An Affair To Remember: Second Hand Rose style

On the 16th of January it was the anniversary that me and Mr. Boyfriend got together. Our year has been full of happiness, lots of laughter, Dad's Army and cake. It was full of ups and downs and unexpected turns, but in some ways it has been they best year of my life. Even though I did miss out on those amazing high heels on Ebay. Mr. Boyfriend is practically the male double of me, but without the fascination in 60's china. He also doesn't spend hours watching old romantic movies with a big box of Kleenex, he is more of a zombie film kind of guy. We both adore old fashion, music, cars etc and we spend countless hours watching comedies like Steptoe & Son, Only Fools and Horses and Porridge.

He is my best friend, my true love and the first person I turn to outside my family. Plus he will listen to me moaning on about how much I want a particular bag and how much I desperately need a closet like  Carrie in Sex and the City, which is always a plus. He has been a shoulder to cry on and still even finds me attractive with no makeup on or me sporting the panda look. We may not be Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr, have met on a cruise or have an Empire State Building near us, but our relationship is definitely to be remembered. Well all the pictures and souvenirs from everywhere we have gone together makes it pretty hard to forget.

So what did we do for our anniversary? Well on the Sunday (the 15th) we went to the cinema to see The Iron Lady. The cute thing is this is more my sort of film then Mr. Boyriend's film, but he still insisted that we went to see it. He wanted to treat me so after I got my card in the machine first to pay for them, he quickly stuffed £20 in my purse, yes ladies he is a gentlemen. Then we went to get our 'extras', now this is where some couples differ and I have even seen a couple argue over their taste of popcorn and turn into a 'you always disagree with me, oh yeah and you still haven't put that shelf up I asked you to do two weeks ago'.

Fortunately we are not like that and we both adore popcorn and love it sweet. I find at the cinema you can always tell the people who are on a first date. Even if they both like the same flavour they will always get a separate box, so they don't have to deal with the awkward hand touching when they both get some popcorn throughout the movie. This is 100% true, look for them next time you go to the cinema and throughout the movie you will see the guy several times shyfully putting his arm around the girl and then just scratching his head, oh the perils of love.

The man I fell in love with

The Iron Lady was a good film, we both enjoyed it but I found Margaret's dementia very sad and quite distressing. I just wanted to give her a big cuddle and a victoria sponge. I was a bit distracted by Mr. Boyfriend eating his popcorn, every time he had a mouthful he kept dropping some on the floor.

He is very fidgety, so throughout the movie when he was moving his feet you could hear this crunching. Then when we left the movie he stood up with popcorn falling down him and there was a large pool of popcorn around him. I felt so sorry for the poor people that had to clear the floor up and I made him quickly leg it out, so no one would see that it was him that made the mess. There were a few ladies in there that looked like they spent their time with a pack of Dettol wipes and would tut and sneer at the mess. I had to jump over the pile so I didn't make a huge crunch like he did when he walked over it, plus I didn't want popcorn stuck to my new amazing glittery gold spats.

This was extremely funny and I didn't know whether to laugh or just claim I'd never seen him before. Please remind me the next time we go to the cinema not to let him have hold of the popcorn throught the film, oh and to buy him a bib, a sparkly one of course.

So after the Iron Lady and the popcorn incident we went to Wagamama's and had a gorgeous meal. For the second time now we have chosen the exact same meal out of about 50, its cute yet slightly scary. We then went onto a pub and had a drink. I asked for a red wine which was gorgeous, when we were leaving I asked him what it was and he said he didn't know and he just asked for the best one that they had. I asked him how much and he said about £9!! Nine pounds for a glass of wine, how cute is he!? You can get four shots of vodka for £3 at most clubs on a saturday night. But I'd much rather have a nice glass of wine, having a cuddle in front of a fire in a warm pub with the man that I love, oh what a firecracker.

So the next day our one year anniversary had arrived, it has come so quickly and it only feels like we have been together about three months. I think that's a good thing isn't it? Please send your answers on a postcard.
If you've seen some of my earlier posts, I am actually obsessed with cake and decorating them. I will find any reason to make a cake, is getting an amazing deal on a handbag in a sale a good enough reason?

So there I was at ten o'clock in the morning rolling fondant with my hands and nails smothered in food colouring and my face covered in buttercream. I had my Grandma as my wonderful assistant due to staying at her house at the time, oh and Jasper my cat was on hand to help of course. I got her cutting out 150 hearts to cover my cake, yes 1.5.0. I baked a lemon (his favourite) rectangle shape cake and made it into the shape of a 1.

 I then cut the pieces in half to add a big dollop of buttercream in the middle and the outside. I hate it when you have a cake and it doesn't even have enough buttercream in the middle to run your finger through to lick it, come on we've all done it. I adore buttercream, so every cake I make is literally suffocated with it, I obviously leave some in the bowl for me to eat, come on I'm not that stupid.

I spent all the morning and the afternoon decorating the cake. By the time I finished I was sick of the shape of a heart and had hands so red it would make Poirot suspicious. I covered the cake with pink, red and white hearts with pearl essence on. By the time I had finished I only had around 40 minutes to get ready. Make that 30 after I used half a Radox soap dispenser to get the colouring off my hands, it looked like Poppy No3 colouring was going to become my new nail colour. Red blood like hands and a romantic dinner don't really go together.

So after running around trying to get ready and nearly making a huge ladder in my tights, I'll never learn how to put tights on slowly and not end up looking like a duck because I haven't got the seam right, seriously can anyone do that? So I was picked up at 5pm by a very hunky man at my door, which my Grandma enjoyed, I'm talking of Mr. Boyfriend by the way, she is his No1 fan.
We were taken over to his house by his lovely mum and when we got there, he went all mysterious and wouldn't let me in any room or upstairs except his sitting room. So when his mum and his sister when out he told me 'I'll be 2 seconds' and kept running up and down the stairs. After I helped Peppa the Pig find her handbag he came in and said to me 'Would you like to come this way madam?', so he took me up his stairs to his room. What held before me I had know idea, it could be a Maccy D's and a Flake Whippie for all I know. He made me shut my eyes to walk into his room and when he said open, Oh. My God.

The vision in front of me was amazing, no he hadn't bought me some Chrisitan Louboutin's, but it was better then that. What's better then Christian Louboutin's I here you ask? He had decorated the whole room with 100 ballons which nearly made him pass out three times and some gold metallic paper ribbons. He had put some candles around the room and in his fireplace. He had the legend Matt Monroe playing and had put the dining room table in the middle of the room all loveingly decorated. It was the nicest thing anyone had ever done for me and was incredibly sweet. I asked him if his Mum knew anything about it and he said that she came home and found the kitchen table missing and wasn't very happy! 

He escorted me to my seat and went to get our meal. We had an amazing pizza with a gorgeous bottle of wine, with I'm sure are the biggest wine glasses in the world, if you want to get me drunk Mr. Boyfriend just give me a pack of wine gums, you should know that buy now. We then had a lovely cheesecake and had our cake with a special '1' candle and blew our first anniversary candle out together, a very lovely moment and one of the best in the life of the Second Hand Rose.

So for  presents, I gave him two Rolling Stones records, including his two favourite songs and I made him a photo album. Well I bought one from Boots and covered one with the fuzzy quilting stuff and purple satin, accessorised with pink ribbon around the photo of us on the front and 'Our Memories' painted on in gold paint. Clintons eat your heart out. I was completly blown away and so touched with the present that he made for me. He is very handy with a glue gun, so he made a heart out of seven inch records and put our favourite picture in the middle of it. To top it off he put a clock on it too, personally I think he did this so he would not have to keep waiting thirty minutes patiently waiting for me to finish my makeup. Picture of it to follow so keep reading!

I had the most amazing anniversary, and I can't wait to spend the next year having a laugh and making more memories, it was so beautiful and so us. No huge fuss, no huge expense just me, him and a whole lot of trodden on popcorn.

Second Hand Rose
XxxX