Surprise

A few weeks ago, I posted a little progress report on my 12 goals of 2012.  One of my goals for the year had been to continue our vacation tradition of getting away at least once as a family (with a trip to the Atlantis already planned and coming up soon) and once for just Josh and I.  I said in that post that Josh and I didn't currently have plans, but that I hoped to be able to squeeze something...even something small...in.
Well, sneaky sneaky am I because I actually already had a trip in the works.  It was actually Josh's birthday gift, and even though the chances my husband will actually read my blog are just about nil, I didn't want to go blurting about it just in case.
But it all started a few weeks ago.  You may recall I gave Josh a fun 35th birthday bash, but I also wanted to get him something as well.  Josh is one of those buy what he wants type of people, though, and I was really stuck coming up with something for him.  Plus, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I didn't want to spend a lot of money on something, though, because well...it's his money!  I came up with the idea of doing a mini-getaway, knowing a kid-free night would be a really special treat for my husband (and me, for that matter).  When my dad came through with some major assistance in scoring a great hotel at a crazy rate, we were in business!
Since we were only going to be gone one night, I wanted to do something pretty close to home.  This usually means either DC or Nags Head for us, but I wanted to do something different and somewhere even closer!  Richmond is a little less than 2 hours away (well, normally...of course it took us about 3 to get there this weekend due to ridiculous traffic), and while I have been there about a bajillion times for family events, shopping, and things like that, we have never really done Richmond as a destination per se...so that's where we decided to go!
We drove up Saturday, and after doing a little shopping at the Short Pump Mall, we checked in to The Jefferson.

picture stolen from website

The hotel itself is a Richmond landmark.  Supposedly, the staircase is the one from Gone with the Wind.  

corny posing in front of it

We didn't really have much on our agenda for the evening...just to have a good dinner and enjoy some quality adult time together.  So, basically, we did a lot of this

That's bar sitting if you can't tell...a hobby we used to pretty much dominate, but rarely get to explore anymore.  It certainly was nice to revisit it for a night.  And we did squeeze in that good dinner too. Josh and I had looked into a lot of Richmond restaurants and had even gotten suggestions from some of our local friends/family.  In the end, we decided to go with the Tobacco Company, a Richmond landmark.  We reasoned it may not be Richmond's BEST or trendiest choice, but it was certainly a staple of the city with good food, and since neither of us had ever been, we thought it was a good one to try.  Despite our crappy waiter and the marathon dining session that he was the cause of, it was a really good choice...exactly how we had anticipated...nothing outrageous, but good and classic.

the view from inside the Tobacco Company...
it's a 3 story restaurant and we were seated on the second floor

Josh enjoying his meal and company

So after stuffing our faces and indulging in a few cocktails, we headed back to the hotel for the best part of our vacation...sleeping...with no potential of waking up before we chose to wake up!!!  

While we both agreed that the night was certainly more get-away than vacation, it was such a nice treat to be able to spend some real quality adult time with my hubby...and it was nice to be so close to home that we could get home to our boys (including a certain baby that suddenly mastered crawling while we were gone!) quickly on Sunday.