The Date Inspired by the Letter H

I promised to tell you the end of Ryan's birthday celebration, and happily I can report that this date doubled as the date inspired by the letter H!

After he got off work, and after he opened his gift, we went out for hamburgers for dinner! Originally I thought maybe on this date, we would go to some drive-in hamburger/hot dog place, but since it was his birthday, I decided to go a different route. We headed out to Five Guys, which we've only been to once before and loved.

Ryan loves the peanuts you can snack on while you wait for your food! (And I didn't love the bad lighting AGAIN.)

I do love that you can choose your burger as a smaller size or a bigger size, so there was something for both of us. And they don't charge extra for ANY topping, so we loaded up with all the toppings!

(We got the Cajun fries and shared them. Oh my goodness. Good stuff!)

After dinner, we went to Starbucks so Ryan could get his free birthday treat.

And then we went to Highland Park. (If you're not local, that's just the city park in this fine town. It's a nice park! Had some of my senior pictures taken there, actually.)

It was a perfect night, weather-wise. We just strolled through the park, enjoying the sights. (And sounds of ball games.)

Funny story. Our selfie stick died a few weeks ago, so part of Ryan's birthday gift was a new one. We hadn't used it yet, but we brought it with us for when we took our chalkboard picture for this date. We could NOT get it to stay connected to his phone, and this beauty was captured while we messed with it. It's probably one of the more accurate pictures of the night.

(Great. We're turning into 85 year olds before our time.)

Finally got it!

Then we walked to another part of the park, and I had no idea Ryan was taking more pictures while we went.

He cracks me up!

We visited Old Ben, a stuffed steer.

We wanted to sit on some swings, but the ones we found on the non-occupied playground were also swings for toddlers - so we couldn't fit in them. I found a most lovely bench by the water, and we sat down, only to realize that thingiemadoo in front of us was for wastewater. Eyeroll.

Seriously! Who puts a scenic sitting area by that kind of an aroma????

So we gave up and moved. Found a little area that was unoccupied and just sat for a while to finish our coffee and talk.

Turned out to be a pretty fun date night, and our most favorite part was just being TOGETHER. We had spent so many of the previous nights apart while Ryan helped people with projects, we were just glad to be alone together!

You can see all the alphabetical dates (so far) here!

The Date Inspired by The Letter D

Our alphabetical date quest continued this past weekend, and we did TWO in one weekend. And both were out of order. I need to sit down. Someone bring me a brown paper bag! (Kidding.) (Kind of.)

So we were originally supposed to do the "D" date two weeks ago on Friday night, but the theme for the night was the Double Date with Dinner Downtown, and the night we were scheduled to go, the other half of our double date had a family thing come up and they needed to reschedule. I was busy last Friday night, so that meant this "D" date ended up falling after the "E" date we did last Saturday morning.

Totally worth the wait, though!

First, let's talk about the "double date" part. We've not gone on a lot of those in our life, but we'd been intending to get together with our friends Mark and Kari ever since we moved to Kokomo, and it hadn't happened yet. Kari and I had gotten together to hang out, but never all four of us. So we made arrangements to hang out together for dinner, which took care of another "D."

There are a decent number of little restaurants in downtown Kokomo, and we had driven by Wings, Etc. several times, but had never been. Ryan loves wings, so I thought this would be the perfect time to give it a try.

And then he didn't order wings.

I guess that means he ordered etc.

Anyway. So this restaurant is way bigger than I thought it was. It's in a really cool old building with exposed brick walls and all, but the dining room goes allllllllll the way to the back of the whole building. And that would also be where they sat us! Right next to a very festive St. Patrick's Day bunch. (I'm talking green sequined berets, lighted flashing earrings and the whole bit.)

We have one of those discount cards for various businesses around town and at this place, you can get a free appetizer with the purchase of an entree. We got soft pretzels with cheese and I'd love to show you a picture but someone (ahem...who may be writing this post) was so hungry, she cared only about eating them!

I decided before we went that I wasn't going to worry about finding the healthiest thing on the menu, since that probably didn't even exist, and it could be treat night. I got something I never get anywhere, but really like: jumbo shrimp! For the record, I brought home over half the food in this picture and then split it with Ryan when I did eat leftovers!

Ryan, the lover of wings, got a wrap. LOL!!

It was also good that the restaurant had an assortment of TVs, because we accidentally scheduled this adventure smack in the middle of March Madness. (Shouldn't that be the M date???)

But we had a great time with Mark and Kari. (She's one of my extra sisters. Not related by blood, but I'd claim her as one!!)

Double dates are fun! We should do more of them!

(All the alphabetical dates so far are found here, if you need some ideas for your life too! 

Alphabetical Dates: The Letter "C"

Welllllllllllll, here is one date that certainly saw more modifications than I intended! Just to catch you up real quickly, in case you're new here - we're mixing up our married dating life this year by going on alphabetically themed dates. You can read about the "A" date here and the "B" date here, and this week, I was bound and determined that despite the chaos of our week, we were GETTING the "C" date. And it turned out to be one of the most beautiful and welcomed parts of the week. That's for sure!

My friend Odie said we needed to go on a CRUISE for the C date, and we definitely agreed, but alas. We just bought a gallbladder eviction, so we lacked the funds to buy a cruise.

So the next best thing? A "coffee shop crawl." How fun is that? It's like a pub crawl, but we don't drink, so we went from coffee shop to coffee shop instead. Or at least we tried. It was a brilliant plan on paper. I spread the date over the course of three days, because I felt we could enjoy the coffee much more if we weren't trying to do allllllllllllll the coffee shops in one day. I mean, that is a lot of caffeine and sugar - even for us.

I found three coffee shops in Kokomo we hadn't yet visited, and I spent time researching when they were open and arranged the dates accordingly. (Can I just say that is my only complaint about Kokomo coffee shops? None of them stay open very late at all.)

So the plan was that Thursday morning, we would get up extra early and a little after seven, we would go to The Bind Cafe, which is a coffee shop downtown that I didn't even know existed until a few weeks ago when I saw it on a list of must-visit coffee shops in the state of Indiana. Their Facebook page said they opened at seven, so I thought I'd give them a couple of minutes to settle, but go early enough that we would still have time to enjoy coffee and breakfast before Ryan had to work.

We arrived at 7:10 to this.

Closed up tight. Not closed, but lights on and people milling about, just running behind. Closed, closed, closed. Dark inside, no cars outside, CLOSED.

I don't think I need to explain how disappointing that is for two coffee addicts who have already survived a significant chunk of their morning without coffee, waiting for this glorious moment.

Baffled and befuddled, I checked their Facebook page again to see if I had somehow misread it. Nope. It said right there in bright green: "OPEN." And yet clearly, not so much. So we drove away with much sadness, and headed instead to Big Ben Coffee, which is our favorite local shop.

Ryan got fresh brew and I got the same with a scone on the side. (He was having breakfast at work, so he didn't need food.) We thoroughly enjoyed watching the sunrise and talking together. A lovely, leisurely morning, and even though it was Plan B, it was wonderful. And we took some goofy photos.

Friday night, after the lonnnnnnnnnnnnnng week was finally behind us, we went to our second destination. There's a place in town called Coffee Junkiez that has several locations. Most are drive-thru only, but they have one full-sized restaurant that is both Coffee Junkiez and Pizza Junkiez. So we went for dinner and coffee.

The thunderstorms that rolled through central Indiana showed up while we were eating dinner, so it was nice to be inside where it was comfy and dry. It was actually quite a nice little place to eat. Quiet, calming music, lots of space, DELICIOUS pizza.

Ryan would like to point out that we got the Carnivore pizza, because it also starts with C. After we ate, we ordered lattes. Andes Mint for Ryan and Raspberry Delight for me, and we just kicked back, talked for a while, and watched the rain while we enjoyed our coffee. Delicious.

A keeper of a night, a keeper of a coffee joint, and the ONLY date that went as planned.

Saturday morning, we had plans to go to Main Street Cafe, because we had a gift card we'd been saving to use. It's hard to go to this place, because they have NO evening hours at all, and that makes it tough when you have a day job. (Plus, Ryan only gets 1/2 hour for lunch on weekdays, so eating out is not an option.)

I'd been there on a Saturday morning before, with one of my friends, so Ryan and I got up early on the only day we could sleep in, got ready, and drove in the snow to Main Street Cafe: Closed. Apparently they're not open on Saturdays. Not sure how they were open the day I went, but they were definitely not participating for our date day. Womp, womp.

So we drove to another part of downtown to a little cafe called Gabetta's, and ordered breakfast and fresh brew. It wasn't a true coffee shop, but desperate times call for desperate measures, right?

When we went to pay the bill, we discovered it's owned by Coffee Junkiez, too, so SCORE! It counts as a coffee shop!

So the winning part of our C date was that we had three opportunities to enjoy quality time together in the middle of a week that was totally chaotic and exhausting. Love that. And that's what really counts. The losing part of our C date was that 2/3 of our destinations were complete busts. Sadness indeed.

Hometown Date: Christmas at the Seiberling!

One thing I've really enjoyed about our move to Kokomo has been the chance to go on fun hometown dates to places I'd never been before. We did several during the summer, but we had a chance to do a couple more last week, and I wanted to show you one today!

There is a mansion here in town called the Seiberling, which you can read about here if you're a big history buff. It was built back in the 1800's as a private residence, and has been owned by a handful of {equally wealthy} people over the years {And, I learned, for a short while, it served as the campus of IU Kokomo. Can you imagine? A whole college in one house?} It's now a museum that houses historical things about Kokomo.

I confess that being the non-history-loving girl, I would be unlikely to visit a museum, but at Christmas they deck the halls, the windows, the stairways, and everything else, so it suddenly held massive appeal for me.

You do have to pay to go on the Christmas tour, but they had a few nights when businesses covered the cost and it was free to the public, so we went on one of those nights. THANK YOU, First Farmer's Bank and Trust, for giving us a date night! :)

{I had wanted to go, but since Ryan was feeling so lousy, I didn't think we'd be able to. At the last minute, he said he was up for it, and some of my friends happened to be going that same night, so it turned into this big group outing!}

LOOK AT THIS HOUSE!!!

Yes. It has three floors. Isn't it so pretty!?!?!!?

I call this piece "Shaffer Selfie in the Foyer."

We don't rock mirror selfies.

Anyway. Here are some of the sights of the house. {There was also live music on two of the floors, and a voting contest to vote for your favorite room.}

This is what happens when the Shaffers visit a fancy establishment but cannot manage to take the Shaffer out of the visit:

And yes. That is a chamber pot. {The ladies working that room got a big giggle out of this moment.}

Back to the loveliness:

Look at that VILLAGE and the TRAIN! And if you look just ahead of the train, you'll see a police car that has pulled over a Krispy Kreme truck. LOL!!

Group selfie on the third floor!

Porch picture:

And at the house next door {which is also part of the museum complex}, they had snacks and SANTA!!!!!

It turned out to be a really fun night, and I was so thankful Ryan powered through the miseries of his cold to give me a beautiful memory! :)

 Linking up with Tamar!