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mistressofmuses) wrote2024-01-11 09:17 pm
mistressofmuses) wrote2024-01-11 09:17 pm
Weekend Trip, Part 2!
Saturday was the second (and main) day of the holiday trip. We had the morning and early afternoon to ourselves, though we didn't do much. I guess the hotel is well-known for having a water park, but we... never made it there, ha. I don't currently own a swimsuit, and half of the pools were outside. While they were heated, it was still far enough below freezing that swimming outside didn't sound great, alleged hot tub or not. Sorry to have missed out on like, the resort's Thing, but oh well.
We had a fairly lazy morning. We got coffee from the cafe downstairs, and I bought a quiche from there for breakfast. It seemed like the most financially responsible choice. The resort is pretty big on its restaurants, but uh... on the pricey side. Probably very good! But a bottle of water from room service was $4.50, which shows the general pricing of everything, haha. Apparently the Italian restaurant had a brunch buffet, but I was afraid to even ask how much it was.
The quiche was tasty, and minus a minor annoyance where apparently the entire hotel's key cards were wiped because they were surprise! switching to a new system, which caught the staff off-guard too, it was a mellow few hours. I was very tired, because I did not sleep well, though didn't want to nap and miss the stuff we were supposed to do. Taylor read a bit of Mort by Terry Pratchett out loud, and that was most of the morning.
There were two activities for the afternoon: a beer tasting at a brewery in town, or a paint-and-sip event in the hotel. All three of us chose the paint and sip, because I don't care for enough beer to make a tasting very fun, and painting sounded like a better time.
I did An Art!
The way the "paint and sip" thing works is that in addition to the boozy beverage, there's an artist who sort of guides you, Bob Ross-style, through the steps to paint your version of the example picture. She led us through what colors to mix, some of the techniques for how to do the different parts, plus some help if anyone was very dissatisfied with their results.
The setup pre-painting. Five colors of acrylic paint, a canvas, our "inspiration" picture, and an alcoholic beverage. (Canned peach bellini for me, lol.)
Our group's pictures! I don't remember which belonged to everyone, ha. Mine is the one all the way to the right. Taylor's is the one that's the brightest and most like a bi pride flag. Our mom's is the one sideways to the right of Taylor's. I really do like how different everyone's wound up, honestly! Even though we followed the same steps, mimicking the same thing, all the trees are different, the mountains are different, the shades of color are all different...
For mine, I'm happiest with how my snow on the branches looks.
It was pretty fun, and it was a little nice to see a handful of people who'd clearly never tried ANY sort of art getting a bit into it. The artist kept it very light and encouraging, even when people were being very self-deprecating.
It's not a wild masterpiece to follow the steps to create something pretty specific, but it was still enjoyable. I know Taylor said it made them want to buy some paint and paint something of their own for fun. :) My mom wasn't happy with hers initially, but it grew on her a bit later.
The part that was probably most frustrating was that the whole thing is timed. Not in a literal countdown sense, but that the event is only scheduled for 90 minutes or whatnot, so you can't take as long as you'd like. I never made it to putting falling snow on mine at all, because I was trying to finish the previous steps! That was the part that bothered my mom too, I think.
A close-up of Taylor's. The pride flag colors were intentional, ha.
After the paint-and-sip, we headed back to our rooms. I was still very tired, though didn't ultimately nap or anything. Taylor and I read some more, just sort of waiting around for dinner.
Because the main draw of the evening was... food!
An open bar, again. Taylor and I each had another of our mixed grapefruit drinks, then each got a moscow mule. On suggestion of the (very excellent) bartender, he also added some bitters to them, which gave them a more spice-heavy flavor, and the darker color. They were very good, ha.
An surprisingly delicious salad. Greens, endive, some very thinly sliced goat cheese, dried cranberries, and a champagne vinaigrette.
Apparently the addition of the soup course was an eleventh hour decision, and one I'm glad of. It's tomato soup, and it was SO delicious. I'd use it as pasta sauce, frankly.
I picked chicken for my main course. (Though I was torn between it and the halibut.) It was stuffed with spinach and sundried tomatoes, served over a really delicious barley, plus some very nice carrots. Delicious! But the one thing I didn't quite manage to finish.
Though as full as I was after the main course, I managed to find room. Dessert was a chocolate-orange creme brulee, and it was fucking delicious, lol.
After dinner, we were split into two-person teams (by random drawing, one "old person" (born pre-1980) and one "young person" (post-1980) per team) in order to play "Music Video Bingo." Each team got a bingo card of various songs and their artists, and then the DJs played the first thirty seconds or so of various music videos, and you'd mark them off if you had them on your card. It was fun! I recognized a lot more than I thought I would, probably almost completely thanks to Todd in the Shadows, lol.
Tragically, my partner and I were LITERALLY ONE AWAY from winning. Our second-to-last song/square was the winning team's last one, and then they let the playlist continue, and our last square was the very next song to come up. If we'd have won, we would have gotten some very expensive electronics that I can't afford for myself, sob-cry.
We mingled for a little while more, but by then we were all pretty tired, so again, we headed back to our rooms. I know that plenty of people went to continue drinking and socializing, but we just didn't have it in us!
I'd noticed but forgotten to get a picture on Friday night, but there really was a vaguely creepy aspect to the parts of the hotel that were very empty at night. The perpetually-running, brightly-lit escalators were especially strange.
It's space that's so clearly intended to hold a LOT of people, with triple-wide hallways intended for conventions and such, so having it be almost completely empty felt strange and just slightly wrong.
Sunday morning, the three of us split a very tasty chocolate-raspberry croissant from the cafe bakery. Should have taken a picture of it, because it was also a very attractive pastry.
After checkout, we met up at the Stanley Marketplace for brunch at the Denver Biscuit Company. The Stanley Marketplace is a pretty cool place. It's sort of an indoor mall, but it's in an old manufacturing building, and is a pretty great example of repurposing a cool old building into something new, rather than tearing it down. I've only been there once before, and that was with my driver friend for the Van Gogh exhibit we went to before she moved.
The restaurant doesn't take reservations, so our party of 14 or so (as we kept losing people, lol) had to wait a while for enough seating to open up for us, and we wound up being very glad we'd eaten something beforehand. Mom, Taylor, and I all got basic biscuits and gravy, which seemed like a safe bet for a biscuit place. It was delicious, but SO MUCH FOOD.
It was a very fun weekend, and I'm appreciative that A) Taylor and my mom's company does this sort of thing for them each year, and B) that they brought me along. :) It was a fun time, if way bougie-er than anything I ever do otherwise. I had a great time, but I was also glad to get home and take a nap, haha.
We had a fairly lazy morning. We got coffee from the cafe downstairs, and I bought a quiche from there for breakfast. It seemed like the most financially responsible choice. The resort is pretty big on its restaurants, but uh... on the pricey side. Probably very good! But a bottle of water from room service was $4.50, which shows the general pricing of everything, haha. Apparently the Italian restaurant had a brunch buffet, but I was afraid to even ask how much it was.
The quiche was tasty, and minus a minor annoyance where apparently the entire hotel's key cards were wiped because they were surprise! switching to a new system, which caught the staff off-guard too, it was a mellow few hours. I was very tired, because I did not sleep well, though didn't want to nap and miss the stuff we were supposed to do. Taylor read a bit of Mort by Terry Pratchett out loud, and that was most of the morning.
There were two activities for the afternoon: a beer tasting at a brewery in town, or a paint-and-sip event in the hotel. All three of us chose the paint and sip, because I don't care for enough beer to make a tasting very fun, and painting sounded like a better time.
I did An Art!
The way the "paint and sip" thing works is that in addition to the boozy beverage, there's an artist who sort of guides you, Bob Ross-style, through the steps to paint your version of the example picture. She led us through what colors to mix, some of the techniques for how to do the different parts, plus some help if anyone was very dissatisfied with their results.
The setup pre-painting. Five colors of acrylic paint, a canvas, our "inspiration" picture, and an alcoholic beverage. (Canned peach bellini for me, lol.)
Our group's pictures! I don't remember which belonged to everyone, ha. Mine is the one all the way to the right. Taylor's is the one that's the brightest and most like a bi pride flag. Our mom's is the one sideways to the right of Taylor's. I really do like how different everyone's wound up, honestly! Even though we followed the same steps, mimicking the same thing, all the trees are different, the mountains are different, the shades of color are all different...
For mine, I'm happiest with how my snow on the branches looks.
It was pretty fun, and it was a little nice to see a handful of people who'd clearly never tried ANY sort of art getting a bit into it. The artist kept it very light and encouraging, even when people were being very self-deprecating.
It's not a wild masterpiece to follow the steps to create something pretty specific, but it was still enjoyable. I know Taylor said it made them want to buy some paint and paint something of their own for fun. :) My mom wasn't happy with hers initially, but it grew on her a bit later.
The part that was probably most frustrating was that the whole thing is timed. Not in a literal countdown sense, but that the event is only scheduled for 90 minutes or whatnot, so you can't take as long as you'd like. I never made it to putting falling snow on mine at all, because I was trying to finish the previous steps! That was the part that bothered my mom too, I think.
A close-up of Taylor's. The pride flag colors were intentional, ha.
After the paint-and-sip, we headed back to our rooms. I was still very tired, though didn't ultimately nap or anything. Taylor and I read some more, just sort of waiting around for dinner.
Because the main draw of the evening was... food!
An open bar, again. Taylor and I each had another of our mixed grapefruit drinks, then each got a moscow mule. On suggestion of the (very excellent) bartender, he also added some bitters to them, which gave them a more spice-heavy flavor, and the darker color. They were very good, ha.
An surprisingly delicious salad. Greens, endive, some very thinly sliced goat cheese, dried cranberries, and a champagne vinaigrette.
Apparently the addition of the soup course was an eleventh hour decision, and one I'm glad of. It's tomato soup, and it was SO delicious. I'd use it as pasta sauce, frankly.
I picked chicken for my main course. (Though I was torn between it and the halibut.) It was stuffed with spinach and sundried tomatoes, served over a really delicious barley, plus some very nice carrots. Delicious! But the one thing I didn't quite manage to finish.
Though as full as I was after the main course, I managed to find room. Dessert was a chocolate-orange creme brulee, and it was fucking delicious, lol.
After dinner, we were split into two-person teams (by random drawing, one "old person" (born pre-1980) and one "young person" (post-1980) per team) in order to play "Music Video Bingo." Each team got a bingo card of various songs and their artists, and then the DJs played the first thirty seconds or so of various music videos, and you'd mark them off if you had them on your card. It was fun! I recognized a lot more than I thought I would, probably almost completely thanks to Todd in the Shadows, lol.
Tragically, my partner and I were LITERALLY ONE AWAY from winning. Our second-to-last song/square was the winning team's last one, and then they let the playlist continue, and our last square was the very next song to come up. If we'd have won, we would have gotten some very expensive electronics that I can't afford for myself, sob-cry.
We mingled for a little while more, but by then we were all pretty tired, so again, we headed back to our rooms. I know that plenty of people went to continue drinking and socializing, but we just didn't have it in us!
I'd noticed but forgotten to get a picture on Friday night, but there really was a vaguely creepy aspect to the parts of the hotel that were very empty at night. The perpetually-running, brightly-lit escalators were especially strange.
It's space that's so clearly intended to hold a LOT of people, with triple-wide hallways intended for conventions and such, so having it be almost completely empty felt strange and just slightly wrong.
Sunday morning, the three of us split a very tasty chocolate-raspberry croissant from the cafe bakery. Should have taken a picture of it, because it was also a very attractive pastry.
After checkout, we met up at the Stanley Marketplace for brunch at the Denver Biscuit Company. The Stanley Marketplace is a pretty cool place. It's sort of an indoor mall, but it's in an old manufacturing building, and is a pretty great example of repurposing a cool old building into something new, rather than tearing it down. I've only been there once before, and that was with my driver friend for the Van Gogh exhibit we went to before she moved.
The restaurant doesn't take reservations, so our party of 14 or so (as we kept losing people, lol) had to wait a while for enough seating to open up for us, and we wound up being very glad we'd eaten something beforehand. Mom, Taylor, and I all got basic biscuits and gravy, which seemed like a safe bet for a biscuit place. It was delicious, but SO MUCH FOOD.
It was a very fun weekend, and I'm appreciative that A) Taylor and my mom's company does this sort of thing for them each year, and B) that they brought me along. :) It was a fun time, if way bougie-er than anything I ever do otherwise. I had a great time, but I was also glad to get home and take a nap, haha.