Zen and the Art of Pizza Making

[DISCLAIMER: The title of this post could potentially fool one into thinking that there is a pizza recipe somewhere in this post.  And if one was thinking that, one would be wrong.  I will say that pizza doesn’t really require a recipe – you just put sauce and ingredients on the dough and bake it.  So if that’s what you were looking for, you are very, very welcome.]

This weekend has been an amazing, refreshing, restorative few days comprised of delicious food, amazing friends and beautiful weather.  Not gonna lie, it was pretty satisfying to type that last sentence.  ‘Cause it’s true!

We were graced this past week by the presence of Snuggles, one of our BFFs from college, and his buddy, Tall D.  The two (very smart!) boys took a much-needed break from East Coast work and humidity (yuck!) to come bask in the Colorado sun for a few days, and we took good care of them – the not-so-secret part was, we LOVE having visitors and they took care of us just as much in that sense.

[This is definitely a life-update post, so if you don’t care about those, scroll down for pretty pictures and a reader-wide thank you at the end.  It’s for you!]

After a Friday night lingering at our beloved local sushi joint, Hapa, we woke up bright and early Saturday morning for a pretty sweet double whammy of breakfast quesadillas and a hike.

I’m gonna be real here and admit that this was my first legit hike since moving out here – I’m not the world’s most avid hiker in general, and I’ve generally been pretty thrilled that we have an enthusiastic hiker friend living out here upon whom I can pawn off my man when he starts getting the hiking itch.  (An itch, I might add, which I find very unfamiliar and a little disconcerting.  Hike to 14,000 feet say WHAAAAA???)

And then I go shopping.

But not this time!  We set out to hike to the top of one of the Flatirons, and a few hours later, we’d done just that.  We took lots of breaks because hiking at 7,000 feet sort of makes the average person feel like their lungs have officially quit and gone on vacation back down to the bottom of the mountain where there’s air.  But the payoff view was pretty awesome, and we even got to do some rock climbing at the top!

[Snuggles and Tall D, after making it to the top and scaling some terrifying boulders!]

[Majestic mountain man, but it’s no big deal]

[Clamoring for attention, because I do NOT LIKE being ignored]

[The Thinker]

Saturday night brought on a new adventure of the home-cooking variety.  We all toyed around with the idea of going out again, but decided it would be more fun to raid Whole Foods and make exciting drinks and pizzas in the comfort of our own home.  On the menu: gourmet pizza (one shrimp, one half-pepperoni-and-mushroom and half-mushroom-spinach-and-artichoke…mmmm!!!!!) and homemade frozen mint lemonade, garnished with vodka.

(If you caught that and you’re judging, it happens to be a very effective garnish.)  Some pictures of the preparation process…

[Not exactly the recommended stance for shaping pizza dough]

[Whole foods lemonade, blended with fresh mint, ice, and lovingly adorned with Absolut.  I can’t possible recommend these drinks highly enough, they were incredible!]

[Proud boys with their homemade shrimp pizza – tall D used to be a baker!]

[Trying to fit my overstretched dough onto the pan…I may or may not have gotten a little overzealous with the pizza dough while singing “That’s Amore.”]

[pre-cheese…]

[and post cheese…NOTE, these are my man’s hands NOT MINE.  I have not developed some weird hairy disorder since any of you have last seen me, I swear.]

[The finished product…hungry???]

[Mangia time!  The best part of the night.]

So, that’s my weekend.  I don’t do a lot of “here’s what I did today!” posts because I’d generally rather talk about food or chandeliers, but this weekend was so awesome that I felt like it merited some blog time.  I hope you had an awesome weekend as well – I’m feeling pretty ready to take on the week right now.  Happy Sunday!

Oh, and one more thing – I realized this morning that this silly thing has had over 2,100 hits since I started it just over two months ago.  I know that most of you don’t comment, but check in silently when you feel like reading- and just so you know, I love that you read this, whoever you are.  I love that friends from high school and friends of my parents and extended family members will say offhandedly, “Oh, I saw that on your blog!”  I’m really enjoying checking in here every once in a while, and thanks for helping me feel like it’s worth it.  I loves ya.  🙂