End of Summer Splurge

Our family took a fun trip to Denver over the weekend. It ended up being a total splurge weekend since our hopes of a mini-vacation to the mountains never panned out. We had a super fun time. Splurging is always fun though, isn't it?

(Heads up: this is a long, photo-filled post!)

We headed north Friday morning and stopped at Park Meadows mall. The kids have been saving their allowance money all summer and they each had a place in mind that they wanted to shop.

Abbey spent her money at the American Girl store. We've been several times this summer and I love watching the little girls in that place trying to take it all in! Plus, I just love AG stuff and love that my girls still love playing with their dolls. Money well spent! Abbey bought some purple accessories that'll pop up in some pics later!

After shopping for awhile, we stopped for lunch. John's parents took the kids to the Grand Lux Cafe when they were staying with our kids in May and the kids have been raving about it ever since. Of course that was where they all wanted to go when John asked them where we should have lunch! It sounds like the name of a casino to me, but it was yummy, and they get ten thumbs up for having Bendaroos for kids to play with while waiting!

We did a little more shopping before heading downtown and checking into our hotel which was just two  blocks from Denver's 16th Street mall and the Colorado Convention Center. Here's a view from our hotel room.

See that big blue bear looking into the windows of the convention center? VERY fun. Downtown Denver has lots and lots of (very cool) public art. The bear sculpture is called "I See What You Mean" and if you're interested you can read more about it here.

I did my research and found out that a pinkberry had opened just two blocks from our hotel. Pinkberry is a fro-yo chain and it is every bit as delicious as all my California friends rave. Even our resident yogurt hater loved it. Even Justin Beiber agrees. (My kids found that little tidbit fascinating!)

We knocked around 16th Street Mall for awhile before heading to the Rockies v. Cubs game.

I love baseball. We had so much fun at this game!!!

We were thankful the rain missed us. It was very windy and cool as the storm blew over but it cleared and turned out to be a perfect evening to play ball!

We almost chose to go to the Saturday night game with some friends, but were SO glad we picked this game instead. The Rockies ROCKED the Cubs. They scored TWELVE runs in the bottom of the 8th. It was AMAZING. They were on a huge roll and the crowd was going NUTS. My kids know I'm a crazy football fan, but they were surprised that I got so worked up about baseball. We all sorta did. All the Cubs fans around us were so disgusted they left. The Rockies won 17-2.

We were walking back to our hotel after the game when John surprised us with a horse-drawn carriage ride! Huge splurge. So fun!!! The kids loved it.

Thanks to hotel black-out curtains we all slept late Saturday morning which was wonderful after a late night at the game.

One of the things on our list of hotel criteria was an outdoor pool. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a hotel in downtown Denver with an outdoor pool? We never found one. And we vetoed several hotels that didn't even have an indoor one. We had the pool to ourselves that morning. The hot tub too.

After swimming, we got dressed, checked out of our hotel and walked down to Lo-Do (lower downtown) for brunch at Snooze. John had breakfast there with his editorial team back in December and has been wanting to take us ever since.

The wait was L-O-N-G but it was so worth it! I kinda regret not trying the sweet potato pancakes so I guess that just means we'll have to go back. Did I mention that we were by far the oldest people there? We were. It's a pretty hip joint!

We walked around Lo-Do and the 16th Street mall for most of the afternoon.

John hardly ever buys stuff for himself, but he found a shirt he liked at one of his favorite places in Denver--Rockmount.

We stopped by pinkberry AGAIN. Oh my. I think I have a new addiction. Too bad (for me) that the closest one is an hour away.

Original with blackberries and strawberries is my favorite, but I liked the pomegranate too. Here's a pic of the chocolate one just in case you chocolate lovers are feeling left out. Smile.

We stopped by the mall again on the way home because we have one child who likes to explore all her options before spending her money. And we ran in Old Navy so the kids could use the gift cards that a friend sent to them. (Thank you again, NTH!)

We were only gone a day and a half but we had such a fun time. It was the perfect overnight getaway and a fabulous way to wrap up our fun summer! Did I just say that? I'm in a bit of denial that it's actually August. Didn't you heard me groan when I flipped my calendar over this morning. I'm going to put on some black clothes and sit in a pile of ashes. I'm soooooooooooooo sad that this amazing summer is almost over. Sigh.