Life in the Emerald City

Yesterday Sean and I celebrated our 4 year anniversary as a couple.  We chose to sleep in on a lazy Sunday morning as we don’t get many opportunities to sleep in.  After noon, we got up, showered and dressed for a fun day of good food, drink and friends!

We started the day at the Ambrosia Cafe for their Champagne Brunch. 

All in all, I’d say the food was about average and the outside patio had little air circulation, so it was very HOT!  However, it wasn’t overly expensive and Sean and I left with satisfied tummies.  From there we headed to Ed Cox’s house for an afternoon Bar-B-Que.  A very charming little beach cottage make-over in beautiful Santa Monica.  Ed Cox is a former roommate and now very good friend of Sean (and me).

We started with the Fantasy football draft, which turned out to be a lot more exciting than I had expected.  Basically there are ten people in our league (most of them former Gators) who’ve formed teams (i.e. chosen names) and we each get to choose a player one at a time for 14 rounds.  Then every week we choose 9 of our players to play against one of the nine other ‘fantasy’ teams.  Based on how the players do in real life (which means we of course have to watch all of our ‘fantasy’ players’ performances) determines how well our fantasy team does.  It is all very confusing to me, but it gives me a reason to watch more than just Gator games and root for other players than just Tim Tebow and Percy Harvin (a.k.a. The Greatest Players of ALL Time!).

So, after the draft is finished, Sean and I take a think break.  We headed over to West Marine for some window shopping and Ralph’s for some much needed chocolate bites!  Then, on to the party…

Sean and I pose for a close-up.  The flower in my hair is from the BEAUTIFUL bouquet of roses Sean bought me this week!

Our party hosts, Ed Cox and his girlfriend, Jessica.  I caught them in an awkward hugging motion, but you can see we were all having fun!

Party guests…sorry, there were too many great conversations and laughs going on for me to remember everyone’s names, but they were all very nice and it was very nive to meet all of them!

The Bar-B-Que was very laid back with great food and awesome wine!  Thank you Ed and Jessica for helping us have a wonderful celebration and for the great atmopshere and conversations.  As for me, I’m off to bed to get a new week started of right! 

My how the time goes by…it’s been a week since my last post! This week I accepted a position with Mildred’s Big City Food as a line cook, so I can learn how to become a professional chef from some of the best around. In addition, my friend Sarah has taken a new position with her mother’s dentistry practice. Lastly, my friend Joann has joined a top photography team here in Gainesville as their new marketing consultant.

With all the new, exciting things going on in our lives, we decided to take out our boys and celebrate! First we enjoyed a wonderful meal together at O!O Tapas & Tinis where I had a yummy fruit and cheese plate with double martinis and ended with a scrumptious chocolate mousse! Oh yes, I celebrated! Sean skipped the martini and enjoyed a Serrano cheese-wrapped fillet mignon with white asparagus and saucy potatoes. He didn’t celebrate as much as I, but I think he enjoyed his meal!

After lots of laughs over some great food, the idea was thrown out that we should go skating! We decided to take on the challenge and rekindle the memories of our childhoods! See the pictures below:

My how the time goes by…it’s been a week since my last post! This week I accepted a position with Mildred’s Big City Food as a line cook, so I can learn how to become a professional chef from some of the best around. In addition, my friend Sarah has taken a new position with her mother’s dentistry practice. Lastly, my friend Joann has joined a top photography team here in Gainesville as their new marketing consultant.

With all the new, exciting things going on in our lives, we decided to take out our boys and celebrate! First we enjoyed a wonderful meal together at O!O Tapas & Tinis where I had a yummy fruit and cheese plate with double martinis and ended with a scrumptious chocolate mousse! Oh yes, I celebrated! Sean skipped the martini and enjoyed a Serrano cheese-wrapped fillet mignon with white asparagus and saucy potatoes. He didn’t celebrate as much as I, but I think he enjoyed his meal!

After lots of laughs over some great food, the idea was thrown out that we should go skating! We decided to take on the challenge and rekindle the memories of our childhoods! See the pictures below: