This week Ben took a couple days off so we could relax and spend more time together. We decided to pretend we were visiting Denver, so we would do things we normally ignore.
Thursday Amanda came to stay with the boys so we could have 24 hours to ourselves. We shopped Cherry Creek, went to the Mark Mothersbaugh art exhibit, had dinner at the Cheesecake Factory, strolled 16th Street Mall, then went to our hotel for a long night’s sleep. The next morning we had breakfast at DJ Berkley’s cafe in the Highlands.
Sam missed us, but Jack bemoaned our return, a testament to Amanda’s tremendous babysitting skills. All day I heard “too bad Amanda had to go home [pout pout].”
We cheered them up with a visit to the gym. Yes, we go there four or five times a week already, but this time we went swimming! The indoor pool there is really great, with slides and whirlpools and jungle gyms. Jack went completely bonkers loving it. Sam was not so keen, but eventually sat in the kid area and splashed a little. Friday night was regular dinner for the boys, take-out Indian food for us, and a movie in the basement theater after bedtimes.
Saturday we took the family to the Denver Aquarium. It’s one of those places we never bothered to visit even though it’s right there downtown. It was nice. A bit overpriced, a bit schlocky over science (you can tell it’s owned by a restaurant corporation now rather education based). But we saw a lot of fish, some fiesty otters, a regal tiger, and a mermaid performance I’m embarrassed to admit that I loved. We didn’t spend more than an hour there before we felt done. Just as well since Sam was feeling the effects of a skipped nap.
Lunch at McDonalds, because why not, if we are on vacation? The boys took long naps while I finished sewing a shirt.
Later we had another babysitter come so we could enjoy one last dinner out together. We planned to stay local, but then I found a place in Boulder that looked good. We visit so infrequently now, I’m always astonished at how much has changed and how much has stayed the same over all this time. We briefly browsed Pearl Street, only to find the restaurant, Centro, had a 40 minute wait. Yeesh. By stroke of luck we found another place a few doors down that could seat us right away and had a similar menu. The tacos really hit the spot for me, exactly what I was looking for (I blame Jason’s Mexico vacation).
(snuggled watching TV together, waiting for the sitter) 
So that’s it, our little “stay-cation” at the media types like to call it. Fun to try new things while spending time together.
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