Surprise Roses

Good morning friends! Hope your Monday is going great whether you're at work or enjoying a nice 3-day weekend. I'm soaking this extra day up since the next holiday doesn't roll around until Memorial Day in May.

Our Valentine's date night on Saturday took us to Scarborough Fair in Sea Girt, which was rated the "most romantic restaurant" by Open Table. I was excited to check it out, and even more excited to try the food once I found out it's almost all organic and locally sourced. Even the meats are humanely raised and organic, and the seafood is all wild.

We tried a medley of things, including escargot in puff pastry with brie and pernod, spanakopita bites and lobster bisque (we went a little nuts on the apps!). For my entree I selected the sea scallops with herbed risotto, asparagus and lemon thyme butter.

The scallops were so good, and tasted just as good when I ate them for dinner again the next night alongside a pile of fresh string beans.

The restaurant itself was quite cozy and romantic as they promised, but I felt extra special when the maitre d' delivered a big vase of red roses to our table that Matt had ordered ahead of time.

He's too sweet. They looked beautiful by our table, which was next to a window overlooking a snow covered wrought iron deck. So magical.

But they look even better at home where I can see them in all their glory every morning when I wake up. After all these years together I am still a sucker for getting flowers. They just make a girl feel loved.

The rest of our weekend has been spent relaxing around the house, hanging with Matt's family and checking things off our to-do list. We took Riker ice skating for the first time and he was a champ. He had to take a lot of breaks, but he had a blast out there.

One of our big items over the last few weekends has been moving Riker out of the nursery and into his "big kid" room, which is down the hall from us and slowly being decorated in a surfer style theme. He wasn't too keen on letting go when we first started the process...

Ha! Once he realized he was keeping his own bed and got to help pick out all the decor and toys for his new room, though, he was game. I was worried he'd have a hard time adjusting, but he slept perfectly fine in there the first night and actually loves it now.

After we finished picking out all the stuff for Riker's new room this weekend, we started looking at colors and themes for updating the nursery. We're changing it from Riker's safari theme to...I haven't quite figured that out yet. But some pink will be involved. ;)

I have to say it was a little emotional for me to take the plunge and not only move Riker into a new room, but to start throwing new paint on the nursery walls. My family and I decorated that room with such love and care and it makes me a little sad to know that Riker's outgrown it. But I dried my little tears and am looking forward to starting the process again with our baby girl. It also helped that it took Riker about .5 seconds to love his new room and realize that I was definitely more upset about this move than he was. I think us adults have a harder time with change than they do.

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We just got home from some errands and I made us a lunch of seafood "tacos" in Romaine lettuce leaves (shrimp for Matt, mahi mahi for me, chicken for Riker), alongside veggie sticks with homemade cilantro lime hummus. Fresh and delicious.

Time to get started on my afternoon projects!