Indoor Drive-In

Hubby and I really wanted to go to a drive-in the other night. 

Few problems though:

Our budget is non existent at the moment.

No babysitter.

It has been scorching hot and humid lately.

I mean stepping-outside-is-like-stepping-into-a-hot-shower kind of hot.

No problem!

We made an indoor drive-in at home!

Welcome to the Whiteley Drive-In!

I had most things ready before Hubby got home so when he walked up the stairs to our apartment, this is what he saw:

I used construction paper, ribbon, scissors, glue....anything and everything I had on hand.

This date didn't cost a dime!

I made a "road" street sign and stop light to keep with our vehicle theme. 

Inside is where it really got fun.

I took christmas lights and strung them on the ceiling to create "stars". 

Then I brought out a cardboard box (we have plenty of those around since we are moving in two weeks!!!) with paint, paper, tin foil and clingy wrap.

Then we went to town making our "car" to take to the drive-in.

Hubby painted doors and handles, while I made a cute little license plate ;)

We used clingy wrap for the windshield and tin foil for the side-view mirrors. 

Once we were done, we "drove-in" and watched a movie together under the "stars"!

So fun right!

This date was completely awesome because :

A. Free baby! 

B. We had complete temperature control

C. Hubby and I got to create something fun together instead of just watching a movie

Try it! 

And send me pics! 

I would love to see what kind of cars ya'll come up with. 

Stay cool and....

Happy Dating!

Linking up:

SKip to my Lou

3rd Anniversary

On Saturday June 23, Hubby and I celebrated our 3rd wedding anniversary. 

3 wonderful years.

We were married in the Salt Lake City Temple for time and all eternity.

It was a beautiful, cloudless day. 

Everything was perfect.

To celebrate, we went to our favorite local ice cream shop. I got chocolate and butter pecan on a homemade chocolate dipped waffle cone. Hubby got cantaloup and banana. 

I don't know about you guys, but if I am going to get a dessert....I am going to get a dessert. 

None of this fruit nonsense. 

Sheesh.

After we put Sweet B to bed (with a sitter), we went to a beautiful spot on the river to watch the sunset. There is a tree swing that sits right off the bank with a gorgeous view. It was wonderful to spend the evening together listening to the river and watching the fire-flys surround us on the swing.

We laughed, made faces, and cursed our cheap camera that can't seem to capture anything we want it to. 

Darn it. 

Just image a gorgeous river, speckled with glowing fire-flys. 

Then imagine a big beautiful tree with a couple sitting on a swing.

And I will imagine that my waist is the size that it was 3 years ago. 

Ahem...

Happy Anniversary Hubby!

Thanks for the happiest years of my life!

Happy Dating!

Romance Spotlight: Lauryn

Hello everyone and welcome to another ROMANCE SPOTLIGHT! Lauryn from love notes by lauryn is here to share her and her hubby's story. It's super cute and I hope you take a minute to read it! Be sure to stop by her AWESOME blog too. 

Take it away Lauryn!

hello friday night date night readers!

i'm lauryn from the blog

mackenzie asked me to post about my husband and i.

she asked me to write it a LOONG time ago.

and i never got around to it. not because i was trying to be irresponsible, 

but because i wanted to capture our story perfectly in a short amount of words.

see i have known my sweet boy for 7 years. 

out of those 7:

2.5 were spent dating

2 were spent writing letters

& for 2 years we have been married.

i could honestly write a long book about our story....

much too long for a blog post. 

so i will share our life and our love story in a very very small nutshell.

and for those of you who really don't even want the nutshell version, 

here is the story in pictures:

pull up a seat and grab some popcorn or something.

even the nutshell story is long.

high school sweethearts

michael and i met my freshman year of high school. i was 15 and he was 16.

i was often a visitor at his house.. he had the party house.

we talked, played ping pong, had water fights, drove around crazy in the car, etc.

one night as i was leaving he so casually said 

"you're not leaving without a hug"

i already was crushing on this boy. 

and now, my 15 year old self was going to get a hug from this stud!

ah, bliss.

we began to see a lot more of one another, and one night he kissed me.

i was 15.

i was horrified.

so i cried.

and broke up with him.

over text.

yes, i cried. yes i broke up with him. yes it was over text.

i'm awful i know.

i really couldn't believe i had been kissed. i felt so little!

naive little me, ruined by an innocent little peck.

so i decided it was probably a great time to go back to my old boyfriend 

who i held hands with, texted a lot, and was never alone with him.

much more comfortable for me.

by time i was a sophomore, 

i was a single girl again. ready to enjoy my high school life.

i would see cute little michael on the hill at lunch.

him with all his cool friends and pizza just hanging out in the back of a pickup truck.

gosh, he was so cool.

whatever.

i didn't even like him.

i think.

my friend one night asked me if i would ever get back together with him.

i jumped right on that.

uh, yes.

next thing i knew we were dating again! 

i loved it. it was always so much fun. 

all the time happiness.

called to serve, rochester NY

eventually, 

the time came that the boy had to leave me.

he turned 19 and it was time for him to serve the lord.

he got called to serve a mission for our church in rochester, new york.

i was completely supportive. i wanted him to do this.

but the thought of him being gone for 2 entire years-just short of the amount of time we had dated-

made me sick. sick sick sick.

i went with him to the missionary training center when he left 

(you could do that back then, now it is not permitted)

when i came home, i went right to the lovesac in our front room

and lived there.

for days.

weeks.

i was hysterical.

it was pathetic.

i couldn't believe it.

i slept with kleenex boxes and woke up to tissue crumbs.

i missed a TON of school.

no one warned me how hard this was going to be.

what had i gotten myself into.

a big freakin' mess.

that's what.

somehow i gained the composure to go back to school.

i finished out my senior year of high school and could not have done it without my bestie ky.

we had a blast.. to this day she is my best friend. i love love love her.

time for adventure

when i graduated i decided it was time for me to have some adventure.

i don't know why or where it came from, but i decided i was going to go to mexico.

i went for 4 months, stayed with an AMAZING family and taught english to sweet little kiddos.

i grew up a ton. 

i got busy enough i wasn't constantly stressing over my missionary.

i came back and was a counselor at a youth camp.

i got my first REAL job teaching preschool. (i still work there today!)

i started school at the university of utah.

and waited.

such a long wait

people told me it would get easier. it didn't.

people told me the second year was easier. it wasn't.

i still had many nights where all i wanted to do was go find my lovesac and sleep.

i needed him.

it was so so hard.

i would find myself with less tissues in the bed, 

but that didn't stop the random bursts of pain, spouts of tears, heartache.

i remember talking to ky and telling her i could actually feel pain in my heart.

every once and a while now, i will remember the pain and begin to cry.

i can not even explain how hard it was on me.

i didn't want to be one of those girls... all sappy and weird about a kid from high school.

but i totally was. i didn't care, i still don't care. 

he is my sweetie.

...but so worth it

after 2 years, and 4 days extra too!

he came home.

(i even felt relief writing that!)

i went to the airport with his family.. i was a nervous wreck!

sweating like crazy, shaking....ah.

what was i going to do.

first person of the plane.

no.

not him.

not them.

not her either.

suits?

missionaries!

michael!!

this could not be happening.

i was SO happy.

the second i saw him i knew things would work out.

i just knew it.

may 28, 2010 ...then comes marriage

and they did.

michael got home the beginning of december.

he proposed at the end of january.

we got married in the salt lake temple at the end of may.

these have been the happiest 2 years of my life.

i love my cute michael so much. 

he is absolutely amazing.

i feel 100% complete with him.

he is the only thing that can make me TRULY happy.

i am lucky lucky lucky in LOVE.

thanks mackenzie for having me.

it was so good for me to finally sit down and write our story.

♥

Thanks so much Lauryn! Loved it!
Hope you stop by again for another ROMANCE SPOTLIGHT!

Happy Dating!

S'mores Night

Have I mentioned the fact that I have awesome neighbors?

Because I do. 

True story. 

The other night as we were getting in to bed we noticed our lovely neighbors building a fire outside.

That can only mean one thing:

S'mores!

 Who doesn't love a s'mores night? It was kind of a spur-of-moment thing and one by one fellow neighbors trickled out of their apartments to join the fun. 

 It was a fantastic way to end the evening. There is nothing like gathering around a fire roasting marshmellows while watching fire-flys fill the night sky. 

Aaahhhh.....I just love Virginia. 

And my neighbors...

And date nights...

Happy Dating!

Linking up:

Something Swanky

Romance Spotlight: Rachel

Hello everyone and welcome to another ROMANCE SPOTLIGHT! Rachel from The Random Writings of Rachel is here to share what she and her hubby did for their first anniversary. I hope you take a minute to read all about it and be sure to stop by her blog and say hi!

Take it away Rachel!

Hi! I’m Rachel and I’ve been married a year and a half to my love, Angel. 

 My husband and I decided shortly after we got married that we’d take turns planning anniversary celebrations. I volunteered to take the first year. We were both in college when we first met (he was a senior and I was a freshman back then), and I was still in college, and, in fact, even had one class on the day we celebrated our 1^st anniversary, so I decided to give our anniversary celebration a “Back to School” theme. I also wanted to go traditional with the anniversary present (1^st anniversary is paper), so I bought a journal for us to share, to write to each other in. 

My husband didn’t have to work, and drove me to school on the day of our date. Before I left for class, I left him with a Test and a Reading Assignment. The Test was compiled of a whole bunch of “How well do you know your spouse?” type questions. The Reading Assignment was found in the new journal, it was a letter from me to him. He chose to add a Writing Assignment too, and wrote me a letter while he was waiting for me to get out of class. 

When my class was done, I was happy to find out that my test and assignments had gone over well, and he was excited to find out what we’d be doing next. I told him that we were going out to eat at the only restaurant we ever ate at while he was in college: Taco Bell. Where we are, Taco Bell is the cheapest place to eat out, and during my first year of college, it was the go-to place when Angel and I and our friends wanted some food. After he graduated and started working, we could afford restaurants on a slightly higher level of sophistication than Taco Bell, but I wanted to take him back there so we could remember the fun days of being in college together. At Taco Bell, we went over the test Angel had taken (I had taken one earlier), and I found, to my dismay, that he had a higher score than I did—he knew more right answers about me than I knew about him! I learned that I have to work on my research skills.

After that, we went out for “recess”—to an arcade where you can play games for quarters. Another college student-budget friendly activity! We just happened to hit the jackpot on one game and ended up getting enough tickets to redeem them for a stuffed bumblebee, which now sits proudly on a shelf in our bedroom, forever a reminder of our 1^st anniversary.

 It was simple and inexpensive, but also fun, and now I can’t wait to see what Angel does for our 2^nd anniversary!

Thanks so much Rachel! Loved it!

Hope you stop by again for another ROMANCE SPOTLIGHT!

Happy Dating!

Flour Fight Group Date

I am so exited to share this group date with you guys! It was seriously THE BEST!

We had a Flour Fight!

That's right. We threw flour at each other. And it was probably the most fun I have had on a group date. 

Ever.

Everyone brought a bag of flour and put them in a pile in the grass. Then we all raced to the pile and grabbed whatever bag you could get your hands on. 

As much fun as this was, I gotta say it feels like death when it gets in you ears. And then there was some bright lady who brought powdered sugar instead of flour. (Glad it wasn't me...ahem)

Never use powdered sugar. 

That's all I'm going to say about that.

Even the kids got involved in this one. Everyone had a blast!

I highly recommend this for a group date. I can't say it enough: It was so fun!

It's relatively cheap too. Just use the flour in your house or whatever you have on hand. Whipped cream, baby powder but whatever you do don't use powdered sugar!

You have been warned.

Try it! Grab some flour and have a go!

Happy Dating!

Linking up: