Happy Friday y’all! I hope your week has been full of warm(er) weather and sunshine. It’s always so nice when the winter cold starts melting away and we get the first true glimpse of spring. I just love it. Also, my husband has been gone basically the last two weeks on some business trips, and he’s finally home now so I am very excited to spend the weekend with him.
Today’s blog post is about a quick trip I took a few weeks ago to Colorado. My brother lives near Denver, and it’s so nice to be able to see and stay with him when we visit. My dad also flew in while we were there, and he and my brother and I got to go snowboarding for a day, which was really fun! I didn’t take nearly enough photos on this trip, so I may also be sprinkling in a few throwback pictures from my high school – and possibly childhood – days!
Around Littleton, CO
My brother Jon lives in a town called Littleton, which is on the south side of Denver. My husband Keith and I took a late flight out of Tulsa on Wednesday evening, so it was nearly midnight by the time we made it to Jon’s house. Wednesday morning we took it slow and it was lovely to sleep in and then just relax after a few hectic weeks at work for both Keith and myself. Since my brother and his wife were both at work that day, we were on our own. But by lunchtime we were ready to head out and explore.
Usually when I am visiting it is a weekend or my brother has off work. But since that was not the case, Keith and I were determined to find a really great lunch spot on our own. And boy did we! A quick Google search of “best restaurants in Littleton CO” yielded several results. I really wanted to eat somewhere near the cutie downtown area, so after browsing a few online menus we decided to check out Black + Haus Tavern.
The food was phenomenal – I’ll get to that in a minute – and the ambience was so pleasant! We ordered the gochujang Brussels sprouts as our appetizer, and when I tell you I still dream of them, I really mean it. So good. Mouthwateringly good. For my entree I ordered the veggie Cuban sandwich with the blackened Caesar side salad, and Keith ordered the prime rib french dip sandwich with a side of parmesan fries. We both loved every bite! My brother had never been there before, so we took some leftovers to him and recommended that he go there himself immediately!
After lunch we walked up and down Littleton’s main street for a bit just window shopping. There are some really cute shops there that we enjoyed browsing.
Next, we headed to Trader Joe’s to pick up snacks and lunch supplies for the next day. We don’t have a TJ’s in Northwest Arkansas, so it was a real treat for us to go pick up some of our favorite foods from there that we had grown to love back when my travel nursing contracts took us somewhere with a Trader Joe’s nearby.
One of my favorite things to do on vacation is nap, and that’s exactly what I did for the rest of the afternoon. For starters, it’s a luxury that I don’t often have when I am at home, so whenever I am able to I always take full advantage of the opportunity. Secondly, I never sleep well when I am not in my own bed. We had gotten there late the night before and I had woken up a few times throughout the night. And thirdly, I knew that the next day spent snowboarding would be tiring. Fun, but tiring. So, a glorious nap it was.
That evening, Keith and I picked my dad up from the airport, then headed into Denver to meet my brother and a few other local friends for supper. We decided on North Italia. There was a little bit of a wait, which was honestly fine with me because it gave us a chance to catch up with our friends who we don’t get to see nearly as often as we would like.
The food there was great as well! We got a few orders of the white truffle garlic bread as an appetizer, and as my main course I got the eggplant parmesan (one of my favorite go-to orders!), and I also did try a slice of my friend’s margherita pizza and it was very delicious. I don’t remember what anyone else ordered, but everyone was pleased with their meals.
Keystone Ski Resort
The next morning my dad, my brother, and I woke up early to make the drive to Keystone Resort. I have been there so many times to ski and snowboard, and it was really nice to be going back for a day. And it was especially nice to be able to spend some time with my dad and my brother!
My dad has loved snow skiing ever since he first went in high school; his school took them somewhere in Arkansas (I have no idea where!) that had man made snow, and he said it was so hot that he was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. Ever since, anytime he has the opportunity, he still enjoys the sport – even now at the age of 70! The high school my brother and I went to had a ski trip every year, and my dad would always help drive the bus from where we lived in Texas to Colorado. It was a great excuse for him to be able to go skiing himself.
My brother and I both have our own snowboards (which he allows me to conveniently keep at his house!), but my dad needed to rent a pair of skis so we stopped at Wild Ernest Sports in Silverthorne, CO. It is about fifteen minutes from Keystone, and the prices are much more affordable than renting there at the mountain. Wild Ernest was always where everyone would rent gear from on the ski trips we came on with our high school, and one of the employees there still remembers my dad from his many years of coming on the trips. It was like walking down memory lane going in there.
I hadn’t been snowboarding in about five years, so when we got to the mountain I requested that we start with an easy run. Keystone is a great place for people of all skill sets because they have a lot of green runs (easy) as well as blues (medium) and blacks (difficult). In fact, the Schoolmarm trail is one of the longest green runs in the state of Colorado, at three and a half miles long! It didn’t take long for me to remember what I was doing and feel comfortable on my snowboard again, and for the rest of the morning we went down some blue trails.
After a sack lunch of Trader Joe’s black bean burritos and a few other snacks, we went down a few more runs together before I got really tired and decided to call it a day. The boys went back up for a few more runs, and then we made the hour and a half drive back to Littleton.
We were all too tired to cook supper that night, so we got pizza to go from Jet’s Pizza and ate it at home with my sister-in-law who I hadn’t even seen yet on the trip! She’s a pharmacist, and her work schedule just hadn’t allowed us to see her yet, so that was really nice to be able to spend some time with her.
Early the next morning, Keith and I flew out. This trip was our first time using our newly obtained TSA Precheck, and let me tell you I am never going back. It was so nice to be able to skip the long lines and, best of all, not have to take off my shoes! That’s always been the grossest part of the whole airport security process, and to not have to do it is a dream. Definitely worth the investment.
Final Thoughts
I really love documenting my personal adventures on this blog, and I hope you enjoy reading about them as well! At the very least, I hope I have entertained you with these photos of me as a teenager. As always with my travel journal posts, I mentioned a lot of businesses. None of them are sponsoring me, and neither is TSA Precheck. If that changes in the future, I’ll definitely let you know!
*All my blog posts contain a selection of images that I’ve taken. This blog post contains images that I took myself for personal use and enjoyment and are not intended to be used for marketing purposes. Most of them were taken on a cell phone, and all of them are unedited. If you are interested in viewing some galleries of my couples, intimate wedding, and elopement photography, click here. If you’re interested in booking a wedding or session with me, I am more than happy to send you a full gallery upon request!
I’m a wife, a dog mom, a foodie, a wanderer, a registered nurse, and a couples/intimate wedding/elopement photographer … and this blog will cover it all! If you enjoyed this post, first of all thank you, and second of all please follow me on Instagram + Facebook and sign up for my monthly newsletter to get exclusive wedding planning advice and access to all of my new (and old) freebies! If you have any questions about elopement photography, my journey from nursing to photography, or my time spent as a full-time RVer, drop a comment and I just might write a blog post answering your question (but I definitely will)!
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