Not Your Average V-Day

Happy Belated Valentine's Day everyone!!! This week has been a pretty crazy one. From Chris and my outrageously busy work schedules, our recreational commitments, Chris' last minute trip to Austin, and Valentine's weekend, it's been hard to just get an hour of relaxation. As some of ya'll know, Chris' dad is going through chemotherapy right now. He is the hardest working man I have ever met. He is always moving around, building something, or tearing something apart. Well, since he has been on chemo, he has become significantly immobile. Chris has been pretty strong during it all, but Thursday night broke down. He went up to Austin (where his dad is being treated) on a last minute decision to visit him. His dad was having a surgery to insert a feeding tube, and Chris' sister told him that he had been pretty down lately. So Chris went up there, and spent some time with him. His dad isn't in dying condition, but is no where near his normal self.

That night was particularly hard on me. This may sound selfish, but whatever. I have never spent the night alone in our house, and going to sleep without Chris next to me was soooo hard. I talked to Chris on the phone, I talked to my mom, and even tried to get Matthew to come spend the night with me just so I wouldn't be alone. I eventually had to just suck it up and fall asleep. Well, around 3am, I heard a noise which startled me awake. It sounded like someone breathing. I was facing the door and looked around and didn't see anything. I turned around to look at the alarm clock, and saw Chris laying next to me. I didn't believe my eyes. I thought I was still dreaming, so I reached out my hand to touch him. He felt real. I was sooo confused and couldn't understand why he was in our bed, so I just fell back asleep. The next day, he told me that he realized that he needed to be home with me, so he drove back. That was really special.

Friday night Chris and I went to Zio's for dinner and we had SUCH a great time. He had the never-ending pasta bowl, and I had crispy shrimp scampi (which is VERY hard to say quickly lol). We had great conversation too, which reminded me of why we fell for each other in the first place--we are such good friends. We talked about our past relationships and how we grew from them, and how/when we knew that we wanted to marry each other. It was the sweetest thing.

Saturday, Chris had to work. He accepted a position at the bowling alley on the weekends as the director of the youth bowling league. He is already in charge of a league on Monday nights, and really has a heart for youth as well, so when this position was offered to him, he jumped at it. It's just another hobby he enjoys--Lord knows he's not doing it for the money.

Anyway, while he worked, I was able to sleep in a couple hours. When I woke up, I cleaned our WHOLE house!!! Ahhh! It took me until 3:30!!! Chris came home a little while later and we planted my Valentine's Day present from him! He bought me a Mountain Laurel tree!!! Mountain Laurels are my favorite trees because their purple blooms have the sweetest smell in the world. So we spent all afternoon and part of the evening planting that thing! It was definitely not your typical Valentine's Day. After that we made dinner together. We had steak, scallops, baked potatoes, veggies, and some great wine. Later on, I gave Chris my gift to him, but I can't really give any details on that. Lets just say that it got pretty steamy in the Shaw house last night! ;]

Here are some pictures of our first tree! Disregard my very tired appearance!