To start out similar to last year’s anniversary post, it’s hard to believe Josh and I have been dating for two years. Two!! Years!! That’s 730 days of talking to the same person. Or, in our case, 730 days of annoying the same person.

We both made sure we had Thursday, July 20 and Friday, July 21 off so we could make plans together, which were officially decided upon the week before.

(And yes, I know the featured image for this post is just the beach. We forgot to take a picture together during our adventures 🙃)

Wednesday, July 19

Right after I finished work, we headed over to my parents to pick up their pop-up tent for our beach trip on Thursday. (Much more on that in Thursday’s section.) And, of course, played with the pups for a few minutes. We also stopped into Walmart to buy ourselves a cooler; for our trips last year, Josh borrowed one from his parents, but we figured it’d be easier to buy an Igloo-brand one for ourselves.

Our plan for dinner was to make a charcuterie board, sort of a tradition of ours for special occasions. My parents gave us the really nice wooden board for Christmas. We also cooked some mini hot dogs in the air fryer.

After dinner, we had a few chores to do, like pack for the beach and shower, etc., so we did those before settling down to pick out a movie to watch. We picked The Out-Laws, which we only watched about half of because I was getting restless around 9:00 p.m.

Thursday, July 20

We took full advantage of sleeping in, especially Josh who had worked 8 days in a row; he switched his days off so we could do stuff Thursday and Friday, so, unfortunately, he had a super long work week.

After breakfast, we exchanged gifts, mostly at my demand because I am like a child. Now that we live together, we have to get creative in hiding gifts from each other, so I made Josh close his eyes while I got his bag from where I hid it. We like to do a few little gifts for anniversaries since we usually do afternoon trips together. 

By the time we finished packing and putting together food and snacks, we left around 10:45 a.m., first stopping to get ice for the cooler before hitting the highway. The beach we went to, Hammonasset (the same as last year) was about an hour and 10 minutes away. Josh drove my SUV because it’s free parking for Connecticut residents.

I think we can all agree that the walk to and from the beach while lugging all of your stuff is the most awkward walk ever. And once you hit the sand, it feels like you’re walking so much slower.

We found a spot up toward the back of the sand, and from that moment on, all of our hopes and dreams were crushed. Josh opened up the case for the pop-up tent and goes, “Uh, where’s the tent?” and I said, “What do you mean?” 

We had the metal frame for the tent but not the actual tent for the top.

Cue panic.

I put in a call to headquarters, aka my parents, and told my mom we didn’t have the tent part. She rummaged through the shed and found it; for some reason, it was stored separately from the case and no one realized it.

We decided to suck it up and go without covering for the afternoon. My mom was sending me links to the nearest Ocean State Job Lot to buy an umbrella or tent. I was still freaking out and Josh was like, “This is fine. We’ll be fine.” (In case you can’t tell, we’re complete opposites: I’m nervous all the time and he’s super chill.)

So this was our setup. The beach chairs were new and worked great, though.

We ate our lunches—sandwiches always taste better on the beach for some reason—and then went in the water. Yes, without waiting 30 minutes after eating, and we survived.

Josh made sure we were on a strict every hour sunscreen application routine, especially since we didn’t have cover. I brought a book with me and laid out for a bit while Josh enjoyed not working.

We did a lot of people watching throughout the afternoon. The people around us were fine and kept to themselves; there was a bunch of teenage guys a bit further down that we called “The Bros” who were doing, well, dumb teenager stuff, so they were entertaining.

Around 4:45 p.m., we packed up and made the dreadful walk back to the car. I just really, really hate that walk. We did a quick change in the bathrooms and then headed to dinner.

We decided to go to Eli Cannon’s in Middletown, where we went after our second beach trip last year. There was about a 10 minute wait for us to get seated.

I got the Sangria and Josh got phresh from Alvarium Beer Company. For food, I got the chicken salad melt and Josh got what was called the “Wicked Pissah” which was a tuna steak burger.

When we got home, we each took showers and discovered just how burnt we were. Mostly my chest and shoulders were badly burned while Josh’s chest was very blotchy and red. I guess it could have been worse, but we knew we’d be in pain for a while.
Afterward, brought the mattress out in the living room for a sleepover and finished up The Out-Laws.

Friday, July 21

We compared sunburns after sleeping in again. Our plan for the morning was to get brunch, so we took our time getting up and getting ready.

I got eggs over easy with corned beef hash, homefries, and toast, while Josh got eggs benedict with corned beef hash and homefries.

After breakfast, Josh went to his parents’ house, so I tagged along—mostly so I could see their pup, Pennie. As part of my anniversary gift, Josh wanted to get me flowers and wine and was going to let me pick them out. There’s a grocery store near his parents that has flowers and an entire wine and beer selection, so we stopped there. Oh! And also got aloe, most importantly. 

We came back to the condo to kill time before our dinner plans. I worked a bit on homework for my online HTML and CSS class, and Josh and I meal planned so we could go shopping on Saturday. 

Our intention was to sit outside but since New England is now Flordia, it’s been hot, humid, and rainy and won’t stop. Like we’re getting such bad thunderstorms and so much flooding. The weather radar showed some rain likely later on, so, unfortunately, we opted to sit inside once we got there.

For our first round of beers, I got Peach Tart and Josh got King Julius; we also split a Margherita pizza which was so good. We lucked out in our timing because we were able to snag one of the last few two-person tables; I think a lot of people wanted to go outside but it had already rained so most of the chairs were wet.

Our second round of beers were Dreamer for me and Peach Tart for Josh. You can also place a can pick-up order while you’re there, so we each got a 4 pack for ourselves. On our way out, we were waiting at the pick-up area and one of the guys there suggested we do the outside pick-up because it’s faster.

So, yeah, good idea in theory, but it was raining like the entire sky just opened up and dumped out the water it’s been storing for years. We ran to Josh’s car and were soaked, and, of course, as soon as we got in the outside line, it stopped for five minutes. Regardless, we got our cans and we were on our way home.

Overall, it was a good two days; obviously, we had our pros and cons:

Pros: celebrating our relationship, getting out of the condo for a bit, and having some good beers.

Cons: sunburns and getting soaked.

Here’s to what the next year brings! 🎉❤️