<p>“What is your male perspective of what the OP should be planning?”</p>
<p>There’s a certain Calvin-Coolidge-tours-a-chicken-farm story that I’m guessing 99.999% of guys who’ve been married 20 years can relate to.</p>
<p>Well, we bought a new house for our 25th anniversary, but for my husband’s birthday that year, I bought him a Weber gas grill. We live in the south and grill all year long. Over the past 30 years, we have replaced our grills on average every 3-5 years, but we
could never justify the extra money to get a Weber. It was a complete surprise, which is unusual for us, we usually choose our own gifts. I had it delivered and assembled, put the cover on it with a huge red bow. He absolutely loves it and I have to say, it does a much better job then our previous grills.</p>
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<p>Great idea, except our anniversary week includes Son’s freshman move-in at Wake Forest and Daughter’s sweet 16. The week prior the four of us will be on a cruise to mark all 3 milestones. </p>
<p>Scheduling a trip after the anniversary might be do-able, but tricky. H works for an NFL team during the season, so he’s always booked for the last 18 weekends of the year. (And if the Ravens do as well as he thinks they will, January may be unavailable, too. Poo.)</p>
<p>The best idea I’ve got right now is 3 or 4 nights at the Sundance Film Festival. But, I won’t know if that’s realistic until the NFL post-season schedule comes out. We’d have to schedule the trip around the AFC Championship. (Shameless brag: H won the Director’s Trophy at Sundance in the late '90s.)</p>
<p>Thanks for all the great ideas. Keep ‘em comin’. :)</p>
<p>I’ll probably get flamed for this one, people have strong feelings about it (please don’t), but I got H a motorcycle. He sold his first one when S2 was born and had no time to ride. He loves that bike and thanks me every time he rides it.</p>
<p>The point wasn’t ‘what’ it was, the point was it was something just for him, he would never buy himself, that he enjoys for leisure/destress which he genuinely needs.</p>
<p>blueiguana, H also sold his motorcycle when we had kids. He’s talked about getting another. But neither one of us is willing to give up our spot in the garage. :p</p>
<p>DougBetsy,
Very cool…shamless brag allowed on ALL counts
Daughter turning 16
Son starting at Wake Forest
Wedding Anniversary
Amazing season ahead for the Ravens (we live and breath football in our house!)
Sundance Directors Trophy</p>
<p>Live it up girl!! Celebrate!! Given this information, I honestly think a trip to Sundance would be very, very special to the both of you. If you can work it out, I would book now somewhere you have a cancelation policy that allows you an ‘out’ within the window of finding out the AFC schedule.</p>
<p>I’m soo excited for you!! :)</p>
<p>“I got H a motorcycle.”</p>
<p>Something new and sporty for him to take a thrilling ride on even if you don’t completely understand or approve…you’re getting warmer!</p>
<p>DougBetsy- Hahaha</p>
<p>That darn bike took my freaking spot in the garage! We play car swap constantly! We can’t park on the street here which keeps the neighborhood looking nice, and safer to drive, but with our two cars, the bike, our 19yo goes to cc, and now our 17yo interns so he needed a car this summer…thats 4!! Someone is always yelling from the mudroom ‘MOVE YOUR CAR!’</p>
<p>Blueiguana, you don’t have to KEEP the thrilling gift. When you keep it, it becomes just one more thing gathering dust and cluttering up your lives. Haven’t you noticed that although guys like having a nice clean home and eating healthy food off of nice china, they can appreciate that wholesome stuff even more if they occasionally eat a big greasy slice of pizza off a paper plate, and then toss away the plate?</p>
<p>I took H (now ex-H, but don’t let that influence you :)) on a surprise day trip to take a hot air balloon ride for one anniversary. It was really fun and memorable. We went at dawn, and floated over a lake where we could see our reflection in the perfectly still water. We went over deer in the woods that didn’t even know we were there… It was almost 20 years ago now, and I still remember it perfectly (and I think he does, too).</p>
<p>Back to ideas for a shared adventure: how about a race-car driving class? I’ve done the high-performance driving class here at Portland Raceway with my husband… that was great! [Directory</a> of U.S. Racing Schools and Performance Driving Schools, by state](<a href=“http://www.edmunds.com/ownership/driving/articles/109745/article.html]Directory”>http://www.edmunds.com/ownership/driving/articles/109745/article.html)</p>