My wife and I have several cute traditions. One of them is making posters for each other for special occasions. We fill the posters with pictures of ourselves, drawings, and notes. I decided to make a poster for my wife for this Valentine’s.

I forbade my wife from coming in to our office and printed off about ten pictures to glue onto some foamcore board we had left over from a school project. My cat helped me by lying down on the pictures to make sure the tape was firmly pressed down to keep them on. I added some extra decoration with hearts and a love note on the back.

I also got my wife a stuffed monkey holding an heart that says, “I ❤ U,” on it.

The crowning present I got for my wife was a playlist CD I made. The songs were:
1. I Will Follow You Into the Dark by Death Cab for Cutie
2. If This Isn’t Love by Jennifer Hudson
3. Without You by David Guetta featuring Usher
4. All These Things That I’ve Done by The Killers
5. Always On My Mind by Willie Nelson
6. I’m Yours by Jason Mraz
7. Love Story by Taylor Swift
8. Can I Have This Dance by The High School Musical Cast
9. Love Like Crazy by Lee Brice
10. When I’m Sixty-Four by The Beatles

The CD is meant to be the story of our lives. The first song frames the story with us reflecting back when we’re old and dying.

The second and third songs are us having fun and starting our relationship in high school.

The fourth  and fifth songs are about my breakup with my wife (then girlfriend) during our first year of college and my subsequent move to be closer to her and the rest of my family.

My wife and I joke about the sixth song. I was planning on proposing to her with it. I got all ready, hit play, and was singing along to it with the ring in my pocket. Then her grandma walked into the room and the moment died. Still, the sixth song represents me asking my wife to marry me.

The seventh song was used during our wedding ceremony. The eighth song was our first dance together (our relationship actually closely parallels that of Troy and Gabriella in the movie).

The ninth and tenth songs are about us growing old together. Then if you have the album on repeat you can go back to our deaths where we reflect on how happy our lives were together.

The album made her and myself cry several times. Successful Valentine’s!

-Mister Ed