18 Years of Wedded Bliss!

Saturday, August 23rd, was our 18th wedding anniversary! Steve surprised me on Thursday night by saying "Let's go to Naples for the weekend to celebrate." So I did some surfing on the web and found this nice place not far from downtown and close to our friends who live in Bonita Springs. It was called the Inn of Naples. What a nice place to stay! We basically had a one bedroom suite with a mini fridge, microwave and balcony. Now THAT's my idea of camping!!!

We had a living room with a flat screen HDTV where Steve enjoyed relaxing the first evening.


And the bathroom was HUGE!


Now THIS is the way to be treated!


On Saturday night we walked along the beach at Naples, then walked around the shops downtown. It was the first decent night we'd seen in over a week as TS Fay had finally moved out of the area. My carefully straightened hair didn't stay so straight. And as I started to put on my makeup that morning I realized I'd left my foundation at home. I was NOT a happy camper! But it was so humid that it wouldn't have stayed on anyway. :) We finally found a nice place to eat called Trilogy. The service was impeccable and the food just melted in your mouth! We asked the waiter to take our picture.


When he found out that we were celebrating our 18th anniversary, he brought us a little gift. These were YUMMY chocolates!!!


We spent a lot of time with our friends Elias and Trish getting caught up and just chatting. Trish is doing REALLY well! We were SO happy to see them! And on Sunday night we finally dragged ourselves away and drove the 2 hours home to rescue our little dog Zoe who had been cared for by our friends Heather and Leo. She was quite happy to see us!

So what's my advice for staying so happily married for such a long time? Let God choose the right one for you! And make sure that you realize it's a 100% commitment every day from BOTH of you to stay married and to continue loving. Yes, we've had our ups and downs. With three stepsons on my part and a stubborn, opinionated stepdaughter on his part, (all of whom we endured the teenage years with) it wasn't easy! But we learned early on to choose which battles were the important ones and which ones we could just let go of and only fought the important ones. That went for each other as well as our kids! Being best friends helps too!

So thanks to all of you for your congrats and well wishes! And here's to many, many more years of wedded bliss! I love you Honey Bunny!