I wrote this post as part of the Plugrá Butter Brigade. Thanks, Plugrá, for sponsoring this post and for making my favorite butter!
Mike and I accidentally celebrated our 5-month wedding “anniversary” yesterday. You may wonder how it’s possible to accidentally celebrate an anniversary. Allow me to regale you with a tale of intrigue and fondue (okay, or incompetence and fondue.)
Mike and I have always been bad at anniversaries. It’s not because we don’t love each other or whatever. It’s just because dates and times and calendars and schedules are hard and stupid and I hate them. And apparently I’m a sullen 5-year-old about it. So there.
I have trouble knowing what day of the week or month it is at any given time (I’ve even surrendered the job of writing the date on the board in my classroom to my students’ more capable hands). So year after year while dating, we let our anniversary pass us by (and we had around 14 of those before getting married!)
When we got married, I was pretty sure this phenomenon of forgetting anniversaries would end. In fact, we were so honeymoonish and in love and gross that I was pretty sure we were going to start celebrating monthly anniversaries like those cloying couples on Facebook. YOU KNOW THE ONES.
Then we missed the first one. And the second. BUT I WAS BUSY. We were up to our ears in moving boxes! Whatever! It would happen.
Three months, four months. Every now and then I’d count up how long we’d been married and be shocked. Time goes so fast! Who has time to celebrate? We were still unpacking!
Another thing we were similarly lame about was using the awesome fondue set my parents had given us for our wedding. I kept promising Mike (who was for some reason really adorably excited about fondue?) we would set it up and have fondue when we were finally “settled in.” You know, SETTLED IN: boxes recycled, apartment assembled, some semblance of normalcy achieved. Only we never seemed to get there. Who can clean when you’re planning 3 entirely new English curricula plus two other preps and trying to keep up with Dance Moms?
Finally, winter break came and we were able to fully clean the apartment for the first time since we’d moved in. I was shocked my vacuum cleaner still worked. I hadn’t seen my feather duster in months. I found I’d grown kind of sentimental about the pile of unsorted mail towering on the bookshelf. Stop looking at me like that.
One night we were sitting in our newly cleaned living room and I realized I finally felt home. It was time to celebrate! Mike and I decided to have a New Year’s celebration with (drumroll) THE FONDUE SET. We couldn’t manage it on New Year’s Eve, though (midweek and all that), so we moved it to the weekend.
YOU KNOW, THE WEEKEND. JANUARY 4. OUR FIVE-MONTH ANNIVERSARY. And that’s the story of how, with no actual planning or intention, we managed to finally, accidentally celebrate our flippin’ anniversary. Now someone please set an alarm for August 4. And hire someone to clean my apartment. Thanks.
It was pretty snazzy accidental celebration if I do say so myself! The fondue was fancy-schmancy and delicious (we made a traditional Swiss fondue with Gruyère and Chardonnay). We watched the finale of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, because we’re nerds and we do that sort of thing. And for dessert, we had these incredible Buttery Almond Stuffed Morning Buns.
These buns are definitely a special occasion treat. They’re the best yeast rolls, soaked with butter (using my favorite Plugrá Butter), stuffed with an indulgent almond mixture, and drizzled with a sweet almond glaze. Basically, they’re insane. If you’re an almond croissant fan like me, you’ve gotta try them! Maybe it’ll accidentally be your anniversary? You never know . . .
One year ago: Boozy Icebox Cake
Two years ago: Healthy Roasted Tomato and Onion Bread Soup
Three years ago: Two Exquisite Tea Sandwiches
Four years ago: Pumpkin Cheesecake Bread Pudding