This post is coming much later than expected. We had a Valentine’s date planned that was (gasp!) canceled! But more on that in a bit. Let’s talk about what goodies we got each other! Ryan was sick all week (like, bad sick – he had to take of three days from work, including Valentine’s Day), so I really wasn’t expecting anything. But surprise! He got me a beautiful pair of earrings I’d been eyeing. They’re from Stella and Dot, one of my favorite places for affordable, trendy jewelry.

stella dot emerald earrings

Also unexpected: flowers!

Seriously, how gorgeous are tulips? The best part: he picked them out himself instead of going to a florist. So, money saved!

I got him a few gifts too. Pretzel M&M’s (Ryan’s favorite, but we don’t keep them in the house because they’re dangerous!), a mug (B is for boyfriend, haha) and some box wine. Laugh all you want – that’s the equivalent of four bottles and it’s about $16 (and it’s good!).

So back to the canceled Valentine’s date. We planned to go out the Saturday after Valentine’s Day. The weather man told us we’d be getting a “few flurries” sometime Saturday “afternoon,” but this is what it looked like a bit before 11 a.m. after about an hour of “flurries.” It continued to snow until sunset.

Harumph. The roads weren’t bad, but to be on the safe side, we postponed our Valentine’s dinner by a week. So finally, this Saturday, we got to chow down at a new Raleigh hot spot, Bida Manda.

Bida Manda is a Laotian restaurant. And it is gooo-ooood! Ryan tried duck for the first time. I got a vegetarian pad thai. We tried Beer Lao (a dark and a regular). My friend who recently spent more than a year in Asian said “it’s the best beer in Southeast Asia!” It was good, but nothing special (I’m all about strong flavored crafts). And for dessert, we indulged in a cheesecake and macaroon combo with a caramelized Thai tea sauce.

After stuffing our faces, we took a lap around the state capitol building. I couldn’t resist the photo op. Raleigh is such a pretty city, we’re so lucky to live in this area.

We started on a fun project this weekend too! I probably won’t get to post about it for a couple of weeks – it’s going to be one of those extended “work in progress” projects. Oh, and completely unrelated, I started playing around with DuoLingo this weekend. Totally relearning all the French I forgot (years of not speaking/practicing it will do that to you!).

How was your Valentine’s Day? Do anything fun this weekend?

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