Our Valentine’s Day

Today Ryan and I celebrated Valentine’s Day! We’ll get to all the love fun in a second, but first I think you’ll be proud to hear that I actually made it to the gym today!

I have to be honest with you guys, it wasn’t looking good at first. When Ryan and I took Sadie on a long walk around 10 a.m., I told him I just wasn’t feelin’ it. Then I got home and read this comment from Melissa:

I did the same thing this morning . . . planning to workout a little later & hoping it happens! I’m going to think of you as a virtual workout buddy today–I have to show up later because Julie will!

How could I not workout after reading that!?

So I trekked over to the gym with Ryan and took a BodyPump class after I completed 15 minutes on the elliptical.

It felt great. Like I always tell myself, I’ve never regretted a workout!

Valentine’s Day Mission

After the gym, Ryan and I split up to complete our Valentine’s Day Mission.

Each year we split up at the same time for two hours and head out to pick out Valentine’s Day gifts for each other for under $15. You may see what we got each other last year here.

This year we upped the budget to $20 (inflation + marriage ) and I drove straight to one of my all-time favorite stores for bargains.

Marshalls!

I was initially going to go to Sports Authority to look for a new workout shirt for Ryan, but knew I’d have a much better chance of staying within our budget if I went to Marshalls. I ended up with an awesome $10 forest green Nike dri-fit shirt for him which he really seemed to like!

I also got a little side tracked…

How cute are these tennis dresses? I seriously debated taking up tennis so I could justify adding these dresses to my workout wardrobe.

After Marshalls, I hit up a few more stores to pick up random food-related goodies to round out a gift basket for Ryan.

A pit stop to Menchie’s for some frozen yogurt also occurred.

I think I may be addicted to fro yo.

I then headed home to exchange gifts with Ryan before heading out to dinner.

Gift Exchange

Our gifts to each other seemed  to have a similar theme… food and exercise. Go figure.

For $20 I gave Ryan:

• Forest green Nike dri fit workout shirt
• Oatmeal chocolate chip cookie from Whole Foods (Our fav!)
• Gourmet spiced olives from the Whole Foods
• Cheddar + caramel corn snack pack mix from Kernel Encore

My gifts from Ryan included:

• Thorlo padded running socks (I love these!)
• Lots of fun-flavored gum (I’m addicted)
• Cheddar + caramel corn XL mix from Kernel Encore

Notice that we got each other the same popcorn? I guess we have a knack for buying each other the same presents.

I loved my gifts from Ryan and he seemed to like the gifts I gave him. Valentine’s Day success!

Valentine’s Dinner

After our gift exchange I headed off to get a hair cut at Great Clips (nothin’ fancy for this girl) before I came home to change and get ready for our dinner date this evening.

Ryan surprised me with reservations to Kres, a steakhouse in downtown Orlando that we’ve heard a lot about.

I think a lot of couples were celebrating Valentine’s Day this evening because Kres was filled with duos.

After perusing the menu, we placed our orders and enjoyed a warm loaf of sourdough bread.

Ryan and I shared a bowl of French onion soup with duck.

The soup was amazing! It had a lot of cheese and delicious onion slices throughout.

For our entrees, we shared blackened sea scallops, roasted Brussels sprouts and the Kres trio of lamb, filet mignon and garlic shrimp with au gratin potatoes and asparagus.

I was really excited about the scallops but they really disappointed me. Ryan wasn’t a huge fan either and neither of us liked the Brussels sprouts. (We brought them home for Sadie who loved ‘em.) Bust!

Luckily the Kres trio was fantastic. All the of meat was great and the au gratin potatoes were creamy and unbelievably cheesy.

Our waitress then brought us dessert menus and we immediately selected the crispy banana sundae.

Holy whipped cream! The sundae was really delicious.

We both said our date itself was fantastic though the food at Kres was only so-so. Fortunately it’s hard to have a bad date experience with Ryan. He’s a good time!

After dinner we walked around downtown Orlando before heading home to eat more popcorn. We’re in love with that stuff!

I’m off to hang with Ryan before my sister arrives in town for the evening! I can’t wait to see her! Sadie’s gonna flip when Aunt Leslie walks through the door.