Saturday, October 4, 2008

10 Years Ago...

Rob and I were married. (Technically, we had a commitment ceremony because to make it all legal we had to go the the Justice of the Peace a couple days before. That was fun as well since we just had to walk across the street from our apartment to the JOP and then went a block more to watch a movie.) We had a small (maybe 75 people) ceremony at the Strathmore museum in North Bethesda, Maryland. We did the ceremony ourselves which included an Alanis Morissette song, Khalil Gibran poetry, and our variation of the seven steps (Saptapadi) from the Hindu tradition. The reception was also at the Strathmore and all the food was vegan, of course, and prepared by Gail's Vegetarian Catering. We had comments from the pianist and photographer afterwards that the ceremony was the most touching and unique wedding they had ever attended. Omnis and vegans alike raved about the food. Even my grandfather was impressed with the food and he was a farmer and then a butcher when my mom was growing up. Rob and I had a lot of fun at the wedding. It was so nice to have kids (from babies to pre-teens) attending and later running around and laughing. I put my brother on the spot to say a toast and I couldn't help tearing up at his words. We took most of the pictures prior to the ceremony and it sprinkled a little which I took to be a good omen, but it was a beautiful day.

The night before the ceremony we had the "rehearsal dinner" with our friends and family who were in town for the wedding at the Vegetable Garden and the evening after the wedding we ate at Yuan Fu's (two of our favorite vegan Chinese restaurants which were both close to where we lived). I do miss the DC area restaurants and Rockville, Marland, heck all of Maryland, will always feel like "home" to me, but I just can't imagine signing up for the hectic, expensive living now that we have children. Sigh.

Back to the present....We went to the Market at the Square this morning and did more talking than buying which is fun. Then we did our weekly shopping at Common Ground which was even more fun than usual because it was their official grand opening. We stayed around a little while for the pie contest. Our friend Jenny entered a vegan pie and we wanted to see if she won, but we had to leave before the judging was over. She won!! Jenny also said she would teach us her pie making secrets so we win too. We had a great afternoon at a birthday party with lots of fun things for the kids, lots of talking of politics for the adults, beautiful weather, and vegan cake. When we arrived home, we called my sister since she offered to watch the kids so we could go out. We spent a few minutes at Cynthia and Ernie's enjoying their fire before Karen arrived. We were going to take Josie with us when we went out, but I nursed her to sleep. Thus, we ended up having dinner just the two of us (this never happens) at KoFusion (we wanted to stay close to home in case Josie woke up...which she did just as we ordered, but Karen is amazing as was able to put her back to sleep!).We shared a seaweed salad, avocado sushi (and some fuji sushi, but I didn't take a picture), and I had a vegetable stir fry with udon noodles and Rob had the same, but with rice. Why should you eat seaweed? Well, especially for vegans, it has iodine which can be allusive in our diets unless you use iodized salt. Seaweed (since there are several different types of seaweed it depends on which one you are consuming) also tends to have B vitamins, Calcium, Magnesium, Potassium, and Calcium.
I had a very yummy pomegranate mojito as well. It was nice to be able to sit, relax, talk, and be able to eat without children grabbing my food or a baby nursing through it all. I missed the kids though and was happy to come home. I ate a ton of avocado sushi while I was pregnant with Josie at KoFusion...sometimes more than once a week...so it reminds me of her. The food was good and never make sushi at home (I should!), but I would have enjoyed a quiet dinner at home just as much. I do appreciate Karen taking care of the kids and they always love spending time with her. She is so busy lately, we haven't seen her except for a little bit at the Market at the Square.All in all it was a very nice anniversary. I'm glad to be married to my sweetheart for ten years and counting.

6 comments:

Lisa -- Cravin' Veggies said...

Congratulations and Happy 10th!

It's great to have a night out together once in a while. I usually prefer to bring the kids along, but every so often it's nice to be alone.

River (Wing-It Vegan) said...

Happy anniversary!! I loved reading this post! :)

Miss Jenny said...

Well, that pie did have regular old C&H granulated sugar and brown sugar in it, and I know some people consider those non-vegan ingredients. That's why I didn't label it as "vegan" for the contest. But those could be easily substituted!
It was fun to have your family there cheering me on. Thanks!

Misc said...

Happy anniversary! Ten years, either a mighty long time or just a drop in the bucket. I'm thinking with you two it's a drop in the bucket.

Lori said...

congratulations!! glad you got to go out for a special dinner :^)

VeganLinda said...

Thanks to everyone for the anniversary wishes!

Jenny, I noticed the other day at IGA that C&H has an organic sugar now. I'm so glad you won and that we got a chance to visit for a second. Parker is always happy to talk your ear off...wonder where he gets that from. LOL!