Matt's Birthday Celebrations

Matt's birthday was in early March... For each of our birthdays, we like to celebrate with a nice dinner out and a trip somewhere, not usually a big trip, but something local-ish and fun.

Birthday Dinner - Tar & Roses

For Matt's birthday dinner, we went to Tar & Roses, which is a restaurant we have been wanting to try for some time now, and we were excited to have a reason to visit.  Tar & Roses did not disappoint!  I am pretty sure it rose to the top of both mine and Matt's list of favorite places, and we are just waiting for another excuse to go back!

Matt got duck and I ordered venison - both were delicious!

Yes - the cauliflower was that good! And, it was so cute :)

Happy Birthday, Matt!

Santa Barbara Trip

Last year, we went to Santa Barbara for Matt's birthday weekend, and we enjoyed it so much we decided to do a repeat trip this year for Matt's birthday.  This year's trip was much of the same - visiting wine tasting rooms (which is what you do in Santa Barbara), a morning walk on the beach that included a visit to and short workout at Shoreline Park, breakfast on the beach and ample purchases of our favorite wines.

However, this year we made sure to make time to check out the 'main drag' of Santa Barbara as we only saw it on the way out last year, and it looked so cute and fun - which it was!  Downtown Santa Barbara is very pretty and picturesque with most shops/stores displaying matching Spanish/Mediterranean influenced architecture and an abundance of shopping, boutiques, restaurants and even more wine tasting rooms. It was so fun to spend the afternoon here before heading back home.

Friday

We started with lunch at Figueroa Mountain Brewing Co., more because we like the beer than for any thought of food ;)

After lunch, we visited 4 wine tasting rooms, some were our favorites from last year and a couple of new ones.  Area 5.1 was a new winery that we didn't get to try last year and loved it; ended up going home with a bottle of their Sherry.  Oreana was my favorite from last year, and we returned this trip; ended up going home with 2 of their bottles :)  Corks and Crowns was a place we thought looked interesting last year, but never made it to.  Turns out it is not really associated with a particular winery but is just a tasting room in general for both wine and beer. It had a very relaxed and 'chill' atmosphere plus some very interesting wines.

Friday night we had dinner close by at Fishouse, which was pretty good and we got free wine from a fellow patron who felt generous :)

Saturday

Saturday morning started out much the same as last year - we walked out to Shoreline Park, did a small workout and then walked back to our hotel, stopping for breakfast on the beach at Shoreline Beach Cafe.

Walking on the beach up to the park.

Views from Shoreline Park.

Saturday afternoon was spent in Downtown Santa Barabara - we had lunch, walked around, enjoyed some lattes while people watching and managed to fit in a few more wine tasting rooms before leaving.  All around a great trip and looking forward to going back soon!