Weekend Things

Sometimes you are gifted with a perfect weekend and this weekend, that started with a really good movie, included a night out with our besties and ended with a taco festival, was just such a weekend.  Just thinking about it is making me feel so so happy ♥

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Real life dinner sometimes looks a lot different than Instagram dinner but those leftovers were delicious and we got to watch some of the Rockies game before making our way to the Mayan to see Eighth Grade.  Guys, the movie was SO GOOD.  I think I had mentally prepared for it to be really sad, so I was pleasantly surprised at how A) funny and B) optimistic much of it was.  But don’t get me wrong, there were many cringe-worthy and heart-breaking parts too.  Please see it, it is truly beautiful!

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The Saturday morning plan was to wake up and head straight to the Farmers’ Market then have breakfast when we got back, but Joey got up SUUUPER early and went for a run and then I got up two full hours before the market started so pancakes at home it was!  These Coconut-Cashew Pancakes were in the newest Cooking Light and once I got the batter properly thinned out with extra coconut milk, they turned out really good!

We hadn’t been to the market in something like three weeks, and in our absence, all the peppers popped up!  We paid $20 for our haul and I thought that was a pretty good deal.  Spent the rest of Saturday doing a few productive things — grocery, garden clean up, over-baking some Pistachio-Raisin Bars — but mostly some restful things — reading, napping, watching Anchorman — before our exciting evening plans.

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We made Dining Al Fresco reservations for Osteria Marco all the way back in MAY and even then, 8 PM was the earliest we could get in!  We also waited 20 minutes for our table but there was complimentary Prosecco, so I guess I shouldn’t complain too much.  Once sat, it was just a fun night of dinner under the string lights with our best friends ♥  It started POURING as we drove back home, so we could not have timed it more perfectly!

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Fish Taco from Los Chingones

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Jackfruit Taco from Mas Kaos

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Scallop Taco from Bright Marten

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Hard Shell Beef Taco + Green Chile from La Fiesta

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Barbacoa Taco from Chuey FU’s

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Carnitas Taco from Adelitas Cocina Y Cantina 

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Chocolate + Butter Pecan Paletas from Neveria Jedany’s

Sunday morning, I got up early(ish) and headed to yoga and Joey was out most of the day for a fantasy football draft so when I got home, I got our salads for the week made and finished my book so we could have the rest of the late afternoon to spend together at… Tacolandia!  Aka, an all-you-can-eat taco festival at Civic Center Park.  Look, there wasn’t a bad taco in the bunch, but the barbacoa from Chuey FU’s was my favorite.

After we had watched enough of the Lucha Libre Final Match (the wrestlers slapping their leg as they “punched” each other to imitate the noise was seriously so funny!), we decided to top it all off with some dessert in the form of the creamiest paletas and a Tamaricco, which I’d never heard of before but found super fascinating.  Also, again, the weather was not supposed to be great for this outdoor event, but we totally lucked out because, except for a bit of wind, it was plenty warm and sunny.  We had so much fun doing this!  Oh and Rockies swept the Braves!

Please tell me something fun you did this weekend! 🙂

Weekend Things: Unexpected Perfection

I thought Memorial Day Weekend was going to be my favorite weekend of the summer, but this weekend, the first weekend of June, caught me by surprise with just how perfect is was!  I know we’re only four days in, but June is THE BEST!

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Joey went golfing Friday afternoon and wasn’t planning to be home till late, so I did what any person does when home alone on a Friday night in a house that feels like it’s 90°… make no-bake granola and boil water (to brew kombucha) from the burner on your grill.  The second part of that plan was maybe a mistake because I ended up with a pot of water full of cotton, but shhh, anything to avoid heating up our house is fine by me.

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The rest of the night featured reading in the hammock, eating hot pink slider bun leftovers, watching the Rockies game with Andi (Heartbreak by the Dodgers #1) and then Joey came home and we resumed our watching of Arrested Development Season 5 until I looked over and he was full on sleeping, so I ordered us all to bed 🙂

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Saturday!  The best day!  Joey requested yogurt bowls when we woke up, so I made us each one, and then we ate them in the sunshine of the backyard before biking to the Famers’ Market for the first time this summer.  It’s such a small thing, this little trip we take (almost) every summer Saturday, but it makes me SO HAPPY.  It was already busy when we got there and early-summer produce is always a bit slim, but we got iced coffees and cherries and saw a long-haired dachshund and two new foods stands (BAO BUNS AND TACOS!) so I was truly in my happy place.

Spent the rest of the afternoon on this little retaining wall project Joey cooked up for us.  I lifted like 10 bricks and did very little complaining but OH MY GOD, it was actually really hard for me.  I woke up Sunday and everything was sore!  And before you make fun of me, we looked it up and they weigh 52 pounds each.  Joey was doing most of the work, but he named me Refreshment Coordinator so I helped by providing lunch, plus I arranged for our groceries to be delivered because that just seemed like a major time-saving move.

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We cleaned ourselves up fairly early because we wanted to grab dinner before the Rockies game.  I’d been wanting to try a new-to-us placed called Goed Zuur and oh my god, I cannot believe we had not been there before!  They mostly serve sour beers and we’re on the fence with those but I did have a good one from Odd13 and daily happy hour means it was only $3, plus the food choices were great.  We both opted for a hot dog and shared a bag of duck fat, black pepper & Parmesan popcorn that I think I may have been shoveling into my mouth.  Sooo good, we’ll be back for sure!

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The Rockies gave up EIGHT RUNS in the 7th inning, but thankfully, I was barely paying attention because we attended this game with Hannah, Josh and, for his first ever Rockies game, Mason!!!  He was wearing a little Rockies onesie, baby sunglasses and a teensy hat and I COULD NOT HANDLE THE CUTENESS!  They got him a First Rockies Game button and a picture with Dinger even ♥  He was so well-behaved (and such a flirt too!) but they decided to head out at the 7th inning stretch and Joey and I looked at the score (Heartbreak by the Dodgers #2) and decided to leave too.  Made the spontaneous decision to grab ice cream at Sweet Cow afterward and look, if it’s summer and you don’t have a nightly reminder set on your phone to get ice cream, are you even really living??

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The Sunday plan was for Joey to work on the wall and me to do our food prep for the week, but I thought about it and decided we needed to have more fun than that so I suggested we grab breakfast and hit up the Chalk Art Festival as soon as it opened up and Joey was game.  We got toast and a waffle at Huckleberry then made our way to Larimer Square.  The bad news is that it was already crowded with people but the good news is it probably wasn’t as crowded as it got to be later in the afternoon and it also wasn’t too hot.  I took some shot of my favorite ones, which turned out to be anything with bright or bold colors and then we got the heck out of there.  I checked and we hadn’t been to the festival in 5 YEARS, whoa!

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The rest of the day involved wall building, lunch making (Beet, Farro, and Watercress Salad with Fig Vinaigrette coming right up!) and laundry folding but I did sneak in a workout (amen for partly cloudy skies that make mid-day running possible) and a trip to the liquor store, because I take my roll as Refreshment Coordinator very seriously, okay?  Rockies lost AGAIN (Heartbreak by the Dodgers #3 = a sweep, UGH!) but let’s focus on how good the wall looks so far instead 🙂  Joey wanted to get it in before we get a sprinkler system (FINALLY!) at the end of the month and I already think it looks great!

Rounded out Sunday by reading on the porch swing, walking Andi, cooking a quick but delicious dinner of grilled salmon and a broiled veggie side, featuring radishes we grew ourselves (!) and eating it in the backyard (MY FAVORITE!) before finishing up a movie we started on Saturday called The Tale.  What can I say, except that it was deeply disturbing but masterfully made?  Look it up!  In conclusion, if the first weekend of June is any indication, this month is going to be incredible ♥