5th Anniversary Date Night

Ok, in the record book of date nights, this definitely went down as one of the best. Yes, it was a little pricey on the $$ scale, but oh-so-fun to get dressed up {I actually wore a skirt someplace other than church!} and have a night out on the town with my man. First of all, I barely rolled in the driveway after being gone for a week and a 1/2 in Oregon/Utah a couple hours before we had to leave. This gave me just enough time to hug and kiss my boys, unload our stuff and shower/get ready. It had taken twice as long to get up the 205 as normal, so I had pretty much ruled out dinner before our show but Sean reminded me that we had talked about going to the Brazil Grill and also that the show started at 7:30pm, not 7pm. So I busted my bum to get all girly-ed up while Sean made us some last minute dinner reservations. Boy am I glad he did! It was so fun! I can't wait to go back again.

For those of you who don't know, Sean served his mission for our church in Brazil. So, for 2 years he was fully immersed in their culture, traditions and language. That's right, Sean speaks fluent Portuguese. So how this restaurant works is that the servers, or gauchos, come to your table with a variety of sizzling meats - everything from bacon wrapped filet mignon to black forest ham to marinated prawns. You're given a pair of tongs and then they slice you off a piece while you hold the end with the tongs. My favorite was definitely the ham and the beef sirloin. They also have a yummy salad bar and the pi`ece de re`sistance {please don't laugh at my poor attempt at a word with accent marks!} was the roasted cinnamon pineapple. Hole. E. Mole. E. I love fresh pineapple and didn't think there was much you could do to improve upon it. Boy was I wrong! This was so, so good! There's a cinnamon/sugar coating on the outside that caramelizes as the pineapple is roasting. Oh my gosh. Words cannot describe how tasty it was!
Also, the guy who seated us pointed out a native Brazilian who was one of the gauchos. She came to our table and was very impressed with Sean's Portuguese and Sean was happy for an opportunity to use it! I think she liked being able to speak her native tongue and ended up being our main gaucho for the night. She even put a rush on Sean's request for chicken hearts. Yes, I said chicken hearts. Not legs or even wings. The heart. She came out with a stack of about 7 or 8 on her spear thing and first asked if I would at least try one. I agreed and then she gave all the rest to Sean who happily gobbled them up - popping a whole one into his mouth. Yeah, I was a little more delicate to my approach. I cut the little thing first in half... and then in half again. Sean just looked at me and laughed. What can I say, though? I was NOT going to put that whole chicken heart in my mouth! My verdict? It tasted like... chicken! Not really, it actually tasted more like a mild sausage. {The picture on the right, above, is Sean enjoying said chicken hearts.} I finished all of it, even if it was a little hard once I had reminded myself that it was a heart. The funniest part of it all, though, was the couple in the booth behind us noticed that the gaucho had brought us something and there was nothing left. Usually the gauchos circle around to all the tables asking if they want any. The woman stopped our gaucho, a little ticked, and said, "hey! What was that they just had?!" Our wonderful Brazilian gaucho smiled and politely explained to the couple that those were chicken hearts and she would gladly bring them out some. The man and woman looked at each other and I swear had a slight gag reflex before responding that they were good and did not need to try any! Ha ha ha! It was so funny! The gaucho came back to our table and {think Portuguese accent} said, "The Americans! They never want to try the chicken hearts!" Anyway, we didn't get to stay quite as long as we would've liked but still got our fill. We highly recommend it if you are in the Portland area.

After dinner we rushed to catch our show. Sean and I both love the theater - especially Broadway musicals! We definitely plan on taking advantage of living so close to Portland now - Keller auditorium gets some great shows every year. We try to go at least once a year, but the last show we saw was in Spring of '09, just before Sean lost his job. As you can imagine, $75+ a ticket theater shows fell way to the bottom of the priority list. As in, not even on the list. Pretty hard to justify spending that kind of money when there are bills like, say, electric, water and insurance to be paid! Anyway, we saw The Lion King! One that's been out for a while, but the touring cast only makes in to the West coast every once in a while. Last time it was here, Sean got paid to go watch it with the kids at OSB. Yes, the blind students got to go. And, of course, since some of them have partial vision they had the best seats in the house! So not fair. I was glad I got to go this time and we thoroughly enjoyed it! The way they do all the animals is awesome! Each one is a little different and it took me forever to figure out the hyenas! I think Zazu was my favorite and I loved his line in response to Scar [the bad guy]: "yeah, you bucked up royally." I just can't remember what Scar had said first. Costumes are amazing. Music is amazing. Overall great show!

And that was it. Our anniversary date night. Dinner and a show. And we loved it!! Exactly what we like to do. :)

{Oh, and thanks to Lizzy for baby-sitting Ethan that night - even though she, too, had just got home from Utah. We really appreciate it!}