"i'd like to see paris before i die. philadelphia will do." - mae west

I'd like to see Paris before I die. Philadelphia will do.  - Mae West

My last post was all about my one-year wedding anniversary celebration in Napa. Well, when my husband and I began talking about the trip (the planning started shortly after we were married and returned from our honeymoon), we decided that the trip itself would be our “gift.” And honestly, I was okay with that. True, that I can list about 20 things I’d love to receive as a gift at any given moment (It’s really amazing how my brain can think of that in an instant yet can’t recall where I put my keys this morning. But if you need to know anything about new items on the Tory Burch website, I’m your girl.)

So about a month before the trip, I was working from home and before leaving for work that day, my husband turns to me and says, “Don’t pick up any of the packages from the mail today.” Hmmmm, interesting. Clearly, that means there is a gift coming in the mail for me! Hooray!! But I acted cool and said, “Oh, what? Sure sure, sounds good.” Meanwhile, I started going through all the things I could have possibly mentioned in the past couple months. What in the world was I going to get?!?!?!

And then it hit me. “Wait a minute,” I thought, “if HE’S getting ME a gift, I’m not going to look like a chump and not give a gift on our ONE YEAR WEDDING ANNIVERSARY. “ Maybe after a couple years, it won’t be as important (strike that, of course it will be) but not on this one.  Now, while I can list off all the wonderful things I want, I stress out about what to get others, especially my husband.  After a couple ideas, which were immediately shot down when I ran them by a few friends, I immediately figured it out – THE PERFECT GIFT! Tickets to a concert for the band whose song was played for our first dance at our wedding! Yes, it’s fun because it’s a concert, it’s sentimental which makes it perfect for anniversary purposes, and it’s in Philadelphia….wait, it’s in Philadelphia. Now I LOVE traveling. LOVE IT. But this past year has involved some intense travel and the concert itself was going to be the weekend after we returned from a wedding in NYC.  But since, I hadn’t worked a full work week in a few weeks, why buck the trend now? So I booked it and surprised him with the gift when we were in NAPA.

Ok, ok, long backstory. But now to the Philly part of this blog!

We decided to drive up and road trip it. For the record, I hate being in the car more than 3-4 hours at a time, so this was the ideal roadtrip (sorry, honey, we are NEVER going to drive cross country). We stayed at the Sofitel in Rittenhouse Square. If you’ve never stayed at a Sofitel, book your trip now. It doesn’t even matter where it is. Just do it. I mainly love it because the beds are like clouds. Soft, fluffy, king-sized clouds (sigh….I miss the bed).

Anyway, we get to the hotel and I immediately take a nap in the cloud bed. I wake up refreshed and start to get ready for the concert. There’s a knock on the door and it’s room service. The hotel has sent us champagne and strawberries in honor of our anniversary.  

Quelle magnifique!

our well dressed strawberries

So we down the champagne and head to dinner at Parc where we gorge ourselves on yummy delicious food. The restaurant sends us a dessert with sparklers. I love being celebrated!

Next up, the concert! We arrive at the venue and no one is there. Well there are a few people there but not many. I think this was due in part to the opening bands, which were good but, good in a “this is my dad’s band, he likes to play Grateful Dead type music with his buddies in his spare time” kind of way. Ok, they were better than that and actually my dad doesn’t play in a band but you get the idea. So then Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers hit the stage. The concert was amazing, especially because I was practically sitting on the stage. Here a few of my awesome photos (I know, you are in awe of my photography skills and think the band should hire me)…

the stage before the sk6er magic

stephen kellogg himself

cue the tuba!

After the concert we decide to walk home…which seemed like it was a good idea because everything was so close to our hotel. Things look a lot closer on google maps. Very tricky. And then we decide we want to order pizza from room service. We were full of great ideas that night!

Day two we decide to walk around Philly and soak in the rich history of the city. Well,  I just wanted to pose next to the statues.

posing perfection

We went on a carriage ride tour, at which point, I decided that I want to live in Society Hill…mainly because it’s called Society Hill.   After our intense history lesson (again, it was a lesson for me because I don’t remember anything I learned in high school), it was time for the main attraction – the ANTHROPOLOGIE CASTLE. For those of you who don’t know, the Anthropologie in Philly is four levels. FOUR. My husband didn’t last long in the store but, conveniently the store castle was a block from our hotel. Gosh, I wonder how that happened. So after giving the castle all my money (in exchange for all their clothes) I finally headed back to prepare for our big time dinner at LaCroix (Big Time – said in Paul Rudd’s voice from “I Love You, Man”).   Sadly, this meant that my husband would miss the second half of the Wisconsin/Ohio State game. Lucky for us, we sat next to a table at LaCroix who was also interested in the game and gave us updates throughout the night. Soooooo lucky!

The best part of the night –  (if you ask my husband, it would be the huge win for Wisconsin over #1 Ohio State) was when the restaurant sent us TWO desserts for our anniversary (note, we’d also ordered two on our own, so we now had 4 desserts). God, I love anniversaries.

And with that, Happy One-Year Anniversary (again).

1 whole year! we made it.

In honor of our one-year wedding anniversary, my husband and I planned a trip to Napa. 

where the magic begins

We flew out early Thursday morning…really early. As in I woke up at 4am. Gross.

Our first stop was Atlanta. It’s a quick flight that makes you believe that this whole trip is going to be quick. But it’s a lie. Because once you’re in Atlanta, you realize you still have to fly 4 more hours to actually get to your destination. Atlanta was just a 2-hour side trip to a place you never wanted to go to anyway.  My husband being self-sacrificing, let’s me have the window seat and graciously takes the middle seat, next to a bowling ball. Meanwhile, I sleep comfortably. Well as comfortably as you can sleep on the plane.  How comfortable is waking up every 15 minutes, really?

We land in San Francisco, pick up our rental and drive out to Napa Valley. We arrive at our hotel, AVIA, a modern hotel within walking distance to restaurants and shops.  Being the classic Danny Tanner, I ask that we plan out our days.

The first day, we head to a group wine tour. The limo picks us up and we meet the other couples. It was like wine prom! We were fortunate enough to have a great group of young couples…and the quiet Asian woman with her dad.  It was interesting. I’m sure she appreciated that I pointed out how my underdog college beat her college football team last week.  Ah, making friends wherever I go.

The funny thing about wine tours is that you start off very proper and appropriate and then you find yourself asking about the wine gloves the tour guide referred to (for the record, he said, “wine club” but you could have sworn he said “wine gloves” and now you want to know what those are and where you can find them!)

delicious delicious wine

The next day was our designated driver tour. Basically, a driver comes to your hotel and drives you to vineyards in your rental car. It’s awesome. We drove to smaller boutique vineyards that essentially treated you like VIP.  This is the life! Again, you start off the day demure and sweet and by the end; you’re asking the vineyard owner if you could have a diet coke from their private fridge. By the way, they say yes, you’re VIP afterall (or they just hope that you’ll take the diet coke and be on your way).

By day three, drinking wine was a chore. “Yeah, your cabernet sauvignon is great. But, I’ve had better. Or at least I think I have.  Seriously, do you have a diet coke?“

The night of our actual anniversary, we had reservations at Micheal Chirello’s Bottegga. 

little did we know what awaited us

We saved ourselves all day so when we arrived we forewarned our server. “We are going to order an obscene amount of food.” She giggles. Silly.  No, seriously, it was obscene (I’ve numbered the list to illustrate the insanity):

1.  We order the calamari. The calamari is served with a squid ink aioli. Forget that I hate mayo, this is incredible.
2. But what’s dinner at an Italian restaurant w/o caprese salad? The caprese salad is served with balsamic caviar.  I know, what is that, right? Well it’s balsamic vinegar that they add a tiny bit of gelatin to and then drop out into tiny little gems. Delicious.
3. Then our next order arrives – polenta in jar that’s served with crispy mushrooms and parm.  It was basically as though mashed potatoes had a love affair with macaroni and cheese and bred this creamy delicious goodness.
4.  The next dish was the proscuittio with little parm donuts that you dip into a chilled melon soup. This I didn’t eat but my husband did. (At this point the couple next to us is looking at us in horror. They’re thinking “how are these Americans eating so much food? They are disgusting.” We look at them, recognize their horror and just tell them, we’re still waiting on our entrée.  But truthfully, at this point, we ourselves are disgusted too. It’s like we were living our own episode of Man vs. [Gourmet] Food. It was torture.)
5. So our entrees arrive (I ordered the angry prawns and I can’t even remember what my husband ordered. I think it was lamb or pork. At this point my vision was blurred and my memory was waning). We are doing everything we can to not get sick at the actual table.  I look at my husband to see his eyes are tearing and he actually might vomit…at the table. But I can tell he’s fighting hard. We play with our food and take a few bites. TORTURE. And the server takes away our plates.
6.  But wait! My husband had decided at the beginning of the meal to surprise me with dessert (chocolate hazelnut soufflé). He’s so sweet but we are really going to die at this table. Even the server recognizes the fear at the thought of more food. As she places the chocolate soufflé on our table, she looks at me and says “I’m really sorry.” We take a bite and then just pray for the check.

happy anniversary!

Moral of that story, just plan a follow-up trip  to Bottega and eat comfortably.

Our 5 days in Napa were incredible and delicious. The weather was lovely, the people were sweet and the wine was poetry (I read that on a sign). Next time, we should stay for a month!