Surprise!

Yesterday was Hubby's 30th birthday (wow)!! What a milestone! He will swear to you that he feels better at 30 than he did at 25 (so, it's true, you do get better with age)! Honestly, we didn't do much yesterday because we celebrated over the weekend. Here's what we did (I would recommend to ANYONE):

Hubby had been on my case for months about having a "get-together-cookout-kinda-thing" for his birthday (in other words, I do the planning, he just shows up). What he DID NOT know, I had already planned a surprise birthday party for him at the house. For those of you who know me, know that I cannot keep an exciting secret to myself (if it has anything to do with surprises, I just wanna share). For ONCE, I actually kept him the dark (complete dark)! Over the course of the last month, I had been making arrangements for a personal chef to come to our house and prepare a meal for ourselves and our close friends. The chef needed to come to the house, so I had a last minute plan of getting Hubby out of the house by having our good friends call to say they needed help with a door?! The issue with the door was truly benign, but it got Hubby out of the house for about an hour. The chef showed up, toured our kitchen (all several hundred square feet of it), memorized the layout of the baking items, pots/pans, utensils, etc (again, a small collection),we chose a menu and she was on her merry way (it was extremely rushed because I did not know how long it would take to "fix the door").

During the weeks that passed, I decided to purchase a new grill for Hubby. He continuously alluded to how much he would llloooovvvveeee to have a NEW grill (same grill, only bigger...typical man, right?). I was shopping (for someone else's birthday gift) at Target when I came across all of the CLEARANCED outdoor items (I love a sale, even better when it's clearanced)! I saw the BIGGER Weber grill Hubby was so adamantly wanting! BUT, in my mind, I remembered that Lowe's does price matching (It was about time I could use the price match idea; we spent half of our savings there during the first year we lived in our house doing fixer-upper kinds of things and never once found a price matching deal). So, I immediately (without purchasing the other birthday gift...oopps) left Target and travelled to Lowe's. Of course, when I asked for a price match they had to call Target for verification. And once it was verified the manager had to come do an override for the price (it is somewhat of a hassle, but TOTALLY worth the savings). My savings:

The Weber grill at Lowe's $89.70

The Weber grill at Target $62.99

The Weber grill price difference $26.71

The Weber grill price difference + price matching made the grill cost: $56.68 (I am always looking for a great deal, I believe I found me one)!!

Because I got such a great deal on the grill, I bought a cover and some new grilling utensils and the cost was still less than the price at Lowe's. Now, to hide the grill from Hubby. I just called my wonderful neighbor (and friend) and she gladly (at least it seemed so) accepted the proposition.

Hubby insistently (like a child) brought up the "get-together-cookout" and how I needed to get a plan going. So, unfortunately, the surprise did not last until the day of the party. I ran out of creative ways to surprise him as guests arrived. Thursday, the day before the party I left the invitation for the party out for him to look at. Also, I told him that the neighbors sprung a leak (her Hubby was gone, and it had been raining, it was the best I could do). He went over and found all of his new grilling contraptions! YYYEEESSS, I succeeded, I surprised him BIG TIME!! He had no idea (although he will swear he knew "something was up"...that's just hindsight though)!

Friday was the PARTAY! We had a great time with our friends! The food that the personal chef prepared was EXCELLENT. We had for appetizers: prepare your own sushi, salmon wrapped in asparagus, and bread with goat cheese and sun dried tomatoes. We had a superb salad with a homeade raspberry vinaigrette. Yum! For the main course we had sauteed (not sure what the saute was, but nonetheless great) carrots and snow peas. Rice pilaf with mushrooms. Beef or chicken puff pastry. And MY FAVORITE (dessert, of course)---creme brulee with roasted berries!! My taste buds were definitely having a party in my mouth!

My compliments to the chef--she cooked a fantastic dinner, AAANNDDD cleaned up after herself, and put all of the leftovers in the fridge. I had absolutely NO clean up whatsoever! Meanwhile, we played the game Loaded Questions with our friends! It was sooo much fun! I think (and hope) a GREAT time was had by ALL (especially HUBBY)!

PS----DON'T FORGET ABOUT MY GIVEAWAY! IT'S A SUPER CUTE PAIR OF EARRINGS--LOOK AT SATURDAY'S (THE 12TH) POST TO ENTER!!

Toodle-oo! =)