busy little bees...

I have been pretty busy lately. Obviously. Since I haven't written in quite a while.

I will give you a good overview of the last three weeks. Ready? It's long...

oct 25-30
One of my oldest and best friends came to visit for the whole week! Anneliese and I met in 2nd grade at a friend's birthday party and in 4th grade she transferred to my elementary school. We have had a trillion sleepovers together with barbies, crafts, Fish Food ice cream, and movies. We have partied, traveled, cried and laughed together. We went totally separate ways after high school, but have kept in touch all these years. Even if its a year between our chats we can catch up just like it was yesterday.

She arrived on Sunday and left on Friday night. We had a very eventful week, minus the huge blizzardy storm that made us house bound for a full day.

We shopped at Cherry Creek Mall, Nordstrom's Rack, Target, Park Meadows Mall, Joanne Fabrics, and Halloween stores. We went to Lookout Mountain and Golden, CO. We cooked a few meals, did some crafts, cleaned house, decorated for the party.

The big Halloween party we had been planning for months on Wednesday the 28th, was of course ruined by the crippling 2.5 foot snow storm that started the night before and ended Thursday night. Luckily we had cooked and cleaned all day. We had 5 people at the house already; Tony, Matt, Carly, Anneliese, and me. Our neighbors stopped by with carmel popcorn and the one other guest is our friend Adam. A total of six people partied in the snow and in the garage with the keg for hours and hours!

We had sooooo much food for the 6 of us. We made...
72 mini cupcakes
chex mix
peanut butter cup cookies
sausage rolls
Rotel and Velvetta cheese dip
9 layer dip
cranberry bread
little smokies with bbq sauce
and we got a keg!

Ultimately we had a blast and I fully understood why people didn't make it out for the party. When it snows 2+ feet there aren't too many people that wanna drive to go drinking at a party! Shocking!

oct 31
Work. Blah. Cruddy Halloween.

nov 1-5
Work done by Wednesday morn. Because of the storm last week we threw together an impromptu Post Halloween party to attempt to finish the keg.

I cleaned the house all day to perfection because I knew people were actually coming this time. I asked people to dress-up in hopes of recreating Halloween.

The first couple of guests showed at 6. Then 6:30 Carly showed up. Soon after that, more and more people were appearing at the party. There were some really great costumes; M&M, Russian mail-order bride, Mario (from Mario Bros.), sexy cop, zebra, catholic priest, and more. I think there were about 20 folks in our little house/awesome garage.

We not only had pitchers and pitchers of keg beer, but some girls brought wine, champagne, and vodka. All in all there was a lot of drinking going on. The party went on until midnight. Seriously a fun time and I drank A LOT!

Thursday I probably did something important, but now I don't remember. Oh packing for our weekend vacation!

Later that night, I had a friend's birthday party to attend downtown. I got all dressed up and told myself I wouldn't spend any money or drink. I spent 25 cents on parking and of course there were free drinks.

Someone made me a drink and we danced to the music. We requested some Cyndi Lauper and the DJ said "who?" I then asked for 80's music and he said "what does it start with?" OK. Great!

nov 6-10
Friday morning, Tony and I got up super early to head to the airport. We were headed to Portland for the weekend to visit my dad. Elizabeth flew into Denver earlier that morning to meet our flight out.

Amazing rainy events in Portland...
friday
*Ikea. good shopping, good food and now Tony is in love with the store too!
*Bonneville fish hatchery to watch the spawning salmon in action jumping up the fish ladders
*Multnomah Falls. basically a double waterfall nestled into a lush green forest.
*Kell's Irish Restaurant and Pub. Tony and I love the Seattle location and we had been telling dad about it for years. It didn't disappoint. Corned beef and cabbage with good Irish beer and soda bread ::drool::
*VooDoo Doughnuts. If you go to Portland you have to have VooDoo. The old dirty bastard is AMAZING!!
*POWELL'S BOOKS. That's all I have to say. The best bookstore I have ever been to. When you need an obscure book like Red Dragon first edition or Angels and Demons Illustrated Edition... it's there.

saturday
*pouring rain, actual flooding
*Saturday market. It is a weekly outdoor craft show which might be great except for the cold wet rain.
*back to Kell's for a warm-up drink.
*a beautiful vintage store with Chanel suits and a Karl Lagerfield jacket and much much more. I almost died until I looked at the prices and we left :(
*powell's books again. I just can't get enough.
*Bridgeport Brew pub. Seriously what other kinds of sight seeing are you supposed to do in the pouring rain?
*more vintage stores but in our price range. new patent leather lace up shoes!
*chili for dinner at Dad's house. Nice dry warm evening with family.

sunday
*Elizabeth was supposed to leave, but got really sick in the night so we got one more day with her!
*basically football all day. hmph.
*downtown Vancouver, WA. Thrift stores, antiquing, and more vintage stores.
*Blind Onion Pizza. delicious.

monday
*Tony and Elizabeth left today to go back to work.
*Pittock Mansion. A beautiful house built in the early 1900's. So much history and a fantastic view of the rivers, the mountains, and downtown.
*Powell's one last time :(
*McMenamins on the river for dinner.

tuesday
*home.

Wow. The last couple weeks have been crazy, and now there is just work. Darn. I dont think the next couple weeks will be exciting at all, even though Thanksgiving is right around the corner!!

Here's to the next posts and lets hope they are shorter!