You see that blue thing he is so comfortably sleeping on…Yes, that thing, you can’t miss it…it’s obstructing his face. You see? Okay. That blue thing is what we put treats in for Spot. So, his way of letting us know that he wants a treat is throwing this blue thing in our laps ALL DAY. I am pretty sure at this point he had been ignored by his humans and this is the…”maybe I’ll just (yawn, chew, chew) lay here and close my eyes for a second and get after them again in a just aaa…(yawn) few minutes or so.”

Recently, we had another couple over to have a double date sort of thing at home. We are always looking for ways to make the night unique, keeping life fun as we stay in to save $. We decided to have a picnic at home. When our guests arrived, we had the following prepped…

A blanket and pillows spread out on the patio floor with candles. I know, I know it sounds kinky – GET YOUR MIND OUT OF THE GUTTER! In the center we set up the fondu set with meats, veggies, fruits, cheeses and wine. Careful: pillows + candles = good times? My fireman brother-in-law would think – not.

Seriously though, just sitting somewhere other than the dinning room table, not in chairs, under the stars really created a unique magical night just by sitting on the ground.

So the real date night idea here is to eat in another room in your home, outside, on the floor or somewhere different than the ‘usual.’ I think if you mentioned this idea or surprised your loved one with it, they would think it was pretty cool and special.

Here was the menu that night:

• Steak
• Mushrooms
• Chicken *see note below
• Carrots
• Onion
• Raspberries
• Dark Chocolate
• 2 different types of cheese
• Olive Loaf
• Wine

Here is what we learned NOT to do:

Don’t do chicken with fondu – too scary!

What do you think? Will you try it or have you tried this already?

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Poor poor Spot. He seems to always get something…this time an eye infection. As you may or may not know, Spot will only chase a yellow tennis ball. However, at the beach, it would be great if he would chase a water toy because the sand sticks to the ball. Besides the fact that the sand on his ball frustrates him beyond beyond beyond…even bugs, he swallows tons of sand which leads to emergency bathroom visits. 

But, no, he inisists on the tennis ball and spends a large amount of the time working hard on getting that sand OFF his precious ball (see freak-ish pic above). I never see him dig, but at the beach he thinks if he digs out the sand that is around his tennis ball it will come off. This results in him kicking sand in every direction, sending pee infested dog beach sand in our chairs, clothes, eyes, and mouths. It’s lovely. 

Anywho, the kicking sand everywhere and swimming in the ocean resulted of course, as almost any special outing does, to the vet for…this time an eye infection. For being a good boy, the vet gave him a Charlie Brown bandana for Memorial Weekend.  He does like him some clothes.

Umm, I don’t know what to say. A statue and two dogs.

We swear we followed the directions. 

One of our favorite restaurants is in Denver Colorado called Vesta Dipping Grill.  Not only do they have a wide selection of proteins; seared tuna, grilled lamb, smoked duck, of course chicken, and my favorite madras grilled venison.  They have vegetarian choices as well. *suppress yawn* 

What makes Vesta Dipping Grill unique however is, you guessed it, the dipping.  My G’d the dipping.

To accompany your entrée you select three dipping sauces from over 36 dipping sauces (37) in three categories: Sweet, Savory, Spicy with names like Blake St. BBQ, Wasabi Cream Sauce, Steuben’s Chimichurri. 

Each dipping sauce, and they make pairing suggestions for you if you’d like, creates a completely unique experience for every bite. Many times the dipping changes your meal into a completely new dish.

The reason we bring this up is because one dipping sauce stood out from the rest.  The almighty “Black Pepper Aioli.”

Just hand us each a spoon.

And so we set out.  The directions were easy enough.

• six cloves garlic: pressed.  
• two yokes: yoked.  
• olive oil: half cupped.
• pepper
• simple - blend garlic and yokes. drizzle oil.  constant beating until thick.  Add pepper

What’s to mess up?  ’Parently plenty.

All we could taste was the burn of raw garlic swimming in a mess of a mayonaise.  Our Aioli sauce had an outcome that the recipes didn’t mention.  It sucked balls.  We added more oil. Wrong.

We wish we had a better outcome to report. We did try again and simply cut the garlic in half. Nope.  Still sucked.

The only thing we can think of, cuz we’ll be trying this again, is our choice of olive oil.  We think we bought a cheap brand.  Garlic is garlic.  Egg yoke is egg yoke.  But oil… there’s the rub.

We went with Extra Virgin First Cold Press.  For those that make this well (and you’re probably not reading my post about it anyway) you may recognize this as my mistake.  To be determined.  For we are determined.  To make my Black Pepper Aioli Sauce NOT blow.

Wine was good – that’s what’s really important. 

We want to hear from you! Tell us how it went for you on making a restaurant favorite!  

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This week’s Date Night Idea: 

Every year we pick out a Christmas ornament that represents a memory, meaning or a place together. We then write on a small card that we attach to the string of the ornament with details on why we picked out the ornament for that year. 

For the night, we get in our pajamas, put on Christmas movies, drink Egg Nog spiked with Brandy and put up our Christmas decorations. We have a lot of fun looking back at our ornaments and reminiscing. Of course, it wouldn’t be a night with putting up lights without a freak out cussing session followed by about 10 minutes of silence when something goes wrong like putting up about 10 stings of lights, plug them in only to find out…you know the rest. Good times. 

I know this is specific to the Christmas holiday. If you are celebrating an upcoming holiday, maybe you can find a way to incorporate the idea. 

Date Night Idea: 

Collect Ornament(s) that represent years in your life together and attach a note card with a little reminder to help you remember why you picked out the ornament. 

Date Night Needs List: 

• Ornament(s) (catch up or make it your first year) 
• Egg Nog (Brandy – if you are crazy like us)  
• Christmas Movies – Jill’s favorite:  ”White Christmas. Jack’s Favorite: “It’s A Wonderful Life”
• Christmas/Holiday Decoration
• String, hole punch, note card, scissors for your memory note card that you attach to your ornament. 

To get an idea and to inspire your ornament tradition, here are our ornaments and the story that goes with each one. 

 Leaf

We picked up this ornament in Estes Park, CO, before we were married at this cute mountain town Christmas store. We were up there around Christmas time because Jack wanted to give me a couch for a weekend for Christmas so we stayed at The Wildwood Inn. We were living in a studio at the time with no couch, so it was a fantastic gift. 

Snow Flake 

Jack took me back to the Wildwood Inn the next year to ask me to marry him. He asked me on a hike in the mountains and it started to snow. We were amazed at the intricacy of the snowflakes natural designs. Later in the day, we found this snowflake ornament at the same Christmas store where we picked up the Leaf the previous year. 

Star

We returned to Estes Park, CO to the same Christmas Store again to pick up our ornament. The star was just pretty, the special part was the tradition of picking out the ornament at the same store. 

How did this get in here? Spot found the Snow Man that Jack’s Mom gave us years ago. He has now claimed it and is giving it love. I think he is the only labrador retriever that will not destroy stuffed animals to pieces. He’s a lover not a fighter.

And yes, he is in a t-shirt. It’s hilarious how much he loves wearing clothes. I’ll hold open the neck hole of a shirt and he wags his tail and sticks his head through himself. 

I heart NY

We picked up this magnet and made it into an ornament to represent the year we moved to New York City. 

Door 

This ornament represents the year we bought our first home in Denver, CO. Nuff Said

Labrador

I bet you can’t guess what this one is about. Yes, it is the year we adopted our Spot. 

Pickle

We found this I think at Target. A little different from the first three ornaments, but we just loved the story so much and wanted to play. It has to have some kind of purpose because why the heck would you ever get a pickle for your tree? On our card for this one we have that it was our first ‘real’ tree purchase. Prior years involved mini trees that you could use as a center piece for your kitchen table. 

The story of the pickle goes: 

“Miniature Gurken. Long Ago when parents decorated the Christmas tree, they hung the pickle ornament last, hiding it in the green boughs. When the children were allowed to view the tree, they would begin searching for the pickle ornament because they knew they would receive an extra gift for being the most observant.” 

The Pig

The glass pig we picked up in Sherman Oaks, CA at the cutest store called Handmade Galleries. The reason we connected with a pig…get ready for you veggies out there…you all are going to think we are total HICKS…we had a pig roast at our rehearsal dinner. Hold on now! Hold up! Listen! Pig roasts were something we both grew up with and it spoke to both of our childhoods. My uncle roasted the pig in the driveway just like he did every summer growing up.  

Acorn

Years ago, we had this brilliant idea to make ornaments out of acorns. We gathered acorns and made a business plan. We were so original and on our way to millions. Then we did a little research and discovered we were far from original. Thus, our dreams were shattered.

Recently, we were shopping for our ornament for this year and came across this very well done acorn ornament. We were so impressed…and pissed. Jerks. 

For some reason, I am really craving a pickle right now. Happy Holidays! 

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I mentioned that Spot ran into a rattlesnake in the post Rattled.  We were impressed on his ability to actually absorb rattlesnake training and avoid the snake perfectly, so the great thing is that his memory is great. The bad thing is that his memory is great. 

Shall I go on? 

I always tuck him in like this. This is mid-day nap time at home. He is wondering why I must take pictures while he is trying to get some shut eye. You did your job of tucking me into bed now go please.  

The morning after the hike we take Spot to go potty. Why wouldn’t we? He must relieve himself which involves a grassy well sniffed out place to take care of business. We get to his regular pee zone area. Spot stops, stares at the ground and ‘avoids’ the pee zone. Are you kidding me? 

It was a full week of Spot ‘avoiding’ everything. Which makes me think why didn’t we do ‘poop avoidance training’ while he was a puppy when he thought breakfast was ‘dropped off’ every morning out on our front yard.

It was very sad at first because poor Spot would be trembling while peeing, and while leaving breakfast for others (just kidding, I pick up), he walks and leaves a long trail of bread-crumbs for us to dutifully pick up. Trembling, he would do the poo in record speed while maintaining this walking technique. If he couldn’t walk, I don’t think he could do it.

Every branch, rock, mud spot, leaf, puddle was now…a rattlesnake. 

The poor little guy. 

And at the park, the great joy in his life, the dog that will fetch the yellow ball for as long as you want him to because if he doesn’t the world will come to an end…didn’t fetch. His world had ended.  

What were we going to do? Without the ball, how do we wear him out? That’s when we realized WE need the yellow ball just as much as Spot. 

So…we walked the park instead of chasing the ball. He stuck to my side, avoiding all those very scary things such as grass! Every time we got close to the car he sat by the gate to go home. That was a first. 

I thought, what would the dog whisper do? He would try to distract the dog with positive encouragement and not coddle him. Tough love. So that is what we did. We continued with our routine as usual and didn’t coddle him. 

It took about a week and a half for him to get over it all. We are so glad he did, because sometimes he holds on to things forever! Apparently, he forgets some things after a week. Do you think Jack’s memory works the same way? Maybe I should go buy those shoes on Melrose and just tough out the week. 

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