Treasure Hunt!

Aaron and I headed up to the mountains this past weekend. We really wanted to get in a few more runs on the ski slope before the season is over. Well seeing how no one could remember the last time it had actually snowed up at Keystone, you can only imagine how exciting the skiing was.

We looked around the resort for some other form of entertainment. Tubing crossed our mind, maybe ice skating we thought, but something else entirely caught our attention! The Keystone GEO Cache experience. (Mostly this caught our eye because it was the only free activity.)

We borrowed a GPS unit, typed in a pre-determined GPS coordinate, and we were on our way!

It was a couple miles of walking along snow covered hiking and biking trails.

We ended up tracking two destination points.

Point #1

Point #2

Apparently the whole GEO Cahce thing is pretty popular around the world. Although it was neat to try, I am not sure that we will try our hand at this again anytime soon. We mostly just enjoyed walking together on a beautiful mountain day.

25!

This past Wednesday, I turned a quarter of a century! 25 years old! And I was spoiled all day long!

First by my family...

My mother made me a scrapbook of all of my years at home. It documents my life from the time of my birth until I graduated from High School. It is amazing! I have spent hours looking at it. (Picture to come soon!)

Second by my students...

My students decorated my classroom with streamers and Happy Birthday signs. When I walked into class they all jumped out and yelled SURPRISE! I was almost in tears that they would remember and take the time to decorate and surprise me. Then to top it off they made me a cake and a giant birthday card!



Finally by my husband...

First I had to go on a scavenger hunt around the house to find my present.

Clue #1

Clue #2

All clues were leading me to this website...

Clue #3

www.tinyurl.com/aepbhl



He got me the black North Face fleece that I have been wanting for years!

Then he decorated the house. He got lucky that it happened to be my parents' 25th anniversary not too long ago and we had a few decorations left over from their party that fit this day very well!

Then he did the rope! This is a tradition from my family. Every birthday you wake up to a rope that leads you all over the house! It has little treats hanging on it. He made sure to fill the rope with my favorite Easter candy! Side note- Easter candy is the best kind of candy!

He got so creative this year. I happened to take our rope to school for a lesson one day and have yet to bring it home. To improvise he used the cord from our vacuum. (By the time I had taken these pictures I had taken off most of the treats. I promise the rope is cooler than it appears.)

Here is what I found at the end of the rope...



Upon opening up the movie case, I found two tickets to Phantom of the Opera!



So we headed out for a sushi dinner and a night at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts! So fun! John Cudia played the Phantom. He is the only man to have ever played both the Phantom and Jean Valjean from Les Miserables on Broadway. The show was amazing!



It was a great birthday! I felt so loved all day! Thanks for all of the cards, emails, phone calls, and even the personalized poem! They all meant so much! Thank you! Thank you! 25 is going to be a good year!

We Moved!

We had been keeping our eyes open for a new place for a while. We figured it wouldn't hurt to save some money this year. We hadn't found anything worth moving for until last month. At the end of February, we found a great deal on a pretty great apartment. We were so excited! We called our landlord to let him know we were moving at the end of the month. We started packing and slowly moving into our new apartment a few boxes at a time. About two weeks after we had contacted our landlord, the day after we had signed the lease AND paid the deposit at our new place, he informs us that he would like us to stay so he would be willing to reduce our rent by $200 a month. Needless to say our excitement definitely dwindled. Even though we would still be saving more at our new place, it was a bummer to realize that the savings really wouldn't be much, taking into consideration the costs of moving and furnishing our new place. Then came the real kicker, in a conversation we had with our old landloard after the move, he admitted that he should have just absorbed the deposit at the new place since he would be losing a month without a renter anyway. All in all, we wouldn't have had to move, lose any money, and we would have saved money!


Well after all of the drama, here we are a few weeks after our move and we are loving it. There are a few things that I still miss about our old place like...

My old kitchen! It was beautiful and perfect!



Here is my new kitchen. Aaron and I can barely fit in it at the same time!



But the new place has its perks. Check out my closets! Yes, CLOSETS! I have 5 huge, beautiful closets.



Check out my old closet... or should I say lack of closet! Yea, I am not sad about leaving that behind!



All in all it has been a good change. If things go as planned you may be hearing about another move soon. Hopefully we will be getting a HOME of our very own sometime in the near future!

5280

We love Denver! One of the perks of living in Denver is 5280 week. We get to eat at sweet, normally ludicrously priced restaurants for $52.80 per couple! This year we both decided to pick a restaurant to eat at.


Aaron's Pick:



ZENGO! Your modern Mexican restaurant. Basically it's Latin-Asian fusion. The food was good and the flavors were interesting. Towards the end of the evening we saw an entertaining appetizer that we are dying to go back and try. It was raw kobe beef served with a fire heated rock for table side cooking. It looked so cool! Here is what we had to eat:

She had-

angry zengo roll- spicy yellowfin tuna / cucumber / wasabi tobiko / sesame chipotle rouille

chicken tandoori- masala-achiote grilled chicken breast / naan / black bean dal / cilantro & mango salsas

churros- trio of dipping sauces - chai custard / spicy chocolate / berry

He had-

angry zengo roll- spicy yellowfin tuna / cucumber / wasabi tobiko / sesame chipotle rouille

tamarind bbq flat iron steak- grilled asparagus / curry-olive oil hollandaise

cajeta flan- ginger-prickly pear sauce / fresh berries

Angela's Pick:



THE MELTING POT! The most fabulous fondue restaurant. This was AMAZING!!! It was the funnest restaurant I have been to in a long time! It might possibly be my new favorite restaurant! Here is what we ate during our two hour feast:

We had-

Boston Lager Cheddar Cheese Fondue- Aged cheddar cheeses blended with Tabasco,® Worcestershire sauce and chopped chives.

California Salad- Mixed baby salad greens, Roma tomatoes, walnuts and Gorgonzola cheese, with Raspberry Black Walnut Vinaigrette Dressing.

Fondue Feast- Filet Mignon, Cedar Plank Salmon, Memphis BBQ Pork Tenderloin, Key West Shrimp, Honey Dijon Chicken, Spinach Artichoke Ravioli, Fresh Vegetables.

Flaming Turtle- Milk chocolate, caramel and chopped pecans, flambéed tableside. Dippers... Fresh strawberries, bananas, cheesecake, tasty marshmallows, pound cake and brownies.

I wish Denver restaurants would always offer this deal!