My First Valentine's Day

Flowers from my Valentine

I was shopping for greeting cards for my beloved and made a startling revelation: I could FINALLY buy one of the "For My Husband" cards this year. It's my first Valentine's with a husband.

Look, there's nothing wrong with living with your lover indefinitely, in fact, if there were reasons other than making our lives easier and health insurance to consider, Chef and I might've done it. But since there aren't a TON of differences in the 8 months we've been married compared to the 7 years we lived together, I thought I'd celebrate one of them, minor as it may be.

The sentiment of my Valentine is the same, even if the type is slightly different. My husband rocks the world. Clearly I think that because I married him. But he rocks for many reasons. On this, of all hollowed Hallmark holidays, I share with you a few:

• He makes dinner regularly.
• He has told me on several occasions that it is his mission to make me laugh every day. 
• He actually makes me laugh every day.
• He gets me to lighten up and let loose every now and again. 
• He challenges me--which is probably not that big of a deal, but when I was searching this was hard to find. 
• He spoils me with his time, his talents and his love.
• He encourages me to take the big leap when I need to.
• He keeps me motivated to keep going when I don't want to. 
• He believes in me (and isn't that what we all want?).

I am lucky to have a great husband and a great Valentine. And thankful for my friends and family who helped me believe that I was worth it. 

Happy Valentine's Day!

Good, but Just Not Good Enough

Tonight Chef and I had our Valentine's Day. And how best to celebrate than to do what we love: eat steak. But instead of hitting our usual Ruth's Chris, we decided to hit a place called Maestro's in Beverly Hills. It's gotten great reviews, so we decided to give it a whirl.

I knew we were in trouble when we sat down. The first thing was that our table was smooshed in the middle of the dining room and tiny. The back of a large Asian lady was touching our table. The second thing that happened was that our waitress asked "Are you even 21?" when Chef (and later I) ordered a drink. Normally, I'd be flattered about this but when you're in an expensive restaurant, the last thing you want to be labelled as is an underage couple going out to dinner. It's assumed that you don't have money and haven't eaten by yourself in a nice restaurant.

Calories were of no matter to me tonight. So we had two appetizers- crab cakes and scallops. The crab cakes were okay, but the scallops were delicious. Next was the main course. I had a 12 oz. filet medium, Chef had the18 oz. bone-in filet medium rare. We also had the famous lobster mashed potatoes and brussel sprouts with bacon.

Sounds delicious, right? And it was. But there were little things that just weren't quite right. My steak was medium well on one end and medium rare on the other end. Chef's steak was straight up rare. The brussel sprouts were served without bacon and they were burned. So when we asked for new ones, we got them, but by the time they were cooked again, we were almost done with dinner.

The highlight for me was the warm butter cake. It's Paula Deen's wet dream. It's a yellow cake with a caramelized butter crust and ice cream. It's also got fresh cream that was delicious. Seriously the butter cake was the best part of the meal, but I was so full that I only had about 1/3 or less of it. It was a shame to leave so much on my plate, but I'm sure my waistline will thank me.

After dinner, we waded back through the crowded (too crowded for my taste and especially for a Wednesday night) restaurant and bar to get my car from the valet. It took about 20 minutes. TWENTY MINUTES to get our car.

So, nothing that was a tragedy about the experience, but for the price, I want my butt kissed. I want a table where I can actually hear Patrick talk when he speaks to me. I want to not have an Asian lady's back fat dipping into my lobster mashed potatoes. I want there to be enough light that the waitress doesn't need the penlight she's carrying to see that there's no bacon in the brussel sprouts. It was all nice and good food, but it just wasn't nice or good enough. Maybe I'll get some butter cake to go when I get a craving.

Chef's made me a discerning consumer. That's not such a bad thing.

We Got Donuts for Valentine's Day

When Chef and I first started dating, I would get so anxious about Valentine's Day. I wanted to make it special and had to find the right gift. Chef would try too, but I knew while he wanted to show he cared, he was begrudgingly doing it for that specific holiday.

First of all, it's not quite fair on him that Valentine's Day is only a little over two weeks from my birthday, which is only a month after Christmas. That's a lot of gift giving and creativity to use up in 6-8 weeks time. But I digress.

It's amazing how five years of coupledom will change your perspective. Now we're both like "Wanna go out for drinks together? Cool. Let's not do it on Valentine's Day because it will be too crowded out. Let's go out on Tuesday." It's like we've blended into one low maintenance mind in that way.

So for Valentine's Day today, we cruised over to Krispy Kreme and in a sweeping act of romance, got some HOT FRESH NOW heart-shaped glazed donuts. It was perfect. Now we plan on eating them, doing nothing and enjoying the day together.