Mile High Adventures

So the title of this post might be deceiving, because the only thing we did in Denver was fly in, sleep at my sister's adorable (!) new house, and have brunch with some good friends. There aren't even any pictures of the Mile High City part of this adventure... but it was a nice place to start our Colorado visit. Deep down, it's always the place I consider "home" if someone asks me that complicated question, and it's always nice to visit. Joe and I agreed in the future we'll have to plan a Colorado visit when there's not any specific events going on, since we always end up back there for a busy weekend of wedding or graduation type activities. 

Thursday we took the scenic route to Fort Collins, driving up through Boulder and Estes Park.
Here's the view as we're driving in to Estes Park. The white building in the distance is the
famous Stanley Hotel, a beautiful historic hotel that is said to be Steven King's inspiration
 to write The Shining.

We had to stop more than once to enjoy the scenery!
We weren't dressed to actually hike, though,
so we stayed towards the beginning of the trails we stopped at.

We couldn't resist stopping at the original Oskar Blues brewery in Lyons.

We had some time Friday to explore around Fort Collins, and split our time between the great outdoors and the beer tasting indoors. First, we drove up Poudre Canyon. It was incredible! So beautiful, with the river running down the canyon. It was cold, though, and it actually started to snow while we were up there! Then, we went back down to Fort Collins, and met my dad and brother at O'Dell Brewery. We did a tasting, then a tour, then a little more tasting. It was fantastic beer-- really some of the best that I've had recently. The guys there were really cool, too, and traded us some Chicago beer we'd brought with us for a bunch of their brews. We were well saturated that night ;)  The rest of the weekend was full of graduation celebrations, and lots of laughing and crazy antics with my family. It's always fun when our whole group gets together! 

Cheers!

Graduation Celebration!

Last weekend I went "home" to Colorado to see my family and celebrate a big accomplishment... my little brother graduated from Colorado State University! We spent a couple days playing around at the foot of the mountains, driving through scenic canyons and forest areas. We got to have brunch with our good friends who recently moved to Denver, and of course found time to visit a couple breweries. We also did some major celebrating as a family, eating and drinking in honor of my brother's graduation and birthday, with a sprinkle of mother's day at the end of the weekend. It was a busy weekend, but so wonderful! I love living in Chicago, but it does bum me out that it's far from the rest of my family. At least they're all pretty spread out at this point. If they all lived there and I was the only one out here in the Midwest, I would feel a lot more distant. But at this point my parents are in South Dakota, and us four siblings live in four different cities... so we're all pretty much experts at staying close and keeping in touch no matter where we are!

Congratulations little brother! We're all SO proud of you!

The Dean of the Education School giving the intro at the cording ceremony.

I got to cord Brendan myself. He worked so hard in school, and got
not only a history degree, but is also certified to teach. They wore the
cords at the College of Liberal Arts graduation.

Joe and I with the graduate.

It was an excellent weekend, and spending it with my family was just what I needed. We're a pretty close bunch, despite our distance in miles, and it is always so much fun to eat, drink, and laugh together! Congrats again, Brendan! We're all so proud of your accomplishments!

More pictures from the Colorado trip to come in another post... stay tuned!

A Little of This and That

Life has been good to Joe and I lately. We've had some fun nights out, confirmation about what good friends we have, and lots of warm fuzzies for the amazing city we call home. I feel much more like myself these days, and very grateful for the highlights of the last couple weeks. I've been to lazy to blog lots of separate little posts, so I thought I'd throw together a couple little photo collages, and just call it a day. So here's what's making me happy lately, in low quality iphone pictures!

Clockwise from top left

An amazing 12 tap set up at a homebrewers house. I love parties where everyone brews.

Wanna guess what we talk about?

Raising a glass to toast my cousin Anne, who got married last week!

The wedding was in France, so I just had to toast from afar.

Joe at the Chicago Theatre. Waaaay fancy for a concert venue!

Tasty food always makes life better!

Awesome thai sweet potato & kale soup

The best banh mi in Chicago is around the corner from our condo

Magnolia Bakery, worth the hype

Chicago dog!

The last couple Monday nights have been kick ass. Two weeks ago was Death Cab for Cutie at the Chicago Theatre. The set list was perfect, with a good mix of older songs. The only downfall was that the Chicago Theatre was beautiful, but too fancy for a rock show. People were sitting down the whole time! I would love to see them again somewhere a bit more gritty. The Metro is my dream, but it's pretty small for them at this point. Still a sweet show, and much more exciting than my usual Monday night routine.

Then last week I got free tickets to a Cubs game! Not just any game... they played (and beat!) the Cardinals. My friend Christie and I went, and we really had a lot of fun. We met at Goose Island for a tasty dinner and quality beer, then had a blast cheering on my favorite baseball team!

All highlights of a quality couple of weeks! I hope life is treating you well, too, and that Spring is right around the corner for all of us!

Easter Visitors

We had some special visitors for Easter this year... my parents and little sister came out to visit! We had a great time running around Chicago, and also just hanging out and relaxing together. It was nice for Colleen to have a few days off school, and my parents loved spending time in the big city.  And as the hosts, it was nice to play tourist in our own city, and to not worry about errands or house cleaning or other boring weekend stuff!

Enjoying some sunny weather on State Street

Mom got to meet the Easter bunny!

The BEST cupcakes!

Cute little sister!

Perfect afternoon treat

Saturday night we went out with Joe's parents and brother.
The eight of us had fun catching up, and enjoyed some amazing pizza at Spacca Napoli.

My handsome husband, prepping for mimosas

After Easter Mass we came home to a big Easter brunch.
The quiche was amazing!

Cheers! Happy Easter!

Keep Moving

After an unplanned break from blogging, I think I'm ready to come back. There have been highs and lows over the last couple months, and the last six weeks I've spent coping and trying to move on. Sometimes you can't control what happens in life, and that can be really frustrating and hard. But the only thing to do is to keep moving on, so I'm going to come back to the blog in an effort to continue getting back to normal life. I've been going through the motions of normal life, and each day it gets a little easier. So I'm coming back here, to continue documenting the *exciting* parts of my life to my *many* lovely readers... (Sorry, I had to get a little sarcastic there. A sign I'm acting like my normal self!)

Upcoming posts will include highlights of an Easter visit with my family, a new tattoo (so cute!!), and rocking out at the Chicago Theatre. All sorts of exciting stuff going on in the lives of Erin & Joe, your favorite pairing. So until next time...

New Glarus

On our way to Madison last weekend, we took a side trip to the cutest little town in Wisconsin. New Glarus is Swiss inspired, with a whole collection of Alpine inspired shops and buildings. It was quite adorable, but we were there for a very specific purpose... to visit the famous New Glarus Brewing Company!

 

We tasted while we toured, and took some awesome (*sarcasm noted*) iphone pictures to document our adventure. They built this new brewery just a couple years ago, and it was the most shiny new brewery we've ever visited. There was a self guided tour, which sounded fun. Really, though, it just meant "self guided walk around and guess what stuff was". A map or info sheet could have gone a long way! They seem to have built this brewery with visitors in mind, so it was surprising that the "tour" was so lame. Luckily, we know how the brewing process works!

I would have loved to have learned more about the actual brewery. For instance, they have a female president of the company, which is pretty rare in the beer world. They're also #21 on the list of largest craft brewers by volume, which is pretty impressive considering they're only distributed in the state of Wisconsin.

There was a tasting room, which is always a highlight of a brewery tour, obviously.

A fancy lunch at the brewery.
Cheese Curds, Meat Sticks, and Beer Flavored Chips.

I like their attitude!

New Glarus was a fun brewery to visit, and I'd probably go back on our next visit to Madison. The setting is beautiful, surrounded by rolling hills. I imagine it's quite lush in the summer, and the beer tastes good year round. If you're in the area, take a detour to New Glarus to check the brewery out!

The Band You Need to be Listening To

I know you've seen this picture before. A band, kind of far away, with lots of strangers' heads in the foreground. They're rocking, but could be anyone. Oh, and it's blurry, because it's a cell phone picture taken without a flash or any fancy camera tricks. So why am I torturing you with these crappy pictures?

This is The Head and The Heart, and I want everyone to know how awesome they are. We saw them at the Vic last week, and the show seriously rocked. They're from Seattle and have been playing shows in Chicago for about a year now. They started at Schuba's, a tiny little club at the back of a bar. That was only one year ago, and this past week they sold out TWO shows at the Vic, which is one of the biggest venues of its type in Chicago and has a capacity of about 1,400.

If one person reads this and has a listen, I will be happy. Because as soon as you listen you'll be hooked, and I like sharing good music with people. So put down the Katy Perry CD, and listen to these guys! Look, I'll even make it easy for you. Click here to link to YouTube, and hear The Head and The Heart for yourself. You can thank me later.  Enjoy!