This weekend was a fun one. Josh and I celebrated our first 4th of July in Omaha and our first wedding anniversary. This year has flown by and I couldn’t have asked for a better weekend to celebrate it all.
A Lake Party
Jeff and Joanna invited us to their family’s lake house for 3rd of July celebrations after work on Friday.
I now really want a lake house. How amazing would it be to wake up to this in the summer?
Joanna and I.
Josh and Jeff tubing. I was too chicken to try. Maybe next time.
There must have been 50 people there that night. There was so much food, so many cute babies, and such nice people.
There was also a ton of fireworks! I’ve never been to a personal firework show before.
I was so excited to find out there was sparklers! They’re my favorite. 😀
Josh and I sat out on the dock watching the fireworks.
They were incredible. It isn’t 4th of July without fireworks, and these definitely started the weekend off right.
4th of July Festivities
Friday I went to a cookout at Molly’s. We celebrated the 4th of July with a big group of people, lots more food, and fireworks in the park. I’m bummed this was the only photo I managed to get that night, but Josh and I had a blast.
HIIT Workout
Saturday morning Josh and I woke up bright and early (and slightly hungover) to go workout at Jess‘s. She led us through a HIIT workout that kicked my butt and made me feel strong. She snapped this picture as I cooled down with a stretch at the end. I don’t know what is up with my goober face pictures lately. They’re not flattering, but that’s how I looked in the moment so I’m going with it.
We kept the rest of the day low-key. We grocery shopped, watched a billion episodes of Chuck on Netflix (our new obsession) and napped. It was wonderful.
1st Year Wedding Anniversary Celebrations
Sunday Josh and I woke up early to head to Le Petit Paris to pick up breakfast and goodies for our afternoon picnic. It was our first wedding anniversary, and we had a $24 Groupon to the French bakery that was expiring, so we figured what better time to put ourselves in a carb coma? $24 can buy you a lot of pastries, just FYI. (Josh has some very lucky co-workers.) We decided to sample little bits of everything over Chuck episodes. And then we exchanged our anniversary gifts.
Josh’s gift to me was a photo collage of our first year of marriage. Seeing all these photos brought back such happy memories. I turned into an emotional mess when I saw how much care and thought he put into this. We’ve had such an incredible year. I love how this perfectly compliments the photo collage he made me for our one year dating anniversary. He also got us an overnight stay at a local hotel. I’m looking forward to a staycation.
If you guys read my 1 year gift idea post you already know what my paper present to him was. I was so happy with how it turned out. And I’m so glad he really liked it too. 🙂 I’m looking forward to putting this on our photo wall, next to all the new photos we’ll have after our 1 year anniversary photo shoot next week.
After exchanging presents Josh and I drove a half an hour outside of Omaha to Ashland. We want to visit more small towns in Nebraska, and this was the first on our list. When we got to town, we found a nice shady tree, parked the car, and had a picnic in a park.
Josh introduced me to apple, cheese, and jam sandwiches. He’s had them with his family on vacations and road trips since he was little. They’ve become a tradition of ours.
I could not have asked for a more magical year.
After our picnic we explored Ashland for a little while. We visited Glacial Till Vineyard where we were able to enjoy some sangria while we browsed their art gallery.
It was such a cool place. We definitely want to go back again.
As much as we were enjoying Ashland, we had to head home to Omaha so we could make our dinner reservations. We decided to try Darios for the first time and were incredibly happy we did. Josh got chilled cauliflower soup while I tried the French onion. Both were wonderful. For our main meal I got the veggie spaetzle and Josh got the mushroom crepe. We decided to split them down the middle and try two meals at once. The crepe was merely okay, but the spaetzle was incredibly flavorful and delicious. We both want to go back and order that dish again.
After dinner we headed home to enjoy the last of our wedding cake! We wrapped the top tier up after our wedding last year. It was in my parents’ freezer for the better part of a year, until they overnighted it to us a few months ago. It has been chilling in our freezer here in Omaha ever since. We had no idea how it held up or what it would taste like, but we were surprised to discover it still tasted really good. While nothing could beat eating the cake fresh, it definitely did not taste like we were eating year old wedding cake. We were so happy that tradition lived up to the hype.
Questions of the Day: How did you celebrate 4th of July? Did you freeze part of your wedding cake to eat on your 1 year anniversary?
Happy anniversary! Looks like you had a fabulous weekend of celebrating!
Thank you Angela! It was a great weekend.
happy anniversary! Love your gifts!
Thanks Danielle! I was so surprised and touched by his collage. I’m glad he liked my silhouette of us!
You guys are so adorable. Happy Anniversary!
Thanks Erica! It has been a great year! 🙂
xoxoxoxo and it only gets better and better.
That makes me so happy to hear. Thanks Carla!
Awwww, happy anniversary!!! It looks like you guys had a fun celebration 🙂 I think visiting small towns can be so lovely and romantic! We’re hoping to visit some small towns here in Virginia this summer 🙂
That sounds like so much fun! I love Virginia. I hope you guys have a blast! 🙂
Aw – looks like the perfect 1st anniversary! Congrats to you and Josh! 🙂
Thanks so much Joanna! We had so much fun with you guys on Friday!
Happy anniversary friend! Here’s to SO many more 🙂
Thanks Madeline! 🙂
Congrats on your one year anniversary! I can’t believe it has already been one year! The 4th was my bday, so all of us celebrated that and watched fireworks!
Happy Belated Birthday! I love that you literally celebrate your birthday with a bang each year!
omg it’s been a year already?! Crazy how time flies!
It’s seriously insane how fast time is going! But they say time flies when you’re having fun!
Happy Anniversary!!
Thank you Jenny!
I cannot believe it has been a year…congratulations!! 🙂 I love your gifts to each other…so thoughtful. Yes, we froze out cake and also could not believe how delicious it was!
I was amazed at the cake! I thought it was going to be disgusting, but it was really good!
Happy 1st anniversary! I hope you have many more years of wedded bliss 🙂 I have to try those apple/cheese/jam sandwiches you talked about. They sound so fancy for a road trip 🙂
Apple cheese and jam sandwiches are now our default road trip food. They’re so good!
Happy Anniversary! What a wonderful lake party – I’ve never been to a personal fireworks show before, fireworks are illegal around her in most places, so we go to official shows.
Yeah, I’ve only been to official shows before too. The lake fireworks were so much fun though. I loved getting to be so close to them (While still a safe distance away!).
I’m glad you had a great anniversary! It will just keep getting better!
Thanks Angela! That’s what I hear. 😀
Happy Anniversary! It looks like you had a wonderful weekend celebrating!
Thanks Brie! It was a wonderful weekend.
Happy Anniversary!
Thanks Christine!
Glad y’all had a great anniversary weekend (and that the cake was still good)!
Thanks Stacie! I was surprised the cake still tasted good! I expected it to be a gross mess after a year.
I can’t believe it’s been a year already! You two look so cute together. It sounds like you had an amazing weekend. You need a weekend to recover from your weekend 🙂
Thank you Debbie! Time is seriously flying! It’s been a wonderful year.
Happy Anniversary! Wow the year has flown. What sweet gifts you gave each other. Looks like a perfect weekend!
Thank you Marcia! It was a wonderful weekend. 🙂
It sounds like you had the perfect weekend!! Also, I LOVE the gift you got Josh! It turned out so SO good!!
Thanks Hannah! I was so relieved when I got it in the mail and it looked good. It;s nerve wracking ordering something you haven’t personally seen online.
Happy anniversary! 🙂
We spent the weekend camping in the Sierra Nevada mountains as a family.
Yes, we froze our top layer of our wedding cake… and attempted to eat it on our year anniversary (it wasn’t as good fresh… but edible) 😉
Thank you Rachel! And yay for a fun camping weekend!
What a great weekend! Love the pictures!
Thanks Katie! We had such a fun time celebrating 4th of July!