Celebrating 14 years as husband and wife: January 4,2016

So very thankful to have this man by my side for the past 14 years.

He is kind and loves me well. 

 We found a groupon for a restaurant close by and as 8PM rolled around, we noticed a ton of single people coming in and we quickly realized it was a speed dating event! It was so awesome to watch and talk about how thankful we were that we never have had to be single for a long time! And how very brave these people are to put themselves out there like that! It was such a fun date night! 

And I got some beautiful flowers! 

Cherokee Castle- Valor Discovery Night

one of my favorite pictures that I've ever taken- no photoshop! 

 Mark and I were able to go to Valor's Discovery Night up at a real life castle here in Colorado a few weeks ago. It killed me that they allowed no photography inside the castle. Words don't do it justice. 

We ate an amazing dinner in the great hall and even got a tour by a man who was the butler for "Tweet",  the eccentric lady who owned it for many years. I was amazed at all the genuine, one of a kind, art pieces in this place. My favorite was the turret which housed a small library which had Edgar Allen Poe books signed by Poe himself. It seemed every piece/room had a history to it and the butler knew SO much. It was impressive. 

Here is the website... http://www.cherokeeranch.org/

I would LOVE to return for a Mystery Dinner Theatre sometime. 

view from the balcony of the castle. We got there right as the sun was a little too low for a great picture

Utah Trip with My Man

 Mark and I were able to get away over Spring Break for 3 days on a little road trip and it was WONDERFUL! We are so very grateful to Mark's parents who watched the kids during the day - all 3 days! And for Megan and Alexandra and Alexis who stayed at the house overnight so the kids could get some good sleep and so Grandma and Grandpa could get some rest too! 

Seriously- THANK YOU from the bottom of our hearts! 

I think the last time we went away just the two of us for more than a night was many years ago! 

It was so refreshing and wonderful to reconnect! 

 Marks parents took us to The Original Pancake House for a birthday breakfast before we left!!! 

 A large part of this trip was driving across Colorado to Utah 

and the return trip

Utah to Wyoming to Colorado.

But road trips without kids are a blast in my opinion! 

and if you have a cool fancy new car that you rented to do it in! 

We cranked some tunes, watched movies, talked and enjoyed the beautiful scenery! 

oh and I checked Facebook a lot because it was my birthday and

 it was fun to see who was wishing me a Happy Birthday:) 

We stopped at Red Robin for my free birthday burger! 

 We arrived in Utah Monday late afternoon- Utah is SO pretty! I have wanted to visit there for a while now because Mark has told me how the whole city is surrounded by mountains that aren't far away! It was gorgeous! We checked in at a fancy schmancy hotel downtown! Loved it!  

 The view at night- we were on the 15th floor.

That night we walked around downtown- Fun times! 

 We found this cool little street!  

 view from our hotel in the morning

 The next day, we got breakfast and drove up to the mountains and hiked a bit up and took some pictures. 

 We then went and saw The Hunger Games and had lunch.

 Then we drove to the Salt Lake- it was crazy! It stank and the "beach" had tons of salt crystals everywhere. I couldn't imagine swimming in it-but it would be cool to see how easy it is to float! 

 After that we went to the Mormon Temple- WOW! It was some pretty impressive architecture- 

the sign said it took 40 years to build! 

 We ended the evening at Eva, a yummy tapa restaurant, for dinner and then the Cheesecake Factory for some chocolate fondue for dessert. It was the best! 

We spent the next day driving back to Colorado! 

It was a wonderful, relaxing trip! 

$5 Tuesdays

SO glad that Valentines Day fell on a Tuesday because at Southglenn (5 minutes from our house) Tuesday is $5 night! Yes, you heard that right- movies at Hollywood theatre are $5 ALL DAY AND NIGHT and a really fun restaurant- Bar Louies has a special where all their specialty burgers are $5! So thats just what we did!
We usually do not go out on Valentines Day because it is just very crowded and its hard to find a babysitter, but thanks to some pretty awesome teenagers who suggested that they watch our kids and we go out, we were able to enjoy a very fun and cheap date night:) THANK YOU- Jamie, Tyler, Kelley and Brooke!

Just in case you dont like any hints before seeing a movie- you might want to skip this next part:) Although you will still be surprised even if you read my little blurb below! The movie had lots of twists and turns!
We watched The Vow. I LOVED that is was based off a true story and was even happier that the real life couple are married today and have 2 children even though she never regained her memory. I like to think that if I lost my memory of Mark and I meeting and our marriage and friendship that I would still honor my commitment to him in marriage and that even if the love feelings weren't there, I would still remain in the marriage and work on loving him again! Im sure that easier said than done.
And a side note- they show the husbands back side in the movie that is rated PG-13! I was shocked and  I guess we should have researched the movie a bit more to have found that out before we went. But I didn't know they can have partial nudity in a PG-13 movie - how very sad. I am cringing for the day my kiddos are teenagers- I will have to do TONS of research before allowing them to any movie at all... if the age they expose peoples backsides is 13!!!! makes me so mad. How in the world does showing his bottom help the plot of the story at all- totally unnecessary!
Anyhow, it was so very nice to have a date with Mark, my amazing husband and enjoy good conversation with the man I will spend my life loving- memory or not!

Gourmet Tour of Denver- A TASTY post

I have such a FUN post to share with you today if you like food! Its gonna be long.... but hopefully you'll bear with me! Every Christmas on my side of the family we draw names between my brothers and sisters families and we just get presents for the familys name we drew. Abbey and Jake had us this year and they got us our gift early- a Denver Gourmet Food Tour. We met Chelly (the owner and guide) at the Riverfront by Platte River and began our tour with 14 others. Chelly was a very enthusiastic, professional, knowledgeable and stylish guide throughout our journey. It was SO neat to meet with the shop owners and chefs and hear the "story" behind their business and their inspirations!

{STOP #1} The first stop was the EVOO Marketplace. The owner Mick and his wife met us and guided us through the fascinating world of extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinaigrettes with finesse.  

We started with the balsamic vinegars which were out of this world! We were served vanilla ice cream and asked to choose a vinegar to pour over top. I know, it sounds weird but it was AMAZING!!! Mark chose a Dark Chocolate Balsamic and I chose a Cranberry Pear Balsamic. The sour and sweet were perfect together. I am seriously thinking of adding this combo to my dessert diet. 

We also mixed balsamic vinegars with their fine selection of EVOO. They import almost all their EVOOs from Italy and have many different infused and fused varieties. 

My favorite EVOO was a Blood Orange flavor. It was great with the fruity balsamic vinegars.

 Micks wife was SO knowledgeable with which EVOOS worked best with which vinegars.

She paired a Natural Butter EVOO with a Blueberry balsamic vinegar and said her grandkids eat this over waffles and pancakes- and its tremendously healthy- way better for you than syrup. Pretty cool and VERY tasty! I could not beleive how sweet these balsamic vinegars were- and its all natural sugars. 

 This was definitely one of my favorite stops of the day. The downtown shop has only been open for 2 years. And the best news is that they are opening another shop in Littleton about 10 minutes from my house! I think these would make GREAT Christmas gifts! Looking forward to going back soon!

{STOP #2} Brava Pizza with chef David Bravdica. This was Marks Fav stop of the day and right up there at the top for me! Located on the 16th St Mall,  Dave whips up some amazing pizza pie in his mobile wood burning stove right out on the street and let me tell you its delicious! Dave just spent 9 months in Italy learning from Italian chefs the secrets to true Italian Pizza and he nailed it here in Denver!

I just love that he uses locally grown ingredients in all his pies. He made a Margarita pizza with fresh tomatoes, basil and freshly pulled mozzerella. It was so light and flavorful! The crust was thin and cooked to perfection. he uses a wood burning stove and places the pie right up next to the coals... pretty cool! It was ready in about 6 minutes! 

 We also tried this amazing pizza with atrichoke hearts, kalamata olives and feta cheese.

We tried a pepperoni pizza and then my fav.. the Fun-Guy pizza (get it? fun-guy aka schrooms)

it was drizzled with some Black Truffle EVOO from the shop we had just visited.

AMAZING

All his pies, he serves hot out of the stove and then drizzles EVOO right on top before serving. 

Brava Pizza has been ranked as the top pizza in Denver! Pretty impressive!

We will be back for sure!

{STOP #3} GiGis cupcakes- These cupcakes are very yummy! We have a shop right by us at Aspen Grove so we have had them before. They are awfully pretty too! We started talking to a couple on the tour with us and they are expecting their first children-twins- so it was fun to talk to them about twin life! 

GiGis also has a Pink cupcake trailer that rides around the city selling cupcakes- such a cute idea! 

I chose the Chocolate Salted Caramel cupcake- my favorite part was the sea salt sprinkled on top of the chocolate- YUM! Mark got the Midnight Magic cupcake- LOTS of chocolate! 

{STOP #4} Denver Beer Co.  Now, let me preface this by saying that I do not enjoy beer at all. I have tasted it on several occasions and in my opinion, it just is not very good. Wine, on the other hand, I like a lot! But since this was our last stop I at least sampled them. It was very interesting to me learning how beer is made. It has 4 ingredients- barley, water, hopps, and yeast. The owners of this brewery walked us through and showed us their beer making process. They have only been open 8 weeks and have already won awards for their brew. 

They make their own beer according to the seasons. So, they had 7 or 8 "fall" brews. They do not bottle it or ship it anywhere (yet) so once they make a batch and its gone.. its basically gone forever. We sampled an Autumns Amber - a beer that had a nutty, caramel smell. Also the Pueblo Chile Beer which was really light in color and smelled like chili peppers and then a Fall About Stout beer which was REALLY dark and tasted like coffee and chocolate. 

And that concluded our tour. It was such a fantastic experience! Chelly recommended stopping by Savory Spice Shop right on Platte street so we stopped by on our way to the car. They have a shop in Littleton that I have visited and LOVED. You can buy spices by the oz. and they have any spice you have ever dreamed of! I bought some Mulberry Spices to make some spiced apple cider or spiced wine. It smelled so good!

We had SUCH a wonderful time as we sampled the best that Denver has to offer!
Special thanks to Abbey and Jake for such a FUN Christmas gift!
It was the perfect date!