7 years ago...

I made the best decision of my life by marrying Mario! We've had a great 7 years and lots of reasons to celebrate.

We had a fun weekend celebrating our anniversary since we knew Mario would have to go back to Newark today for work. Friday night we had a babysitter lined up for us to go out to dinner. I planned on something close by, but Mario felt we should really celebrate such a special occasion. He Mario picked a fabulous place about 35 minutes from our house. It was fun driving along the countryside of VA to get there (in Paris, VA). I'm not sure of the history of the Ashby Inn, but is definitely a fancy restaurant. The chef takes great pride in his creations and the menu is full of amazing food utilizing ingredients from the local VA farms. Each dish was paired with a wine by the sommelier. Mario will have to take us back sometime when I am not pregnant so I can really enjoy the blending of flavors. We ate outside and enjoyed a fabulous view with a tasteful live band playing some music for us. Later in the evening, there was a hint of a thunderstorm with far off flashes of lightning and a nice breeze. Fortunately it didn't rain on us.

For appetizers I had the green tomato gazpacho with grilled parmesan crumble, bacon, olive oil espuma. Mario had the rockfish seviche with honey, espellette, puffed wild rice, sour cherry granite. We usually each pick an entree and split them, but we both wanted the smoked beef rib loin with triple cooked potato, rosemary, beet vinaigrette and we were very happy with our choice. For dessert we had the grilled creme fraiche pound cake with blueberry syrup, salted butter ice cream. The chef brought us extra treats in honor of our anniversary. One was a gummy like dessert and the other was a lemon caramel which was incredible. I gained 2 pounds that night, but I think it was worth it, and baby Suarez was happy. http://www.ashbyinn.com/

I've included other pictures in the slideshow. Our other very exciting news of the weekend is that MJ passed the swim test! He had to swim one length of the pool (50 meters I think) and then tread water for 30 seconds. We didn't think he'd be ready to do it on Sunday, but with both Mario and I at the pool with the kids, we had time to practice with him. MJ was determined and he did it! We were so proud of him, but he was equally proud of himself.

Backtracking a little, I have pictures from our fun sailing event thanks to Booz&Co and the Kaza family who watched our kids for us. It was the first time it rained in about 2 weeks, so it was a very wet sail. But we got to actively participate and trim sails, steer the ship, as well as hang out with coworkers, so it was a fun time.

Rounding out the slideshow are a few kid pictures. Joey passed out on the kitchen floor...I guess he was tired. He fell asleep around 5pm and we decided to see if he could make it through the night, which he did and slept 14 hours! Sheila is very interested in dressing herself now, and while she can't put everything on by herself she has her own opinions of what she should wear.

The final picture was taken at 4:30am this morning. Mario found me on the bed in Sheila's room since she was up vomiting in the middle of the night. He was about to drive to the train for work...but we have made an effort to have a picture together on our actual anniversary and this is what we got! Although, I think it does show our love in action.