Classy and Timeless Birthday Weekend

Today I turned 28, and I celebrated over the weekend with the girls (including my sis-in-law visiting from Maine!) by going to The August Weber Haus in Cedarburg.  Originally, I wanted to go to the Melting Pot, but when I couldn't get in there, I did a search for other fondue restaurants in the Milwaukee area.  To my surprise and delight, I found one in Cedarburg.  Not only is Cedarburg closer to home, but that town has many good memories for me.  Plus, I like trying new places, so I couldn't wait for Saturday to come.

I knew the place was going to be small, but I didn't realize how small until the seven of us piled in there.  In one room, there were four tables of four, and the room was big enough only to hold those four tables.  When we walked in, though, we saw the bar to the right and a lounge area to the left with comfy leather chairs and a fireplace.  Since there was seven of us, we sat at the bar, which luckily had an oval shape at one end so that we could all see each other.

We started off with delicious cocktails, one spinach artichoke dip appetizer, and two cheese fondues.

Spinach and artichoke dip

"The Spice" - a blend of pepper jack and cheddar cheese

"The Classic" - a combination of Swiss and Gruyere cheese

The Spice was a little on the thick side, and both cheese fondues took forever to melt.  Also, because there was only one hotplate in front of us, we could only enjoy one fondue at a time, which was fine, but also slightly inconvenient for a party of seven.  We made do.

Both fondues and the spinach dip were delicious, though, but we all wished we had a bigger variety of food to dip.  The Spice came with bread and green peppers; and The Classic came with bread, carrots, and celery.  I imagine they served it that way because those are the foods that pair best with the cheese, but I personally don't care for carrots or celery and would've loved to see some broccoli on either plate.

Next came the chocolate fondues, which I was beyond excited for after seeing other patrons enjoying them.  All five of the waitstaff that were working helped us with different things throughout the night, but this guy seemed to enjoy talking to us and entertaining us the most.  Here he is modeling our dipping accoutrements.

Strawberries, cream puffs, pretzels, ice cream cone, green apples, bananas, and pound cake for dipping

Dark Chocolate Caramel Delight and Butterscotch Pleasure (jewelry from Barnes Jewelers)

We started with the Dark Chocolate Caramel Delight, which contained chocolate, caramel, and a variety of nuts.  I usually don't like nuts in my chocolate, but I didn't really notice them when dipping all the food.  The second chocolate fondue we tried was Butterscotch Pleasure.  Butterscotch is one of my favorite things in life, so I loved this one, which also included coconut, marshmallow, and chocolate.  I have no complaints about the chocolate EXCEPT a suggestion to add rice crispy bars to the dipping options. 

So I would definitely go back again.  The waiters and waitresses were very friendly and personable, which distracted me from the somewhat slow service.  Between August Weber Haus and the Melting pot, I would say that I prefer Melting Pot slightly more, but I would like to try some of August Weber Haus's wine and cheese plate options next time I go back.

One more pic of all the girls in the lounge area

And by the way, the reason it was a "classy and timeless" night is because the birthday girl has a low liquor tolerance after having a baby and was convinced to do this by the waiter and her friends:

Classy and timeless

That would be an ice cream cone filled to the top with melted chocolate.

Sunday morning, the delicious dining continued when my sister-in-law and I met a family friend at The Eatery on Farwell, a bar/restaurant in Milwaukee's East Side known for their bloody marys. 

The bloody marys and the food were all very good.  As you can see, the skewered snacks included with the bloodies would've probably been enough to fill a person up.  But I also had eggs over medium, toast, and their American fries, and I enjoyed all of it.

To round out the rest of the fun weekend, I played lots of Dance Central on our new Kinect and also made an angel food cake to bring to work today.  Pardon the image quality--the rest of the pictures were taken by my camera phone.

For a fun fashiony twist this festive morning, I decided to try the layered tights look I read about so often from the academichic ladies.  I did these black Target textured tights over navy We Love Colors tights.  I thought it would be ridiculously uncomfortable, but it's actually not.  It was kind of a fun way to make the holey textured tights not look so scandalous and the blue tights not look so bright.

And there's the carpet at work.

Happy Valentine's Day!