A Cowtown Anniversary

(The view from our room)

This year we celebrated 10 years of marriage! Our actual anniversary is on the 11th, but we celebrated early since Justin is on his way up to Colorado today. He planned an entire night in the stockyards for us. It was great! I love Fort Worth and everything about it, and this was a perfect night to celebrate. Fort Worth is "where the west begins" and right through the old downtown, is where they would lead the cattle through on their way up north. Its sometimes called "Cowtown." Yes, Carolina friends this explanation was for you. Here are some pictures (not in order for some reason, blogger really messes with me if I try to rearrange things, sorry) and what all we did:

This are pictures of the stockyards. The streets are lined with saloons, shops, boot stores, hotels, and now a local winery.



This is the historical marker outside of our hotel, the Hyatt Place which was right across the street from the coliseum, where they buy and sell livestock still! It was a really nice hotel with a modern western touch.
This was my present, sort of. I really was wanting cowboy boots lately, and we found these in of one of the gift stores on Exchange Street. They were an incredible deal because they were used, but I really love them. I wore them that night after dinner when we went to Billy Bob's.

Here is my favorite country musician, Pat Green. I have loved his music from the beginning, too bad he didn't really "give up on Nashville a long time ago."
And this is where we ate, Lonesome Dove. This was a dream come true! I love food shows and consider myself somewhat of a foodie, so when I heard about Lonesome Dove about two years ago, I was dying to try it out. I saw Chef Tim Love on Top Chef Masters and found out his restaurant was in the stockyards in Fort Worth. When we were here two summers ago, it seemed a bit (ok, a lot) out of our budget, but Justin wanted me to experience this since it was our ten year anniversary and all. He is very glad he did, because we both walked out not remorseful at all of the total bill and admitting that this was the absolute best food we have ever eaten. We had an appetizer sampling some of their first course offerings that included: a spring roll with duck confit, an elk sausage slider with foie gras, a rattlesnake and rabbit sausage and a hushpuppy (unfortunately I don't remember what all was in it, it was not as memorable). For our main entry we split a meal for two that included a kobe steak and lobster with a portabello mushroom risotto. It was amazing! They topped it off with complimentary champagne for our anniversary.
Thank you to my wonderful husband, Justin, for giving me the date of my dreams! Its everything this Texas girl loves:) I love you and look forward to another wonderful 10 years together (maybe by then we will have saved enough for another trip to Lonesome Dove:)