Weekend Review: Good Eating and House Guests!

Wow, I've hit an all time low on my weekend reviews. I know I'm already a week two weeks behind but I wanted to let you know about the awesome weekend I had (er...a couple weeks ago).

First stop, Justin, Mike and I took a mini road trip to Baltimore. For dinner we stopped by Chap's Pit Beef of Man v. Food, Diners Drive-ins and Dives (DDD) and Bizarre Foods fame. And wouldn't you know it's in the parking lot of a strip club. The Gold Club to be exact ;)

Justin and Mike about to enter...not knowing the glorious meat-fest that was about to commence...

I got the Guy's Triple D which consisted of pit beef, corned beef and sausage. I didn't eat the bread, but ate it with a side of sauerkraut. It was yummy!

After gorging ourselves on pit beef deliciousness I headed to the Baltimore Tattoo Convention. Here are some shots of the side show acts. There was also a suspension (!) but I didn't get pictures of that...

Sarah Miller of Ink Master fame was there working...

And here I am with the master of "bubble girlie style" Kristel Oreto...I swear, she is all over Pinterest!

The next day was Louie's Birthday so we stopped by Howl to the Chief on 8th St to check out some birthday treats...

There were plenty of adorable treats like these doggie cookie sandwiches...

But we decided on getting a couple of cupcakes.

One for Louie and one for Derby.

Look at how slobbery excited Louie is. He can hardly contain himself.

Did I mention we had some out of town guests? Justin's roommate from college, his wife, and his brother-in-law stayed with us on Saturday! They were in town visiting from Chicago (the BIL lives locally). First stop on the tourist adventure, Eastern Market where we saw some interesting street performers! 

That evening, while Justin and our visitors headed to H. St. Jill and I went to Echostage to hear Calvin Harris! For all my my non-EDM fans you've heard his music, but probably didn't know it was him. His songs include "We Found Love," by Rihanna and "Sweet Nothing" by Florence of Florence and the Machine. Here's a shot of me and my friends Clint and Mark. I swear, we always bump into them at events like this!

Next I took a picture with my friend from college, Mike, who was working security!

It was the first time I'd ever been to Echostage since it changed from DC Star, but I must say I was pretty impressed. Good sound system, decent outdoor area and plenty of room. The lights were pretty cool too. Wasn't sure if they were the club's or Calvin Harris' but they were top notch. * pew pew pew*

Here's a picture of the crowd from the balcony. I am way too old to be standing in the middle of that...so we mostly stuck by the sides. Because quite honestly as much as I love EDM, the DJ isn't really doing anything worth watching to motivate me to get close to the stage...live DJ acts (i.e.: Diplo) that's a different story

So back to our out of town guests. In addition to showing them around the Hill, we had to show them Georgetown as well, so I made a reservation at Farmers, Fishers, and Bakers to try out their all-you-can-eat brunch! It was super tasty and my first plate looked something like this. Piled on with salad, fruit, guacamole, and taco fillings!

More of the same...the kale salad was phenomenal! 

Too bad I couldn't indulge in any of these that were being passed around by the servers...wah wah...

We strolled around the Georgetown waterfront a little bit to walk off our food babies! LOL, Overall it was a good weekend with good food, good music and good friends!

I'll be posting about last weekend's festivities at my friend's wedding in New York sometime soon! I hope!

Weekend Review: Relaxing St. Patrick's Day

Hi Everyone! I hope you had a good weekend! I honestly didn't do much. Since I can't drink due to my nutrition challenge (I'm saving my cheat days!), I decided to stay in most of the weekend. As unsocial as it sounds, I'm too fond of not drinking while others partake in alcoholic libations (I just get tired!). So while Justin was off "gallivanting" with our friends around Chinatown and H St., I had a relaxing Saturday night with the Frenchies prepping our St. Patrick's Day meal!

 

A couple of weekends ago, Justin and I spotted corned beef at Costco. I knew it would be perfect for a St. Patrick's Day meal so in the cart it went. Fast forward to Saturday night, after thawing it out, I opened the package...

And plopped it into the slow cooker (seasoning packet and all) to cook overnight so we could have a piping, hot breakfast the next day...

Unfortunately, when we woke up we realized that our garbage disposal was clogged and the dishwasher had leaked overnight. :( For some reason, when our garbage disposal is clogged, our dishwasher overflows with water. I don't understand how or why, but that's just what happens. Does that happen to you to? Justin was all ready to call the plumber but I told him that we should first look up and see if we could fix it ourselves. After all, I had seen my dad do it plenty of times--it couldn't be that hard!

 

Luckily, we were able to fix it ourselves (I knew it!) and  crisis was averted. :) Isn't homeownership wonderful? Anyway, it was onto the corned beef! It was piping hot and ready to go!

Mmmm...fatty meaty goodness!

We baked some sweet potato fries and fried up some eggs and it was the perfect paleo, Irish breakfast! We had a ton of leftovers and ended up grazing on the corned beef the entire day!

 

 

After the whole garbage disposal fiasco and eating a huge breakfast, we were exhausted. We relaxed for a bit before tackling our huge mountain of laundry.

 

While relaxing, Justin decided to pull up some frenchie YouTube videos. The boys love watching other frenchies on the computer for some reason.

 

You can hear me saying, "Synchronized 'Why?' face." LOL...

 

 

*Side Note: That sound you hear in the video is a typical frenchie whine...both Louie and Derby do it sometimes (especially when you put them in their crate when people are around). It kinda sounds like a human baby crying, doesn't it?

 

So what did you do over the weekend? Did you celebrate St. Patrick's Day on Sunday or had you celebrated the weekend before? Whatever you did, I'm sure it didn't involve french bulldogs watching YouTube. ;)

Weekend Review: Greveys and Bully Meetup

Hi All! I hope you had a good weekend! Justin and I had a pretty fun weekend! On Saturday, we went to Grevey's Sports Bar to watch the UK vs. Auburn basketball game.  Keith Bogans, a DeMatha grad and former UK player (and current Brooklyn Nets player) was there doing a fundraiser, in memory of his late sister who died of breast cancer. The name of the organization is Kristi's Wish and they were doing tons of stuff to raise money, such as autograph signings and raffles. They even had a Maker's Mark glass dipping table, using the Kentucky blue wax. 

A closer shot of the freshly dipped glasses...

Supposedly they even had hot browns; however, I found that out after we already ordered. It was fine because I was totally content with what we ended up getting...nachos! I love nachos and that side of jalapenos was all mine! 

On Sunday, we woke up bright and early to take Louie and Derby to the Bully Breed Meetup that was going on at the Old Towne Pet Resort. Justin and I had never been there before, so we were excited to take them to a different environment to meet some new friends!

The facility was clean, spacious, and really had a spa-like feel! They took us to the back where the "pawty" was at and even wrote their names on the window upon their arrival!

There were a bunch of cuties at the playdate like this English bulldog...

And of course Louie and Derby were constantly at the "punch bowl" (aka" the water bowl), so we had to coax them a little bit to be more social.  Overall, I would say they played well with others!

There were a bunch of cute brindle-coated frenchies...

Here's a shot of all the action indoors. I wonder if this is what parents do when they have kids on playdates? Stand around and watch, maybe? :)

After a majority of the dogs left, we decided to head outside because it wasn't as crowded. The staff was friendly and attentive, which was much appreciated because bully breeds have the tendency to be really bossy and rough!

Before we left, they gave us some goodie bags packed with water and treats. What a nice gesture! As we were walking out, we saw a kissing booth.  The boys and I had Justin snap a couple of pictures of us before we left. 

What did you do this weekend? Did you spend it with your kiddies or pets? In addition to game watching and doggie playdates, Justin and I also went out for a fabulous meal for Restaurant Week, but I'll update you on that in another post. :)

Weekend Review: Super Bowl Edition

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a good weekend. Did you watch the Super Bowl and did your team win? Although, I've lived in Maryland since 1997 up until about three years ago, but I'm a die hard Redskins fan. Geographically where my family is from, Gaithersburg, MD is closer to Washington, DC than it is to Baltimore--just a little FYI. You would think I would support the local team, but for some reason the Ravens never did it for me, and my hubby would kill me if I rooted for his beloved Steeler's division rivals.  

 
My AFC team used to the Colts when Peyton Manning was there so I might be in the market for a new AFC team...anyway, I digress...

Our Super Bowl Sunday started off bright and early with a trip to Costco to pick up some last minute items and our groceries for the month. We scooped up Jill from the metro and started prepping for the evening's events.

We popped the spiral ham in the slow cooker so guests could make their own ham sandwiches with mustard and pretzel bread (which we bought from Costco). 

 

 

 

And since we had an over abundance of Bisquick I decided to do Make-Ahead Bisquick Sausage Ball Appetizers, since I'm not much of a cook and the recipe seemed pretty simple.

 

 

Taking the sausage out of the casing....mmmm...

 

Any recipe where I get to use the Kitchen-Aid is a win-win for me. Is it weird that I sometimes think about using my Kitchen-Aid to mix my tuna fish salad? #lazycook

 

After mixing, all I had to do was make them into balls and then bake for 20 minutes. Easy!

 

Jill made her own creation "Atomic Buffalo Chicken Turds," which consisted of a jalapeno popper stuffed with real cheese, cream cheese and chicken sausage, wrapped in bacon, dredged in panko breadcrumbs and deep fried. For some reason, I thought I took a picture of them, but apparently I didn't, but trust me they were epic.

 

Jill also made "Slutty Brownies." That's what they're called and they're a real recipe! Slutty Brownies consist of Oreos layered between cookie dough and brownie mix. They were delicious too!

As a matter of fact, all of the food we had was super tasty! Our party was potluck and people brought so many different items! I have to say that my friends are a really talented bunch in the kitchen! We had a wide variety of dips, chicken, and pasta dishes so there wasn't an empty stomach in sight!

 

The dogs were pooped from all of the surrounding excitement with Derby in front of the oven...

 

And Louie in front of the the fridge...or perhaps they were tired of waiting for the power to come back on in the Superdome...

 

Joos and Ian got the plaid memo...twinsies!

 

A shot of the peeps in the living room...



 

But with the addition of our newly mounted TV a majority of the people seemed to congregate in the in the dining room/kitchen.

 

 

Isn't that funny that despite the 55" TV being in the living room and the 32" TV being in the kitchen everyone seemed to stay near the food?

How about you? Did you host a Super Bowl Party at your place? What type of delish treats did you make or eat? Where do people congregate in your casa? The kitchen? The living room? Times like these kind of make me wish we either had an open concept house or a huge basement where everyone could fit. ;)