Super Bowl

I didn't know if I could every re-hash such a hard day for us die hard Bronco's fans. However for the sake of documentation and wrapping up a great Bronco football year I had to decide to put by big girl panties on and write about the day we should  have been the Super Bowl Champs.

In true Sill Family Broncos football fashion we went BIG for the Super Bowl.  Big decorations, long food lists, Orange Crush bar and our favorite football friends.  We had big hopes that the Broncos would come out victorious and make us all proud.  Well folks that hope died for me at the coin toss (negative I know) and continued on the downward spiral with the first play.  I had to sit and watch while my team didn't even show up, it was EMBARRASSING!!  At least I was surrounding with enter circle of Bronco love.

(Warning picture overload)

Decorations: We tried to be festive but not over board on the typical Super Bowl gear.  We decorated mostly with the autograph items we have collected over the years.

Front foyer

Peyton Manning and John Fox

Photo Booth: I thought it would be fun to get a picture of each of our guest before the big game.  Lots of fun props and impromptu shots.  

{Brad and Alisha}

Don't know what is going on here

{Michelle and Alex}

{John and Maggie}

Tight squeeze but the helmet is on

{Warren (Dad) and Julie (Step-mom)}

{Chas and Afton}

The bump made an appearance

It was much easier to take such a butt kicking being around such great friends.  Hopefully next year will end much different.

Weekend Recap

Monday already... Bummer!!  I am happy to say this is a very short week for me and then it is off to Vegas for a work conference and some fun with my favorite person.  Brad is super excited to just get to chill while I work for two days and then we will have two days of fun together.  This weekend was busy with preperation for leaving and a wonderful thing called 5280 Restaurant week.

This years restaurant week is now split between one full week in  February and one in August, this is nice as you can try different places at different times of the year.  Our pick this time was Shanahan's Steakhouse.   Owned by former Bronco's coach Mike Shanahan.  We naturally went with our dinner favorites John and Maggie.  Last year we went to Elway's (John Elway's Restaurant) so there was HIGH expectations. 

The restaurant was very classy with elagent lighting and wine/wine glasses galore.  They used the glasses as their decorating method which was very neat.  We started out with some amazing cocktails (Bubbly Pear Martini), Oysters on the half shell, Parmasian fries (to die for), house salad and the best home made bread with butter. 

Dinner was the absolute best steak meal I have had.  It was a petite fillet served with garlic mashed potatoes, sauteed mushrooms and balsamic drizzled asparigus.  The whole meal literaly melted in your mouth.

John and Maggie

Bon Appetit

Last but certainaly not least was an espresso mousse with raspberry sauce in a decrotive eddible chocolate bowl.  EXCELLENT!!

 Not only was the food devine but it was awesome to see local celebraties as well.  Pat Bowen the owner of the Denver Bronco's walked by, we just missed Erik Decker of the Denver Broncos and we saw the former Govener Bill Owens.  It was fun to watch to see who would walk by next. 

After dinner we were told we could get our pictures taken with the replica Lombardi trophy made by Tiffany's.  We chose to hold the 1998 trophy which was the last game John Elway played in.  The trophy weighed about 40 lbs!!  They also displayed the Super Bowl rings. 

We left feeling like the rich and famous albeit full and then hit the road home to reality!!!

Sunday we ran lots of errands and took it easy. 

Glad to have a short week and then off to Vegas!!

Linking up today with the lovely ladies behind Dateless in Dallas and Showered with Design.

Favorite Things {February 2014}

Geez Louise my weeks have been so busy.  It seems like I was just writing my January Favorite Things.  This by far is one of the favorite link ups as I love seeing all the fun items that others have on their list.  I may be a little late in the post but still wanted to share my February list.   In case you missed my January list please click {Here} or the December list please click {Here}. Thank you to to the loverly hosts Erika and Andrea for such a great link up.

{One} Tide Pods:
This has been a new discovery that I LOVE!!  I hate nothing more then a sticky laundry area with residue all over the washing machine and drips on the floor.  The nifty little pod is a dream for all type A personalities.  You take one pod (much like a dishwasher pod) and place in the detergent area of your washing machine.  It's that simple... not much else to say but A-M-A-Z-I-N-G and no sticky yucky blue residue in your laundry room.

{Two} Bath and Body Soaps:
I know these lovelies have been mentioned by many people before but I am having so much fun with all the fun scents I had to mention.  I have different scents by each sink and come up with excuses to wash my hands to smell all the loveliness of each soap.  I am particularly loving the food scents (even through sometimes they make me hungry) but in particular the Gingerbread.  You can always get such great deals at Bath and Body and the soaps also make great gifts.

Yes please to all these scents!!

{Three} Birch Box:
I have now had my Birch Box Membership for 1 year and am still happy with each of the monthly boxes.  Some months are better then others but over all I have received lots of great samples of products I would not have normally tried.  The subscription also makes a fabulous gift!  I have been thinking of trying another monthly subscription, any ideas?

{Four} Apple Cider:
This one seems silly but I have been loving taking a pack of the cider to work each day and preparing a glass in the morning or afternoon when I need a pick me up.  I OD'd may have had too many Starbuck holiday drinks in the months of November, December and January (couldn't quite let the obsession go) so February has been about trying new things.  Apple cider defiantly hits the spot!!

{Five} Paper Mate InkJoy Pins {Here}:
Ya'll I have 15 plus pins that I write with on a daily bases and different colors for different things.  You should see my desk with my stash of pens.  These pins are my favorite for writing in my planner, calendar, list making and check writing (glamorous right?).  You can pick them up at Target the grocery store and even Walgreens.  Coming from a picky pin girl they get a solid A.

There you have it my February Favorite List.  Looking forward to everyone else's favorites.  Thanks for stopping by.

Arkansas

Continuing on with my little series of Fifty-Nifty United States.  We have already explored Alabama and Arizona.

Arkansas is one of the states that Brad and I have explored more then once together on different trips.  It was a state that we even considered moving to at one time. All the different city's that we visited were great, cute towns with so much character.  The scenery was beautiful, BBQ food out of this word and a nice group of people that love their Razorbacks and yell "SOUIE"!!

Our first glimpse of this lovely state was when we headed from Big Cedar Lodge in Ridgedale, MO owned by Bass Pro Shops (If you haven't been, GO!! I will do a whole post on the fabulousness of this place when I get to Missouri) down to Dogwood Canyon for a nature day.  While  in Dogwood Canyon you can rent bikes and go on a path that goes across the Missouri/Arkansas line.  The Ozark's are by far one of Brad and I's favorite places, the rolling hills and hillbilly atmosphere are one of a kind.  

Hello Arkansas

Gorgeous Dogwood Canyon

 We stopped by a cave called Mystic Caverns and got to explore one of the best caves we have seen to date.  They filled one of the Imax films here as it has a lake inside that they have determined is bottomless.  The divers for the filming actually stopped exploring the area as the lake was so deep they couldn't keep keep going for safety purposes. Our guide talked about putting fish in the lake which would always disappear in the current.  They bodies would never float to the surface.  (I just LOVE caves and all the mysteries!) The cave was for sale and I kid you not Brad and I tried to come up with how we could afford a $600K cave and if we could run a business there.  The cave sold and my dreams shattered! (Kidding aside we really tried to make this work).

We wanted to explore more of Arkansas and decided to visit Fayetteville, home of the beloved SEC Razorbacks.  We flew out for a long extended weekend and explored the whole Fayetteville area. This is the cutest town with a town square surrounded by the most charming shops and restaurants.  We went right after Thanksgiving and they had the whole square decorated for Christmas including an ice rink and horse carriage rides, it was like a scene out of a movie. We were sad that the Razorbacks were out of town that weekend, we would have loved to see the Pig call and all their loyal fans.  However we did stock up on lots of Pig gear!!

I was trying to snarl here with my hog friends

On a hike outside of Fayetteville (PS we look young and perm NEVER again)

Before leaving town we saw an episode of the Duggers where they went to Crater of Diamonds State Park and dug for diamonds.  We knew we had to give our luck a try and dig for the big rocks!!  It was a very neat, unique State Park.  You paid for time in the diamond fields, picked up a shovel, screen and bucket and could dig to your hearts desire.  We stayed and dug for about 3 hours, no luck digging for diamonds but it sure was fun to say "we dug for diamonds".  They displayed some of the specimens that had been dug up and the dollar value.  It really was a fun half day trip.  

photo source

Lots of dirt for digging, photo source

We decided to head back another 4 months later (March) and check out the town of Hot Springs and get some fishing in as well.  We fished with a guide out of Lake Ouachita.  (Side note: I won't get into our flight nightmare getting there including a LONG drive on the UPS super highway in the middle of the night or the gang bangers (kid you not) with guns in Memphis at a gas station, the 2 hours of sleep at a motel and then our fishing guide that kept peeing off the side of the boat!!  It was truly a trip to remember on so many levels, I regress.)   The lake was very pretty and we did get in some great bass fishing.  

Early Morning start

Good Fishing

We explored the town of Hot Springs visiting the Bath Houses, shopping and going to the botanical gardens.  It was a very short trip but were were able to see quite a lot.

National Park Bathhouse, Brad was creeped out by the whole idea of some one "bathing" you

Lots of really pretty flowers and trees

I encourage all of you to take a visit to the "Natural State".  There are so many fun things to see and do. The food is great and the people are so nice.  Defiantly one of Brad and I's top ten states.