Happy V-Day! Celebrating Clutter's Victory...

Because Marinda's mom is coming to visit this upcoming week we decided to celebrate Valentine's Day on Friday night.  In the morning we exchanged home-made cards (a Misra family tradition).  Marinda made Amit a 3-D card that said 'i <3 u'.  Amit gave Marinda a card with Galileo on the cover (inside joke, don't worry about it) and definitions of love on the inside.  One of the definitions was 'What you and I have.'  Awwwwwww.  Also, a mini-rose plant and a heart shaped box of chocolate's ended up on their front step right "before" Amit came home - Marinda is still very curious about who could have left such a romantic present for her.  :)

"When it comes to how I feel about Amit,
My love stands out!"

That night we went to dinner at Ciao Bella, a nearby fancy-ish Italian place.  We had never been there before so it was a risk but the reviews on yelp were good.  The place turned out to be amazing!  The decor was cozy, as seen in this stolen image below.  The food was really good too.  And to Marinda's delight they had creme brulee for dessert.  Looks like someone has a new nearby guilty pleasure.  The following conversation shouldn't be too hard to imagine....
Amit:  Hey hon, what's this random withdrawal of $100 from an ATM doing on our bank statement?
Marinda:  I don't know what you're talking about honey....
Amit:  Wait a second, what are you eating?  Where did that come from?  Is that creme brulee?  Why is there a bag on the floor that says Ciao Bella on it?
Marinda: I don't know what you're talking about honey...(in between scarfing down bites)
Amit: Wait did you get a bunch of cash out to go buy creme brulee, bring it home, then try to NOT hide it from me?
Marinda: <breaks down crying>  I thought I could control myself!  But I was wrong!

Interior of Ciao Bella

We've also been on a Christian movie kick and have been happily surprised with how much we've enjoyed them.  We started with "Soul Surfer."  Then based off of the previews we saw during that movie Netflixed "To Save a Life", "Fireproof" ending with last night's viewing of "Courageous."  All are about being good people and working through problems with Christian values, and all are quite good.

We've also been spending time rearranging our lives...I mean, our apartment...for this baby that's showing up in a few months.  We have a second bedroom that's been functioning as a glorified storage closet (glorified by the presence of Amit's desk) for the past year and a half, but that room will soon have a new occupant.  So we needed to clear it out.  We don't have any baby furniture yet, but we will eventually and it'll need to go somewhere.  Thus, we are busy rearranging everything.  Marinda decided to take this task upon herself while Amit was out of the house for a couple of hours on Saturday.  "I wanted to surprise him!  He does so much, now that I have some semblance of energy I wanted to use it towards something productive."  Needless to say Amit was quite surprised.  "I couldn't believe what I saw when I came home!  I have the best wife-y ever!  And NO I'm NOT talking about my thesis this time!"She ended up vacuuming and everything, but now all there stuff is in loosely defined piles in their living room.  If only we had someone coming tomorrow and staying for a week that could help in this overwhelming task...

Tune in next time when we have a special guest blogger: Marinda's mother, Stacy Mitchell!