Davies Chuck wagon breakfast...

There's this restaurant that I've driven past a hundred times called Davies. As you can see from the picture the sign really catches your eye. Not to mention the fact that there is a big horse stature on top of the restaurant. I forgot to get a picture of it, sorry! Anyhow, every time I drive by I think that place is either amazing or scary and next time my brother David comes to visit I am so taking him there. I recently heard from a co-worker that it's a great greasy spoon kind of restaurant, so Jesse and I decided to check it out for breakfast yesterday. It's a total 1950s time warp dinner. Makes you think you're on the east coast in the 50s for sure. The food was good and fast, the waitresses are either teenagers or senior citizens. It's got a big counter in the front and not much space else wear, but boy was it popular. After reading over the menu I discovered a couple things. It was actually built in 1957. It was shipped to it's current location by rail car from New Jersey (explains the 1950's east coast feel). They say it's the only one this far west. In 1997 it was put on the historical registry. It's an actual historical landmark. Crazy! Oh and they say they have tenderloin sandwiches. To you Iowans this is not anything new, but here in Denver it is almost impossible to find a tenderloin sandwich and you definitely can't find one as good as the one from Menlo's cafe. My fingers are crossed that this one is good. Someday we'll go back and try it. Anyhow the food was rather inexpensive and very tasty and the atmosphere was something to see. Next time someone comes to visit us I think we'll take them there for breakfast.

Holiday deals and new stuff...

Yeah real Tupperware.

Nice new dishes that aren't chipped, but are microwave, oven,
and dishwasher safe.

Last week I found an online coupon and saved 33% or some obscure amount on my holiday picture cards from Walgreen's. Yes! I was terribly excited about that. It got me in the mood for some serious Holiday bargain shopping. This year we're trying to be tighter with our money, so I'm making most of the presents we're giving people. We do however have some things to buy and on the day after Thanksgiving I did get up early, but no earlier than I normally do on a Friday. I walked over to Target (we live right behind it) and I bought a few little presents, but the bulk of my shopping was for us. When I got home Jesse and I stopped by Wal-mart before I took him to work to see what deals they had. All in all we got some great deals. The Tupperware and dishes pictures above, all for under $35 total. We broke down and bought all the Harry Potters on Blue ray for $10 each. We just got a PS3 which plays Blue rays, but we didn't have any to watch. We actually did a Harry Potter marathon yesterday. The biggest ticket item we got was a Tomtom GPS system that retailed for $250 and we paid $97. We're pretty excited about it. Jesse really wants to take a road trip now, so we can test it out. That would require time and money, 2 things we are severely lacking at the moment. Maybe someday we'll get to road trip, probably to Iowa, Utah, or New Mexico since those are the obvious places we always go. Anyhow... I hope you all had a nice Holiday weekend and if you did do some shopping I hope it wasn't that crazy and that you came out with some great deals like we did. :)

Christmas is a coming...

Our Christmas Kitchen

Believe it or not this is a picture of our tiny tree all lit up. It's a 32" fiber optic tree.

This is the front of our tiny tree showcasing the 2 new ornaments Jesse and I got for Christmas. See it's tradition in my family to get a new ornament in your stocking every year and since we won't be there this year my parents sent us our ornaments early.

I called my mom and asked her to send some of my ornaments, so we could decorate our tree. Unfortunately our tree is tiny and most of the ornaments she sent were to big for it. I only put up about half of them. Maybe some day we'll have a bigger tree.

This is the pretty Christmas tree topper I finally found. It was actually quite difficult to find anything I liked to go on top of our tree. Personally I would have preferred an angel topper, but that was impossible to find. I liked the way this one sparkled. Even though it doesn't lite up itself it does look quite lovely and sparkly when the tree is lit.

Our stockings and one of my favorite Christmas ornaments of old. It's a snowflake with my birthstone in it. It was obviously a little big for our tree, but I think it looks nice here. I remember when we (David & me) got them for Christmas. I thought they were so perfect especially since my birthstone is red (Garnet) and his is green (Emerald). Perfect Christmas colors.

I bought an advent calendar as well. When I was little we had one that hung in the hallway near my bedroom in the old house. I remember moving the little bear that lived in the pockets every night before bed. It was very exciting to me.

Another picture of our tiny tree. I forgot to add the candy canes. I specifically bought tiny ones for our tree and for our cups of hot cocoa. One of my favorite things on a snowy day is a nice hot cup of cocoa with marshmallows and a peppermint candy cane in it. Yum!

Hair things...

This picture is for my parents. It really doesn't do justice to the way my hair really looked, but I thought they would get a kick out of it. See I washed my hair before going to bed the other night and figured hey it's short enough it will be fine. Oh no, not anymore. My hair is in that shaggy short length and with all the thickness the waves came back. When I was younger and had longer hair I definitely made this same mistake. Then I would walk upstairs in a zombie like state and my parents would laugh and laugh at me. Ha Ha, very funny guys. I would say to them "It's your fault you know." Anyhow this is an obvious sign that I need a hair cut. Short hair has been good to me. Easy to take care of and no major rooster like pompadour on my head until now. I'm getting my hair cut on Friday before I leave for Texas.

These are hair things I've been working on. I bought the feather part ages ago and just recently found the center pieces for them. A while back I was quite obsessed with wanting some fancy sparkly feathery hair clips, but I was not about to spend $30 or more to get a little hair thing I would rarely have an excuse to wear. Thus, I decided to attempt making my own. I found the feathers @ Urban Outfitters, they were actually coasters, believe it or not and they were on sale for 1/2 off. Yes! score 2 for $8. The pieces in the middle are from Micheal's one was on clearance for $1.99 and the other was slightly more expensive $5.99. Either way that brings my total to around $8 for those 2 and just under $20 for all 4 pieces. I have some clips I bought long ago when I made hair clips with flowers and feathers for Jesse's nieces, so I'm golden there. If only I had bought more of those feathery coasters. I could go into the business and sell them. As it is I will probably only keep one of them. I'm thinking I'll give the other one away as a Christmas present to a friend.

I think this would look quite stunning in my hair once it's cut and I have an excuse to dress up. Maybe I'll keep my hair short for a while and try to talk Jesse into taking me out for a nice dinner.

IF show 11/27/09...

They played the Larimer Lounge again. The crowds were big this time. Lots of old friends that Jesse hasn't seen in ages were out. Adam's (the guitar player) grandma and mom came. They were probably the cutest duo I've seen in a long time. Two tiny little ladies, so proud, and giddy. They kept elbowing each other saying "Oh look, look what Adam just did." They were the best. Jesse did forget the words to one of the songs, but other than that the guys were really tight in their set and the crowd really seemed to enjoy it. It was a nice night.

Thanksgiving...

My poor table all ready for company. I got an awesome deal on this adorable little leaf shaped dish and I thought it was perfect for Thanksgiving, but it's kind of perfect for us in general. I've been filling it with nuts (mostly raw almonds) for us to snack on. I figured since today was a special day I would spring for honey roasted cashews. Yum!

Until I can find a box to fit the tree in for shipping it's going to live on one of our DVD racks and help make the apartment festive. I really enjoy it.

Silly me I forgot my camera when we went to dinner. We had dinner @ a house of one of my co-workers. It was very yummy. I made corn bake with corn from my parents, deviled eggs with cauliflower puree in them, and of course the veggie pizza appetizer I always make. I forced Jesse to pose for this picture when we got home. This is actually the 5 or 6th picture we took, because apparently Jesse doesn't know how to smile nice for pictures.

Next up cleaning the disaster that was once my kitchen. We sort of left in a rush and things didn't really get cleaned up. Ug! Guess I'll be cleaning while Jesse watches the Broncos game. We're going to go for a nice long walk after the game. I've finally broke him down on the going for walks thing. We've been walking almost ever other night. He says it's a warm up to eventually going jogging together. We're being each other motivation. Wish us luck!

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

PIXIES...

No, not that kind of Pixies.

This kinds of PIXIES. The one with Frank Black or Black Francis as the singer/guitarist. The alternative rock group from the 80's.
They're Jesse's favorite band.

Kim Deal, bassist and back up vocals, she was awesome.

We were in the 2nd row.

Kim waving to all the fans. The Fillmore was packed to the rafters.

Waving good bye to all the fans. This is when Jesse and I started to sneak out to the side. It was getting really hot in there and there wasn't really room to move. At one point I started to feel like I was going to pass out, so we snuck over to the side near a door. I sat down caught my breath and enjoyed the cool breeze for a minute before we headed out. We left during the encore performance, so we wouldn't get trampled in the mass crowd.

All the PIXIES together again. Taking a bow for their adoring fans.
You can check out their myspace and listen to their music by clicking on the link under this photo.

In September I heard the Pixies were coming and I knew I had to get Jesse tickets for his birthday. Only problem was I had already bought him presents and a trip to Texas to visit his family. I figured what the heck I would buy them anyway and tell them they were his early Christmas present. Luckily my parents stepped in and didn't know what to get him, so they helped me with the extra cost of buying the tickets. Jesse was pretty excited to get them. He's seen the Pixies perform once before, but still you can never see your favorite band enough and they are getting old. Who knows how much longer they'll be a band. Thanks again Mom & Dad!

From 1 holiday to the next...

My witches hat from Halloween (seen on Felipe's head in the photo) was a little flimsy after years of being stored in a box, so I bought a foam cone from the floral section of Hobby Lobby. As you can see in the photo it helped the hat keep that classic pointy witch hat shape.

I had no idea what I was going to do with said cone after Halloween, but I quickly came up with a plan after browsing the Hobby Lobby holiday section yesterday. I bought some ribbon, 2 berry picks, a small wooden plaque, and a mini tree topper. This is what I came up with. Voila! A Christmas Tree. I'm not completely finished fastening all the pieces down really securely yet though. I think I'm going to give it to Jesse's grandma for a Christmas present, since the woman collects holiday decorations (for every holiday) like a squirrel hordes food. Unfortunately we can't keep it, because we just don't have the room. We did however buy ourselves a mini-Christmas tree and ornaments that will be residing on our Kitchen table for all of December. I can't wait!

Arts Week...

Jesse's original sketches for the pen guy.

On night at the museum these Mexican Dancers came and performed in our theater to a packed house might I add. I snuck these pictures from the crowded entry way to the theater.

Mexican Dancers performing @ the Children's Museum on Night @ the Museum.

Jesse and I out on the town for 1st Fridays. Every 1st Friday of the month the art galleries in Denver stay open late for free. We've gone out and poked around at them before, but this Friday one of Jesse's friends had some paintings in a gallery in our neighborhood. We stopped by to check it out and then went for dinner and drinks with a few friends.

This Friday was the kick off to Denver Arts Week. This year they changed the Night @ the Museum event to Saturday night, bummer for me. I took Saturday day off and went into work around 4:30pm. For the Night at the Museum Event all Museum's all over Denver stayed open from 5-10pm for free to the public. They have a free shuttle service that drives you around to all the museums, so you can get the full Denver cultural experience. It's pretty cool. If you remember last year I helped plan the crafts for all the programs and got clay donated for our clay room. This year I did pretty much the same thing only we have more programs to plan for and I got over 600lbs of clay donated (double what we got last year). I'll have to post some pictures of the clay room as soon as I get some. I believe we served over 1,000 visitors on Saturday night, but I don't have the official numbers yet. I did have to play bouncer for a while since we had lots of adults coming to the museum wanting to play sans the kiddos. Yeah, that's not aloud. No Adults in the museum with out kids. We did give them tours if they were interested, but then we promptly sent them packing.

Jesse's work has commissioned him, so to speak, to draw up a character they can use as sort of brand recognition. They seem to be obsessed with Blue (the K-mart light bulb), but they want a pen. I'm not sure I understand why, because the company is called Red Book Solutions but who am I to judge. They are going to pay him $30 an hour for his time, plus the rights to the character. He's been pretty excited about this. He works on the drawings every night. He's got tons of sketches, but the ones above are the only ones I could get to upload right. When he finishes it and they buy it from him I'll make sure to pass on the finished rendering. He's doing a really great job when you compare his product to Blue, especially when you hear that Blue was developed @ PIXAR.

Dinner & a good night's Sleep...

I blinked. Let's try that again.

What is Moe doing? Let's try that again.

Great now she's laughing, because Jesse is laughing at how difficult it is to take our picture. Let's try it one more time.

Finally that one worked. I think Michon was over Monique & I ruining the pictures. Sorry Mish!

Last night we headed over to Pho 79 a Vietnamese restaurant that long long ago Moe, Ben, I all had lunch at. Moe & Ben were in town visiting since Monique had another hair class in Denver. They're always so busy when they get to town, so it was nice to be able to enjoy a tasty dinner date with them and Moe's twin sister Michon. Sorry we were party poopers and went home early instead of going out with you guys after dinner. It's been a long long week for both of us and we were pretty much exhausted. Maybe next time. Besides, I had to get home to form my new mouth guard. Yep! You heard me right. I have recently been informed that I have started to occasionally grind my teeth at night. I blame the stress and the other Wilsons, who apparently do this too. Thanks guys! It has been annoying Jesse and making my jaw occasionally hurt, so I figured I should do something about it. Especially since Jesse went out and got some breath right strips for his occasional snoring, so I wouldn't be annoyed. We boiled it down and molded it to my teeth after dinner, but it didn't seem to fit right. We reformed it and redid the fitting process. Thank goodness the 2nd time was the charm, because I wasn't about to go spend another $30 on something that may or may not work. I wore it to bed last night and it was a little weird, but I was so tired that I quickly got over the feeling. I think the weirdest part of the whole thing was waking up this morning and taking it out. I can't get over how odd it feels to be able to fully close my jaw and bite my teeth together. It's almost like the weird obsession you get with rubbing your tongue over your teeth after getting your braces off. All my fellow former braces wearers will know what I'm talking about. Bizarre! But... I did sleep great and my jaw doesn't hurt. I guess this will be a new nightly routine for me. I really hope I grow out of this phase. I hear it can be stress related which I fully believe mine is, so I'm planning on taking on some new stress relief techniques before bed time in hopes of relieving the tension. Rubbing Lavender oil on my neck and jaw, taking a hot bath, stretching (maybe doing Pilate's or Yoga), etc... This should be interesting. Wish me luck!

Kolache Addiction...

While we were in Texas Jesse's brother-in-law introduced us to the wonderful world of Kolaches when he bought a variety pack and served them to us for breakfast. They were oh so tasty and from that point on we were sort of hooked. Jesse more so than me, but I do love them too. Apparently they are big in Texas, but we had never heard of them before. Fast forward to just over a week ago. I was driving down Wadsworth Ave not more than 2 miles from our house when I spotted a Kolache Factory. I of course called Jesse right away and we decided that some day we would go there for breakfast. Well we did on Saturday before I had to head to work and apparently Jesse was so thrilled with his polish sausage Kolache breakfast that we had to go again this morning. Don't worry this will not become an everyday experience, but boy are they ever good. While doing a little research online I discovered that the Kolache Factory is a Texas based chain that has just recently started to spread it's reach through out the US. There is one in Colorado (close to home, yes!), one in Kansas, and one in Indiana while the rest currently reside in the state of Texas. Apparently Montgomery, Minnesota is known as the Kolache Capital of the World even though these treats are of Eastern European descent. For those of you who are curious Iowans I also found out that the Catholic Church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa holds a big Kolache Festival the 1st full weekend in June. I highly recommend checking them out. Per my mom's suggestion I think I am going to look into making my own. Hopefully mine are half as good as the real deal. The local Kolache Factory also got some big props from our friends at Westword. Check it out... Kolache Factory Lakewood, Co.

IF Halloween Party...

Hanging out in the garage.

Mask after math. They guys played in their masks for the most part, but the masks got a little hot while rocking out, so they were lovingly ditched on the equipment.

Amber (Adam, the guitar player's girlfriend) brought their dog Isabelle with them to the party. Apparently earlier in the night she was decked out in her shark costume, but she was locked up in her kennel when I arrived, so she had lovingly ditched her costume too.

Amber and I were the 80's Ladies.

Jesse screaming away. I was so glad they provided ear plugs to the crowd. It was a tight space and Ideal Fathers are quite loud.

Crowd shot.

Adam's shiny head and Mike P rocking the drums.

Mike K in all his masked glory.

Group shot... sort of.

more screaming

Finally a clear shot of Mike P in his masked glory.

Shannon & Joel the best zombies at the party.

80's Homecoming Queen & The Day of the Dead Red Skeleton. I wish we had a more full body shot of our costumes, but unfortunately we don't. I wore black leggings with lace on the bottom, my amazing metallic lace covered 80's heals, the turquoise dress, black beaded necklace, black dangle earrings, my black lace fingerless gloves, a million bracelets, my sequined cover up, and the tiara complete with sash & flowers. I got lots of congratulations from other ladies at the party. Jesse wore the poncho with bullets, his sombrero covered in tissues flowers, a black t-shirt, blue jeans, and the awesome red Ralph Loren Cowboy boots that we scored from the ARC thrift store up the road. It's hard to tell in any of these pictures, but Jesse and the guys added LED lights to their masks, so when they wore them they were back lit with the colors of the mask. Jesse's was back lit red, Adam's was back lit blue, Mike K's was yellow, and Mike P's was green. It made them pretty awesome looking, but the effect was a little to hard to photograph.

Hope you all had a Happy Halloween.