Stay-Cation Portland Edition

I don't know about all of you, but I have learned over the past few years how important rest and relaxation can be in our busy lives. It has been a crazy couple of months for Jake and me, so when we thought about what we wanted to do for Jake's vacation week, we knew we needed a stay-cation.

The "rules" were as follows (Jake would never call them rules, and would tease me for saying this because I am a rule maker):
-Do not set an alarm clock.
-Go to bed as early or late as we wanted.
-Spend only the cash we got for Christmas.
-Don't feel guilty about spending the cash.
-Eat really really good food.
-Make memories.

Instead of renting a hotel and putting all of our cash into a room, we decided to stay at our place and Jake's sister's house and spend our money on eating at places we wanted to eat.  Jake and I are foodies. He always says "While many people travel to see things, we travel to eat things."

Thus we headed to Portland!

Our first stop: Olympic Provisions in NW Portland.

Here we ate tasty meats and drank the yummiest wine.

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After dinner we were both in the mood for some ice cream. We drove around the Pearl District until we stumbled upon Cool Moon Ice Cream.

Jake ordered salted caramel with coffee crunch, and I got buttered pecan with the salted caramel. The homemade ice cream was delicious and exactly what we wanted.

The next day we headed to one of our favorite spots. The Lucky Lab.

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They make the best homemade root beer I have ever tasted. I highly suggest it!

Finally we ended off the trip with a suggestion from our friend Crystal with dinner at the Sapphire Hotel.

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Jake had a burger with yam fries that were to die for, and I ordered a flavorful salad. It was so good that as soon as we got home, I made my own version of the salad. I'll post it here this week!

All in all, we had a fantastic week. It was so fun to try different restaurants in Portland. If you ever find yourself in Portland looking for a place to eat, try out one of these great places!