One Year Ago...

...I married my best friend.

So, this weekend marks one year since our wedding. And man, has it really flown by! We kicked off the weekend with shopping and dinner out on Friday night. We both picked out new slippers because coincidentally, we were both missing one slipper from our pairs of slippers. I found these awesome super pillowy, super fluffy, super pink (duh!) ones and Greg found some sensible black fleecy manly ones. Saturday, we went to Fogo De Chao for dinner. We enjoyed the Brazilian tradition of gauchos, their signature drink (similar to a mojito), and endless grilled meat including filet mignon, top sirloin, ribeye, beef and pork ribs, sausage, wings, bacon wrapped chicken, parmesan pork....this list goes on! You also get to help yourself to the salad bar (the best salad bar I've ever seen) and traditional Brazilian sides (plantains, fried polenta, and garlic mashed potatoes) which were all good. We topped it off with a papaya cream dessert...very cold, soothing treat that supposedly has enzymes to help digest the protein we'd just eaten. I would highly recommend this restaurant to someone looking for a spot to celebrate something special, or just to have a new experience and excellent food!

After that we walked over to the Shout House where we enjoyed Dualing Pianos and a few adult beverages. Two really cool coincidences...an orchid topped our dessert at Fogo, which was a flower in my wedding bouquet and the pianists played our wedding song "A Beautiful Day" by U2...we didn't request it, and we've never heard them play it in the half-dozen or so times we've been there. So, it was a really cool coincidence to be there when they played it.

Sunday we just hung out around the house and that evening we went to see the Disney musical "The Lion King" playing now through most of November at the Orpheum in downtown Minneapolis. What a fantastic show! I would highly recommend it to anyone. Like in the movie, there are some "scary" parts so I would think twice before taking small ones who don't like that sort of thing, but otherwise it was a great family show. True to Disney form, there were a few adult jokes in there. Beyond that, the costumes and set were enough to mesmerize an audience of any age. Truly fabulous, truly over-the-top...the best I've seen in musical theatre. The singing was outstanding (we bought the Broadway soundtrack and we think our crew did even better than that recording) and we loved that there were some new songs in the score that weren't in the animated movie! If you go, try to get seats on the main floor, and if possible near the inner aisles. I won't ruin the surprise, but it's definitely worth it! I promise.

So all in all it was a wonderful weekend of trying some new things, and well, out right spoiling ourselves!

wedding photo courtesy of Emmerlee Sherman