a happy 1st

Celebrating our first anniversary together this weekend was so fun! I am so glad that we were married in the summer so we can always party for our anniversary instead of having to worry about school or other things. We headed up to Salt Lake City for the weekend for a little get-away trip, and we had a blast. We didn't manage to make it to a lot of the things we had planned to do, but I guess that will give us an excuse to return again soon!

Of course, most of the pictures I managed to take were of the food. Go figure. 

We decided that on Friday night we wanted to try the Red Iguana. I have heard so much about this place, and have watched it on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, and we both LOVE Mexican food, so we knew we had to try it.

Look at that cutie as we pick out our meals! (He has the menu upside down...silly)

Our server was SO nice and friendly! He brought us out a little sample plate with each of the different kinds of mole (mole-ay) that they make at this restaurant -- there were 8 kinds! There was a mole negro (rich dark taste), mole verde (much more mild, chile flavor), mole amarillo (yellow, sweet), almond mole (our fave), mango mole (the special of the day, not shown), and more. They were all so flavorful! It was incredible! It is insane how many different things go in to making each of these special sauces, and they had such a unique and delicious taste.

Owen decided to order the Puntas de Filete a la Nortena, which had sirloin strips sautéed with bacon, jalepenos, other peppers and more, all served on top of the almond mole. It was kind of like a fajita but oh-so-much more delicious! Talk about a flavorful sensation! It was incredible!

I decided to order the special of the day, which was mango enchiladas. The mango mole was a great mix of sweet and spicy, and they filled me up so much! It had carnitas (pork) inside, and even though they seemed very simple, they were heavenly! I've never liked carnitas as much as I did with those enchiladas!

We also decided to splurge seeing as it was our anniversary and get some wonderful beverages--I got a virgin peach margarita (it was like a delicious frozen peach dessert!) and Owen got the most delicious horchata I have ever had in my whole life. I am now inspired to figure out their recipe, it was amazing. Plus, free refills--that's what I'm talking about!

Here was the view from our hotel room at night. Even though it probably would have been a cooler view on the north side of the hotel, it was still really fun being on the top floor and looking out over the city. Plus, who doesn't love to take slow exposure shots at night, right??

The next morning we woke up and went to the Salt Lake temple. Three weekends in a row -- woo! It was so fun to go the temple on our anniversary and see all of the other couples getting married, and to remember back to our special day and the promises we made to each other and to the Lord last year. I feel so blessed to have been married in the temple and there was no better way to remember it than to take another trip there!

Unfortunately, the temple took a lot longer than we were planning on, and we didn't get out until around 2 p.m.! Sadly this meant that we missed the farmers market at Pioneer Park which we had been planning to visit, and it also meant that we were starrrrrving! So we decided to go to lunch, and since we loved it so much, we decided to go to the Red Iguana AGAIN! Why not? It was so good! We decided to walk there to hopefully burn off some calories from our wonderful Mexican feast the night before, but there was construction in the way, so instead of being a straight shot from the temple like it should have been, we had to walk all the way around the city to get there through some kind of shady neighborhoods, which was kind of scary since I had both my camera and computer with me!

These tacos are the best thing in my life. Owen ordered them, and I was so jealous of his meal. They are the famed Tacos don Ramon, and they are too amazing to describe. All I'm saying is, you gotta try them. As soon as you can.

I got the Enchiladas Suizas, which are one of their more popular items, and paired it with a wonderful Jarritos beverage, because Mexican food seriously tastes so much better with Jarritos on the side.

I was so hungry that I forgot to take the shot before I started eating! This came with SO much mole sauce, which was delicious! You definitely don't need to order the beans & rice on the side because this is sooooo filling! These enchiladas were stuffed with shredded chicken and avocado slices, with the mole poblana on top. Mmmmmmmmm....

After finishing our meal, Owen decided to run back to the car on his own while I waited at the restaurant with our bag full of the two expensive things we own, since he swore he saw some questionable looking guys following us after we passed the liquor store. We may have been freaking out or overreacting, but better safe than sorry!!! We went to the Salt Lake Public Library after lunch to enjoy the AC while it was SOOOO hot outside. Plus I've always heard that it has some crazy cool architecture, and I wanted to see it for myself!

Unfortunately it closed at 6, so we didn't get to stay there very long, but Owen got to read some Captain America comics and I got my pictures, so I supposed that's about all we can ask for.

Plus they had the coolest bike rack there that I have ever seen!

We did some shopping around the Gateway mall after leaving the library, drooled over the Mad Men collection at Banana Republic (I would seriously love to own every piece of that collection), laughed at all the ridiculous prices at Anthropologie (while I secretly wanted to buy everything in that store as well), tasted some unique olive oils and balsamic vinegars, and played in the water fountain. I wanted to check out Les Madeleines, because supposedly they are one of the few shops in SLC that makes macarons, but they had closed at 4! Ridiculous! Around 8, we headed down to West Valley to go to our drive-in movie! Apparently this is the only drive-in theater left in the state of Utah, and we've always wanted to go to one. Unfortunately, the only movies that were playing that a) weren't rated R, b) we hadn't seen yet, and c) weren't going to make me vomit (umm Smurfs), was the double feature of Planet of the Apes and Cowboys vs Aliens. Both of these movies were seriously dumb (Planet of the Apes was shockingly boring and predictable, while the aliens in Cowboys vs Aliens were AWFUL), but it was fun to experience movies in this way!

Plus it was cool because when you got out of your car, you could see all of the other movies playing around you as well! I hope they don't close this place down because I would love to go there again if there were movie I actually was interested in watching and if we parked next to someone who wasn't smoking the whole time (we had to keep our windows closed, it was seriously gross).

And this is the only picture I got of us together. From the whole trip. And we are in the car. Go figure. Oh well, at least we have lots of wonderful memories and had a great experience together! And we can plan on getting lots and lots more pictures together soon!