Flowers for my Anniversary!

Last Saturday, Skint Vegan Dad and I celebrated our sixth wedding anniversary. We've been together ten years in total, but being the boring traditionalists we are we only mark the official anniversaries. We spent a lovely day out by the sea in Earlsferry and Elie, off the East coast of Fife. SVD acquired (i.e. pinched) a 20 year old AA guide to Country Walks from his folks, so we did a bracing four mile trek with the kids around the beach, up the cliffs and over the hills till we were back in the grassy spot where twenty years ago, there had been a car park. This is usually the point at which I bore you to death with some scenic pix, but as someone forgot the camera there's nothing to see here! Our day out ended with hot chips and curry sauce sat in Jessica on the seafront at Kirkaldy. Not the most picturesque of locations, but we were all touristed-out by then on the quaint old-fashioned beauty of Earlsferry and it was on the way home so we were happy to just sit and eat mostly.
When researching anniversary gifts, I was struck by how random some of the traditional options for the years between paper and ruby seem to be. We kind of agreed to stop doing the theme thing from now on. Which is good as it provided me with the perfect opportunity to get SVD The Stone Roses 20th Anniversary Legacy Edition of their seminal first album - the one that was the soundtrack to his university days at Manchester.
So knowing my sweet tooth and my current predilection for everything nutty and seedy, he bought me some yummy dark-chocolate covered seeds and soya beans. The tiny amount of honey used in the glaze for these meant they weren't vegan, but, Dear Reader, I ate them anyway. I don't eat honey normally because I've never eaten honey in a day-to-day way and I don't particularly like the taste. But it's not one of those things I get into a flap about and I was happy to accept the gift with good grace.
But the best present I could have got was him paying for me to have my new tattoo done. I'd saved-up my money, paid my deposit and got my design planned when he surprised me with the announcement that he would be footing the bill! This is an even sweeter gesture when you understand that my husband doesn't like tattoos period. He finds tattoos on girls completely off-putting. Despite his love for rockabilly, hot rods and Bettie Page, he draws the line at sailor tats. I think sometimes when people look at us together they see an over-enthusiastic science teacher (all woolly jumpers and facial hair) with a stroppy overgrown teenager (complete with a bad home-dye job and obnoxious clothes) and wonder how the hell we ever got together! Admittedly, I sometimes wonder it myself. But at the end of the day, underneath all the bad clothes and righteous clashes of opinion, we share a lot of the same values. We have similar goals for our lives - security, sustainability, living a good and honest life which impacts others in a positive rather than negative way. We're both old-school strict parents, but we put our money where our mouth is and 'fess up to our kids when we've messed up with them. Respect should be earned, not demanded. Plus we share a healthily irreverent sense of humour which has saved us amidst more than one blazing argument over... well, nothing that important, obviously!
Ten years down the line - nine years as homeowners, seven years as parents, six years as spouses - and I know that tinkering in the garage, doting on the bairns, and playing 'Four Go Camping' is what keeps him sane and lets him unwind from his job, while he knows you can take the girl out of the tattoo parlour, but...
And I'm happy with that. I don't think either of us ever expected to find that kind of unconditional acceptance by accident. Happy Anniversary, SVD!