 years has gone by.  I'm so lucky to be married to such a wonderful man that is so kind, smart, and loving.  I'm looking forward to this next year of marriage and the new stage of life we'll move into with graduation coming up.

February 2014 Date of the Month

We've been able to take a beach trip every March for our anniversary while we've lived in Portland, but this year we went to Utah to job search in March. So our beach trip came a month early and counts as our February date of the month. 

A beach trip essential

We took a weekend getaway to Lincoln City Valentine's Day weekend.  It was super windy!!! And rainy!! But we still had a good time.  We only made it to the beach for a walk Sunday morning for a little while due to the weather, but we enjoyed time shopping and relaxing.

 

We escaped the storm by enjoying a sushi lunch

A stormy walk on the beach

We took a lot of pictures trying to get a good one. This awful one was probably the best

I hope this isn't our last beach trip while we're here.  I think with family come out to visit this summer, we'll sneak at least one more in.

January Date of the Month

January was my final date of the month, "the final rose".  In Bachelor land, that means a proposal (at least hopefully!)  So I recreated Dustin's proposal for our date of the month.

It started with dinner at The Cheesecake Factory then ended at our house watching While You Were Sleeping.  Of course, Dustin's proposal was way more romantic than that, involving candles, a shower of rose petals, long stem roses, a ceiling full of stars, and a shiny beautiful ring. 
My date of the month had none of that, but I did get down on one knee and asked him if he would take my hand and join me in holy date of the month club matrimony by taking over for the next year.  He said yes!

It's been a fun year of dates and I'm excited to see what Dustin comes up with this next year!

December Date of the Month

Honesty moment: I totally dropped the ball on our date of the month in December.  The date card was

Dustin,

Let's light up the night

Love,

Brianne

The intention was to go to the Portland Zoo for Zoolights, check out the Christmas boat lights parade, and have dinner at Skyline Burgers.
It didn't happen.  Bad weather, busy month, too tired, [insert excuse here].  It just didn't happen.

Luckily, I married a winner who planned a great date for our engagement anniversary and he said it could count for the date of the month.  It was definitely date of the month worthy!
So new date card:

Brianne,

This may be CHEESY, but I'm NUTS for you!

Love,

Dustin

No, he did not give me a date card, but it would have said that. :)  Dustin planned and bought (all on his own!) tickets to see The Nutcracker Ballet at the Keller Auditorium.  I was impressed.  I haven't seen The Nutcracker for a long time and watching it made me want to come home and bust out a copy of when I was in the Nutcracker in like 5th or 6th grade.
He also told me we were going to a restaurant downtown that we've been meaning to go to, but instead he surprised me by taking me to the Melting Pot for a crave combo (cheese and chocolate). We splurged by getting a fancy drink and they made us a "happy anniversary" plate of chocolate.

 

Have I ever mentioned how much I love that man?  Cuz I do.  He's pretty much amazing.  Thanks for saving December's Date babe!

November Date of the Month

 

Dustin,

Let's get physical

Love,

Brianne

The Saturday after Thanksgiving we participated in the Winter Wonderland at the Portland International Raceway.  

 Similar to Spanish Fork's Festival of Lights, they adorn the 2 mile raceway with Christmas lights  and before opening it up for cars to drive through, they put on a race! The weather was pretty good- not raining, just cold- so we bundled up and headed out to the raceway!

I took a few selfies on the way over because I was intrigued by this bald look.  Made me miss my long hair

Bundled up and ready to rock

While there were some cool parts in the light display like the whole 12 days of Christmas, I was disappointed with PIR.  SF's are just way better... way more.  The ones at the PIR were far too spread out. But we had a good time walking and occasionally jogging around the track getting a little workout in. We signed up to do 4 miles but my plantar fasciitis had us done after 2 miles.  Here we are pretending that we're super worn out... we're not, just in foot pain.

 

October Date of the Month

 Dustin,

Are you game for love?

Love,

Brianne

Somehow October escaped us and the date of the month was pushed to the first weekend in November.  Oops.  At least we made up for it!
October's date of the month was all about games.  Dustin received a new Wii-U game, Super Luigi Brothers U.  We enjoyed some quality Nintendo gaming time during the afternoon.  What man doesn't love some good Nintendo time?

The plan was to see Ender's Game at Cinetopia, but we were invited to my cousin Connor's birthday dinner that was the same time as the movie....  No big deal, we just changed our movie to Free Birds at a time that worked. :)  Turkeys are game, right?  Like hunting game?  Maybe it was a stretch but I'm glad we were able to fit everything in.  Plus we got to enjoy it in a movie parlor theater. So comfy and cozy.

September date of the month

Dustin,

There's no place like home!

Love,

Brianne

The final four in the Bachelor/Bachelorette get to take their suitor to meet the family and explore their hometowns. So with Bachelor style date of the months, we had to fit a hometown date in!  We have been homesick for Utah so we did the best we could from far away.
First stop was lunch at Bajio's.   We miss Cafe Rio but were super excited when we learned that Clackamas has a Bajio's! Yum yum!

Salem Utah was originally named "Pond Town" because well, that's about all we have in Salem.  But it's an amazingly beautiful pond.  See?

 It's so pretty!  Dustin and I checked out an apartment complex in Fairview and it had a beautiful pond just like Salem! Ducks and everything!

I was so happy and wanted to move in right away! But we ended up not. :(

Spanish Fork is big for their baseball.  Dustin loves baseball and played it (and just about every other sport) growing up, so we hit up the batting cages down the street.

Dustin rocking his Red Sox jacket at Fenway Park.  I was too scared to try the batting cages (the balls move so fast!!) but Dustin had a great time.
And what's a Utah hometown date without a BYU football game!

Last part of the date was at the local drive-in style Burger joint for some "Glade's" crinkle fries and "Barry's" FlavorBurst ice cream cones.  Gotta love Spanish Fork's dives!

The best part is that we actually got to go home for a few days the next week. :)
While we miss Utah and being close to our families, we are making Portland Home Sweet Home.

August Date of the Month

Dustin's clinic schedule kept him late on Friday nights so we kept our August date of the month local- camping in our own apartment!

 I made a pretty sweet tent in our family room but it was infested with bears!  We watched The Sandlot Friday night and pretty sure we watched some Saturday morning tv in the tent too because we loved it so much.

 Camping dinner outside- hamburgers and hot dogs

 Our forest backyard

 Our indoor campfire

 My kind of smores!

Camping breakfast in the morning- peach cobbler, eggs, and toasted English muffins