Rocky Mountain Rendezvous

So... Denver was a freakin' blast!

 

Genius idea on our part to pick a random city in the middle of the country and meet up for the weekend.

 

Brooke and I have been friends since we were about twelve years old, and randomly finding the fun in almost any situation has always been one of our specialties.

 

There's just something so awesome about old friends, and that feeling of seeing them and feeling like absolutely no time has passed since you last saw each other. We always just pick up right where we left off, and this weekend was no different.

 

 

I apologize for the poor quality of some of the rest of these pictures... Brooke and I had some issues sharing our photos. And PS I hate Shutterfly.

When we arrived Friday morning it was pouring rain in Denver and absolutely freezing. But fortunately we had an indoor activity planned: pedicures at this super adorable salon I had found for Brooke's 31st birthday. I think we both needed a little pampering.

 

We also grabbed lunch at the Ship Tavern, a super cute vintage pub in the Brown Palace Hotel, which is the second-oldest operating hotel in Denver. It's absolutely gorgeous, and if you're ever in town you should definitely check it out.

We basically spent the rest of that day and most of the next day (the weather eventually did clear up, and we had sun for the rest of the weekend) wandering around downtown Denver. They have this area called the 16th Street Mall, which is an outdoor pedestrian mall that's a little over a mile long and has about 300 locally-owned stores and over 50 restaurants. You can bet that kept us busy (and sent me home with a couple new pairs of boots).

The state capitol building and campus were very pretty.

And we loved wandering around the gorgeous streets in the sunshine. Denver has a lot of super random artwork!

Brooke's four-year-old son has had a stuffed bear named Blue Bear ever since he was born. So of course we had to check out Blue Bear Farm in Denver, as well as the 40-foot-tall Blue Bear statue! And we got a souvenir for Blue Bear himself, of course!

We really liked this gorgeous park which was right outside of downtown next to the river.

And I could not get over the completely random architecture downtown. There were modern buildings everywhere, but they were built around super old buildings and churches. It was such a eclectic mix, but it really worked!

We were absolutely fascinated by a building called the Navaree right next to our hotel. It was built in 1880 as a school for girls, but it later became a hotel, and then a restaurant with gambling and hookers! It's across the street from the Brown Palace, and there was an underground tunnel with rail tracks that went to the hotel, so that businessmen could visit the ladies without being seen entering the building! Now it's home to the American Museum of Western Art and unfortunately isn't open to the public on the weekends, because we would have loved to see the inside! I totally think it's probably haunted...

On Saturday night we were super excited about our tickets to The Dinner Detective. It's a murder mystery comedy dinner show that was hilariously entertaining! When we arrived we were asked to pick an "alias" for the evening (Jessica Rabbit and Betty Boop - HA!) and then begin interrogating each other (after visiting the bar, of course) to try and figure out who the murderer was among us.

Then during dinner actors played out different scenes of murders and investigations, and between courses we were allowed to examine clues to try and solve the case.

Brooke and I totally picked out some of the key players before dinner even started, but unfortunately we picked the wrong killer so we didn't win. Shoot. It was still a super fun evening though.

And on Sunday of course I dragged poor Brooke to a sports bar downtown so we could watch the Seahawks play. Road games are always super stressful for me and every other Hawk fan, and this one was filled with even more anxiety for me, because I was in a bar filled with Broncos. Luckily, they were very involved watching their own team play, and I was quietly able to watch the Hawks come back and beat Houston in overtime!!! I was scared to cheer to loudly and piss someone off. Seriously, these fans were rowdy!

The weekend was over all too quickly, and I headed back to rainy Seattle. Honestly though, Denver is a super rad city and I would totally go back there someday. Plus, it was a great place for me and Brooke to meet up -- just a quick two hour flight for both of us. Maybe we'll go back again next year!

As for me, I think my months and months of incredibly busy weekends is finally coming to an end. It's really been a whirlwind summer! Honestly, I'm ready to spend some time enjoying my own city and settling into my new house. This weekend my momma is coming over to help me go though a bunch of old boxes. And as boring as that sounds, I'm actually super duper excited! I'm also seeing all my aunties for some epic garage sale-ing. More on that later...

I hope you're having a great weekend, everyone!