Last week was a much calmer week for me than the week prior. The biggest thing I did was go to Meow Wolf with Shari! The new location here in Denver opened last October, so Shari and I wanted to wait a bit in hopes the hype would die down and we could explore the space with less people. Well, we didn’t realize that the day we went was prime Spring Break for kids, so there were a lot of people, but we still thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The space is something else, it’s a maze with no clear direction. It’s an art installation with hidden messages. While there is a story behind the space, known as Convergence Station, we somehow missed learning about it. I don’t know if you need to buy the $3 phone app in order to learn the story but we decided to forgo that this first time we went per the recommendation of our friends. They said it was better to just explore and then you can go back one day and try out the app. I think that was wise advice, but I still wish we had gotten a better explanation of what Convergence Station actually is. We were told there were five different worlds but the distinction between some of them was not clear at all and I honestly can only think of three worlds, maybe four, that we saw (and one of those was just the entrance to the building). So I wish the narrative was clearer. There were some binders with information in one part of the exhibit but it was a lot of text and so we didn’t read it. Maybe next time.
My other complaint would be we didn’t know we could or should talk to the “residents” of the Station. We also didn’t get handed a consulting business card until our third trip up the elevator, which by that time we were pretty exhausted and almost done with our visit. But we wanted to see what this card would do so we went up to a resident and asked. She gave us a mission to go to all five worlds, take pictures with residents and take selfies, and then come back to her for a consultation. That would have been extremely fun if we had done that when we first got there, but we had been there for 2 1/2 hours already and the idea of having to find our way to all five worlds, and to then find residents within those worlds, sounded exhausting. This woman was extremely kind, thankfully, and told us we could do 1 or 2 worlds and come back to her and that would be enough. So we did.
Overall, this giant interactive art exhibit is pretty awesome and everyone should go at least once. There’s only three Meow Wolf’s in the United States (and the world in general, I think) so how cool is it that we have one here in Colorado? There are a lot of cool details to take in and discover as you wander around this alien world. It’s almost like being in another world, honestly. And the closest I’ll probably ever get to being on a movie set. It reminded me of a place I went to as a child, where kids got to pretend to be firefighters and chefs and many other professions. Meow Wolf is a space for kids and adults alike to pretend to be something else for a few hours. It’s a great opportunity to let go, to open up your childlike wonder, and to explore with a sense of lightness and curiosity.
After Meow Wolf, we headed over to Fire on the Mountain for some seitan wings and dinner. Those wings were pretty tasty and I even gave the raspberry habanero sauce a try. It was spicy, but I was able to handle it. I felt very proud. So that day was a lot of fun for me and Shari. It was our Christmas presents to each other, who can beat that!
Earlier in the week I tried out a new cookie recipe – pineapple cookies. This recipe comes from one of my favorite Great British Bake Off contestants, Kim Joy. Turns out the recipe was lacking in some information I thought would be helpful and I didn’t simmer the pineapple long enough. I realized this before making cookies at least and simmered it longer the next day. Still, I don’t think I condensed it enough even after the second go around but the cookies still turned out tasty. I would consider making this recipe again but would expect to simmer the pineapple for an hour or longer.
The other awesome event in my week is that I got to visit my family! Shari and I headed down Friday evening. We went to the flea market Saturday morning where Kaitlin and her family met up with us. It started out a bit cold but we were all warm by the end of our trek. I let Ollie borrow my gloves for a bit as he was the coldest of all of us. It was very sweet when, after it had warmed up a bit, I asked him if he wanted to remove the gloves (they were absolutely huge on him and he really couldn’t do much with them on) and he said quietly, “No thank you” and then walked away quickly so I couldn’t take them. I think he enjoyed wearing something of mine and it was very sweet. It’s clear my niece and nephew love me and I love them.
I didn’t find anything at the flea market, but that’s ok, and afterward we tried out a Thai restaurant for lunch. My mom tried Shari’s oculus later that afternoon where she learned how to box. I’m so proud of her for jumping into the unknown and giving it her all. I attempted to make pavlova for my family on Saturday but it accidentally got burned so I tried again yesterday. I used a hand mixer instead of a stand mixer and changed up the temperature a bit which made the second go around, while edible, not turn out as good as it did when we made it with Carolyn. My family was all very kind and still ate it and said it was good, but it wasn’t great. I’ll just have to keep trying and figure out how to make a consistently great vegan pavlova. While I did feel slightly disappointed in the outcomes of both pavlovas this weekend, I’m still proud that I tried (twice!).
So it was a good weekend with my family and now I’m ready to start a new week! What are you all looking forward to this week?!
Just Lauren 