Boulder or Bust

Back in January when they were bidding vacation days, Jesse randomly booked a weekend in July off, which happened to be this weekend. We have both been feeling slightly bored with day to day life recently and decided it would be good for us to have a little change of pace. So, Saturday morning we hopped on the early flight to Denver and then drove out to Boulder for the day with no major plans. We didn't actually take that many photos, and the ones we did take aren't that great, but here are some none the less.

It was hazy when we landed, so you could only see the base of the foothills from the airport. Here we are waiting for the shuttle to go get our rental car.

The drive into Boulder. Skies had cleared, so we had a great view driving in.

Just hanging out...

We went down to Pearl Street Mall (a pretty well known Boulder landmark). They were having an art fair this weekend, so we strolled through that for a bit and then browsed a few shops. We split a yummy lunch of tomato/basil panini and summer berry salad. Of course, Jesse opted to take a photo of me just seconds after I had stuffed my mouth with salad...thus the odd smile.

After Pearl Street Mall, we were both super thirsty and craving smoothies, so we searched for a smoothie shop to no avail, and finally ended up at a little coffee shop. We have tried smoothies at a few different coffee shops, and should know by now...they are always gross or artificial tasting. These were unfortunately no exception and left both of us feeling a bit queasy. Ironically, as we were leaving we noticed a smoothie shop just a few doors down....

Our final stop was at the Boulder Running Company. Jesse found lots of stuff to pine for, but ultimately came away empty-handed. (I got lots of good Christmas and birthday ideas for him though.)

One thing we both loved about the culture in Fort Collins/Loveland was the dog-friendliness of the city. Every third or fourth car would have a dog along for the ride, and nearly every other car had a dog gate installed in it. The store Jesse worked at let dogs come in with their owners, and sometimes they would be running around my work as well, and you would for sure see lots of them laying beneath cafe tables as their owners had lunch or coffee on the weekends. Boulder was no different. We spotted dogs all over the place and logos letting people know their pups can come along for the shopping errands.
Perhaps the only thing that could have made the day better is if we had Horton and Monkey along for the ride. =)

One last mountain pic before it was time to say good bye to Colorado again...

Math

This:

Plus This:

Equals This:


Monkey is still learning the rules of the world. We have tried to give her tons of exercise to prevent the above photos! Apparently, this day we failed at that. For her age though, we are lucky we have not had more incidents like this. She is probably even younger than we thought when Jesse first found her. We thought she was about a year old when he found her, but since getting her, she has grown another couple inches, so we're thinking she is probably still quite a young pup. All in all, if she's still less than a year old, she is actually doing quite well in her training. It is funny to watch her as she develops her skills. For instance, she gets SO excited when I get home from work, so she wants to jump. Of course, we do not want this, so I immediately tell her to "sit" when I walk in now. What this translates to when she is excited is "touch butt to ground and LEAP back up". It is generally quite cute and funny, since she does display that she understands what you are asking of her, but she does it in her own crazy puppy way. Next step: the "stay" command!

Vegan Ice Cream: Round One

Ever since seeing the cover of The Vegan Scoop, I have had a one track mind, looking forward to trying my hand at making my own vegan ice cream. Unfortunately, I never located a copy of the book to thumb through. Library didn't have it, and neither did Barnes and Noble. I did a google search for recipes, and for the first time, my dear google failed me. Granted, I was looking for a very specific recipe. Anyway, through all my searching, I browsed probably 50 vegan ice cream recipes, so I got a good handle on the basic themes and important ingredients, and then decided to make up my own recipe from there. I made chocolate-peanut-butter, not really knowing what to expect. Vegetarian products and recipes are very hit or miss, and I assume vegan ones to be even more so. I was pleasantly surprised with the end result, especially considering we don't own an ice cream maker. (Apparently, the constant motion and stirring of the machine is what makes the consistency creamy and not icy.) I used unsweetened almond milk for the base, so it actually has some healthy virtues, like loads of vitamin E and lots of trace minerals. Sugar is the only bad thing in it, and next time I plan to scale way back on the sugar anyway because my only end complaint this round was that it was a little too sweet. But, now that I know it actually works with some success, we can start branching out to other flavors....mmm...

Weekend Happenings

I had started a post over the weekend and never finished it up....so I'll just post some photos and give a quick recap. Jesse and I had an entire day off together on Friday! (Rare with our work schedules.) We went out for lunch and then took the pups for a 3 mile walk/jog which they thoroughly enjoyed. (So did we.) Saturday I walked in a parade for the shelter. (My mom has recently joined me in volunteering there, so she walked in it as well.) Jesse and I skipped fireworks that evening. They are nice, but really, you've seen one show, you've seen them all. Anyway, then came Sunday, where good news was had - one of the dogs who has been at the shelter for about 3 years got adopted! There is a rag tag core group of dogs that are there week in and week out, so it is always so sweet to see one of the "regulars" find a home. In any case, that is the short version of my original intentioned post!