presents 2.

i promised some people that i would blog about the things that j gave to me for christmas this year. well aside from coming to colorado for 5 days and putting up with the cold, crazy children and family bombardment, he also did this:

last time the cardinals won the world series, my dad sent a copy of the post dispatch to to me with all of the coverage in one of their special editions. i still have it and think that it is pretty cool. this year  j and i watched the series together and it was great fun. and i told him that i was sad that we no longer lived in STL and that i would not get a post dispatch this time. i guess he took that seriously and went all out. so sweet.

in addition to my awesome new piece of "art", when we got to vegas he had me get dressed up and informed me that we would be going on a fancy date (we like to do these from time to time).

we began with dinner reservations at this fantastic italian place (bad breath inducing foods is a great way to keep a chaste relationship...) and then he took me to see

phantom of the opera!

i had not been to a real play in years. and i had not ever seen phantom, the opera, play, movie, or anything. i loved it. the music was familiar and the play itself was just really impressive. it was fun to dress up and go out together on our fancy date. the funniest part is that on our plane ride to vegas, i saw an advertisement for the play in one of those skymall magazines. i asked him if he had ever seen it and had him explain the story to me. i told him that i would really want to see it sometime and he simply shrugged and agreed.

little did i know what was awaiting. 

i kind of have a great guy on my hands. he is thoughtful and funny and nice and cute and keeps me warm and drives me places and reads all the dumb articles that i forward to him. plus my nieces love him and say that he is nice because he will play dollys with them. i guess i'll keep him around.

that about wraps up the holiday happenings of 2011. onto 2012 we go.

oh ps: we also both received giant tin boxes of dominos from each other's families.... can you tell what we love to play?