This Valentine’s Weekend was spent with a group of friends, making it a little different than most all of our other Valentine’s Day celebrations in years prior. It was a good way to spend the weekend, and the long weekend for me with the conjunction of President’s Day. It was soooo good to see Bryan again after several days spent in Central Washington alone. And what a guy that one is. He brought me home a beautiful bouquet of red roses and lilies that have gotten better each and every day and a box of chocolates!
After driving back to Seattle, showering, and waiting for Bryan to get home we were off for dinner at Eastlake Bar and Grill first, and then the rather short hour + drive to our ski chalet in Skykomish, WA. We arrived to some already playing games and drinking and we settled into the digs, hot-tubbed and got to bed pretty early.
Saturday morning Bryan and I were in no rush to get to the mountain as we knew that the best snow and skiing would be later in the day. We let the others get ready and set out in their eagerness and we set foot on a walk around our little “neighborhood”. We finally left the cottage just after 11 am, made it to the mountain to ski our first run just after noon. Bryan and I skied mostly by ourselves on Saturday, meaning that we got quite a bit of skiing in from noon to 6 pm when we stopped. We did enjoy a late lunch at the Bull’s Den to warm up and rest up which was a great idea because this was truly when the skiing got great!!! I mean, we were in heaven for the last two hours of skiing and only decided to turn in to save our legs for another day. Bryan and I wanted to check out the bluegrass concert at the Foggy Goggle and stayed for about the first hour of their show for a beer. We headed back to the cabin to have the crew’s leftovers of chili and snacks, hot-tubbed, and fell asleep pretty early again.
Sunday morning we were all expecting to be the best skiing of the weekend. Unfortunately, the six inches of snow the mountain got was now receiving a slew of rain. Bummed, we all still got ready to get to the lifts when they opened at 9 am. The rain never let up throughout the day and was really quite miserable. The skiing was still pretty good with pretty soft slushy snow but heavy snow and difficulty in seeing the slopes with the rain made it even less fun. We skied with the group for the majority of the day which was fun and after over two hours of hard skiing we were ready for a lunch to dry out. Our group had a great lunch again at the Bull’s Den with boozy hot drinks in all attempts to take our mind off of the weather. We begrudgingly set out in the rain again and skied just about another two hours for Bryan and I before I couldn’t take it anymore.
We hurried back to the cabin to hot tub, snacked, napped, and friends made a really wonderful Valentine’s Day dinner for all of us with some amazing grilled steaks, mushrooms, broccolini, potatoes, salmon, carrots and wine. The table was candle lit and we all toasted to good company. After our group digested some Bryan prepared his legendary pizookies for the group. Once ready we dug into them and that really sealed the deal for dinner in my opinion. Bryan and I retreated upstairs to watch Funny Farm before finally calling it a night.
Monday morning we all decided to forgo skiing as it was still raining, harder. We made a huge brunch for the group to use up all we had left; scrambled eggs, fried eggs, potato and kale hash, pineapple, bacon, and more. The clean up of the cabin took awhile and finally we were headed back to Seattle. It was so good to finally be home after a week away for me. Bryan and I were extremely lazy and tired thanks to the effect of the weather. We did manage to unpack, do laundry, tidy up around the house and make one mean dinner of crab and spinach ravioli with a garlic cream sauce for dinner. This was a huge hit among the two of us and we really nailed the pasta dough this time (and it’s been forever since we have made pasta at home).
Back in the office and it feels so good…kind of.
Chelsea
Evolving in the Emerald City 