Memorial Day Weekend 2019

This weekend… wow! ♥

Leading up to this Memorial Day Weekend, I almost did that thing where I look up all my past MDW posts and feel the deep desire to do those same things in an effort to re-create the happiness of past years but then, I didn’t.  We already had a few plans in place and they felt good and right and enough.  I even took out a few things that I just didn’t feel like I had time for and was able to let them go without any of that guilt or FOMO I usually feel.  Plus I made it through the Bolder Boulder, so I guess that means the weekend was perfect!

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After what felt like much too long, we got together with Hannah, Josh and Mason to eat pizza, exchange birthday presents, get caught up on each other’s lives and most importantly, eat ice cream.  Mason looks quite pleased to be standing between two cones of Space Junkie and, I mean, can you blame him??  Hannah and I maybe stood in the regular line for 15 minutes before realizing they were out of our favorite flavor and made a beeline for the express booth where they luckily still had some.  In other news, Mason can walk, point out the letter O, play peek-a-boo, spot motorcycles and cheers drinks now and gosh, he is the absolute cutest!

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We started Saturday with Lemon Poppy Seed Yogurt Pancakes and I already had four on the pan when I thought “these don’t look right” and realized I hadn’t added any baking powder!  Um those went into the trash, but the rest turned out great.  Afterward, we hit up the grocery store(s) for BBQ supplies — Joey and I were maybe on opposite sidbes of the produce section when we both heard “Screaming Infidelities,” looked over at each other and mouthed “your hair, it’s everywhere” to each other, ha ha! — and not enough other food for the rest of the week (oops!).  Then I left Joey to work in our backyard and headed to the mall to find a dress for an upcoming wedding.  I think I tried on about 100 dresses and finally bought one.  Have I mentioned how much I hate shopping? 😛

We went to the Rockies game that night and managed to see the one loss of the series but it did happen to be Game of Thrones night and I loved how they imitated the intro but with Coors Field on the map.

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Sunday, what a day!  We started with our monthly coffee date.  Wait, no, we started by being minorly alarmed that I felt itchy ALL OVER.  I took a Benadryl and it seemed to calm down but not going to lie, I still feel low-level itchy today.  Anway, I had Hoja in mind for our coffee date, but then Joey suggested we walk to Huckleberry and in a rare sighting of flexibility, I happily agreed.  Toasts and iced coffee in the sunshine ♥  We went home afterward and really cleaned the house!  Felt so good to get everything spick-and-span.  We had ribs baking in the oven while we cleaned and they smelled so good!  Afterward, we mixed together two different kinds of no-churn ice cream (salted Oreo and strawberry with vanilla bean and white chocolate chips!) and I was DELIGHTED to discover it was only 2:45 and I fully had time to sit down and read for a bit AND go to yoga.

When I got back home, Joey had made a trip to Home Depot for a new lawn mower (our old one finally bit the dust), new doorknobs for our garage, a few things for our yard and the prettiest hanging plants!  I was so happy when I saw it all.  He is the very best.  We had this for dinner (YUM!) and watched Before Sunset.  I liked Before Sunrise better and also, is it supposed to be a compliment when someone tells you they have a wife and son but can’t stop thinking about you?

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Memorial Day, Bolder Boulder Day, the best day!  We didn’t realize until halfway through the race, but this was our TENTH time running the BB10K, whoa!  We each held up 10 fingers as we crossed the finish line in 59:07 and I felt very proud and happy.  Plus, our family walked the race this year!!!!  We maybe had two whole hours between our finish and theirs so we walked to The Hill for coffee, walked back Folsom Field, discovered we couldn’t bring our goodie bags back into the stadium (this makes no sense…), walked back to the car and finally (another six miles of walking later…) got back into the stadium just as the sun was coming out and John Mayer’s “New Light” started playing.  Never mind all the walking we had just done, I felt peak happiness in that moment!

My dad and Lori came in first and we totally missed them!!!  I couldn’t believe it!  But they seemed to have loved the race.  We did see my mom, my sister and Wayne come in though and I was so proud when I saw them all run through the finish line.  Timing worked out perfectly so that we were able to catch the Women’s Elite race and the winner of the Men’s Elite race all together afterward.  Gosh, those runners are incredible!

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We told everyone to come to our house for a BBQ at 2, then when we were just leaving Boulder at noon, hinted that it would be okay if everyone took their time arriving.  I was feeling slightly frantic trying to shower, get ready and put together a few dishes, but it turned out we had plenty of time and I was just about to text my sister and say “hurry, we can’t stop eating the dip!” when they showed up.  We got to use Joey’s new outdoor cooler, check our Lori’s cute new car and feast on ribs and it all made me feel so happy.  We pulled out the ice creams later on and the salted Oreo was amazing but the strawberry was a bit icy.  We blame the tupperware we froze it in. We were cleaned up, in our pajamas and parked on the couch by 5:30!  Joey and Andi (who was worn out from his play date with Huni) took a nap, while I watched part of Saving Private Ryan because it happened to be on and when they both woke up we started Game of Thrones: The Last Watch (I cannot believe how much went into the making of that show!) but by 8:30 I was EXHAUSTED.  I think I fell asleep the second my head hit the pillow.

What a perfect weekend!

Weekend Things

It was a weekend of finales — we watched the final season of Veep, I woke up from a nap to hear Joey watching the final scene of Big Bang Theory and Game of Thrones, of course — and a weekend of me saying I was going to do stuff and then… not doing that stuff — going out to dinner, running 5 miles, buying a dress for a wedding — but I also got to watch Joey accept an award and finish a half marathon and we finally planted our garden!

Also, SPOILER WARNING because I’m definitely talking finales of all sorts in this post.

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Friday, after work, we headed to Mile High (or whatever it’s called now) to pick up Joey’s race packet and despite how OVERJOYED he was at getting bib number 303, no one else commented on it 😛  We went home afterward to walk and feed Andi then spent way too long trying to decide if/where to go out to dinner then ended up staying in.  We’re the most fun!  But actually, putting on my pajamas, eating leftover enchilada casserole and watching the final season of Veep felt 100% right.

I set my alarm to run Saturday morning and then asked myself if I really wanted to do that or make pancakes and guess what the answer was!  We used our leftover ricotta to make these and wow, I forgot how good they are!  Afterward, we headed to Paulino Gardens and it was A) packed and B) pretty picked over.  I don’t know if it was because it’s already mid-May or because they’re closing at the end of this season but it was sort of nuts in there.  We managed to leave with most of what we needed but we’re still at a loss for what to plant in the shady part of our yard.  Also, Joey stood in line for something like 40 minutes while I stayed warm in the car and ordered us lunch delivery 🙂

I fully planned on heading to the mall afterward but it was already past 1 PM, we had somewhere to be at 6 PM and I still needed to shower and go to the grocery so dress shopping got the ax.  We spent the evening at a work-related gala where we were fed a family style meal of not nearly enough food (my top concern, obviously), but our company won an award, so I guess that’s cool!  Back at home, we watched a few minutes of SNL (oooh, another finale!) then went to bed because Joey had a race in the morning and I was dropping him off.

First time at the Colfax Half Marathon and the parking/traffic situation actually wasn’t bad.  Joey’s race started at 6:45 AM which seemed really early to us (the marathon started at 6!!!) so I dropped him off around 6:15 then headed back home to make myself some coffee before Lori picked me back up.  I think we took a really long route to the finish line, but Max seemed content in his stroller ♥  Joey cruised in at 1:37:59 which is a new PR for him and I was so proud!!!  He and I had a celebratory breakfast at Onefold afterward and then I went home and took a nap.  Wait, did I actually run the half marathon??

Post nap, we regrouped outside and did some planting.  I thought of my mom the whole time I assembled my planter pots since she bought them for me and is such a gardener at heart ♥  We also got our garden seeds in, plus these shishito plants that I am legitimately SO EXCITED about.  Fingers crossed!  We lost our garden bed when we built our new garage but then they left us that little strip of dirt and it looked perfect for a row of flowers.  I took myself to yoga afterward and Joey kept on working like he hadn’t run 13.1 miles very early that morning!

Came home to make salads for the week, finish up Veep, eat dinner and watch Game of Thrones.  Before I get to GOT, can we give it up for Veep?!  What an incredible, hilarious, vulgar, expertly crafted show.  Everyone gives an amazing performance but Julia Louis-Dreyfus is just PHENOMENAL.  What an all-time character!  We are so lucky to have her comedy genius in this world.

Guys, I was so ready but also not at all ready for the finale of Game of Thrones.  This season has been so strange and rushed and up and down.  I don’t think it’s any great secret that the show runners couldn’t quite get it right without the books as source material, plus this is a show built on long term development being condensed into six episodes and that just doesn’t work.  I won’t say I hated all of this season because the visuals are still (mostly) amazing and I thought this season had some nice acting and moments that I really felt in my heart but it also had far too many unanswered questions, logistics that just didn’t make sense, important scenes left unshown and character arcs that felt unsatisfying or worse, unnatural.  I feel real sad about some of it (Dany), real annoyed by some of it (Bran??) and real thrilled about some of it (QUEEN IN THE NORTH, BABY!).  I’m sure I’ll spend the rest of the week processing it all, but what a ride it’s been!  What are we all watching together now??

How was your weekend?