Lake Orion Canterbury Village

For not having any scheduled plans besides a Sunday afternoon outing, this past weekend was absolutely packed!

I’m not complaining. Although I could have used an entire day to catch up on life and blog tasks that need my attention, I pushed them aside.

Sometimes you have to loosen your grip on the to-do list for a day or so.

In case you missed this morning’s post, we chatted about the importance of escaping from your scheduled to-do’s every once in a while. In my opinion, doing so is a necessity that keeps us our most productive and sane selves in the long run.

Keeping that in mind, I let go of everything I wanted to do with my free time over the weekend and enjoyed the gorgeous fall weather we have been so fortunate to have.

Scott and I happily spent Saturday morning at home and caught up on a few episodes of The Voice and Scandal. I’m soaking in these last lazy hours with him as much as I can before the “real” NBA season starts this weekend.

Once Opening Night gets here, I’ll most likely see him again in April.

I am exaggerating, but really, he’ll be a very busy bee and often on-the-go.

For that reason, we did our best to fit in as many outdoor weekend activities together as we could!

Orion Oaks Dog Park

With warm and sunny temperatures in the 50s and 60s, we took that as an opportunity to get outside and enjoy the beautiful fall afternoon.

We hadn’t taken Roadie to the dog park in what seemed like forever, so he was long overdue for a visit.

We found a small(er) fenced in area that wasn’t terribly crowded and let him run around with the other pups.

He loved it!

Remember that cute and fluffy Malamute puppy named Odin I shared a picture of a few months ago?

He belongs our friend, Adam, and is definitely growing!

We spent a little over an hour chatting with the other dog parents and running around with the dogs before we walked over to the Dog Dock.

How cool is this?

There is a designated area just for dogs to have access to lake water.

Even if Roadie doesn’t get in the water, it’s still the part of our park visit that I look forward to the most.

(Saturdays = sweats, ya’ll.)

The views are so calming!

Each time we visit the docks, Roadie gets a little bit further down the steps. We don’t force him and just let him test out the waters on his own. Maybe one day he’ll jump in, who knows. That would be interesting!

Until then, he’ll be busy holding staring contests with the watch owl.

I’m pretty sure the owl’s got this one, bud.

Canterbury Village

We always pass this huge castle looking building on the way over to the dog park and wonder what it is used for.

We decided to stop in this time and found out that Canterbury Village is more than just a giant medieval looking building.

It’s 21 acres full of unique shops, a new Yates Cider Mill location, and home for family and holiday themed events. Even weddings!

We had a final destination of Yates, and took some time to go through all of the stores on the way over.

It was fun to see different cultures come to life in each one!

(Fun fact: Scott is part Scotch-Irish. He’s my little leprechaun.) 

No matter how hard we try and look for it (<- ha, that video is equally fantastic as it is embarrassing), we can’t ever find his Celtic family crest.

The closest we have ever found is Hess, so we usually just roll with that.

We made a stop at almost every store and came across some interesting finds. A personal favorite were these Harfs, a very versatile hat and scarf.

The last store included a collection of teas and natural herbs, as well as a grey striped kitty cat for a greeter.

Pumpkin spice skull candle, anyone?

My phone died as soon as we made it to Yates. It’s probably just as well, considering I flooded this entire post with photos.

Don’t worry… there will be plenty of cider mill-esque photos on the blog tomorrow when I share the rest of the weekend with you.

After our afternoon outside, it was time to grab a very late lunch/dinner, or what I like to call linner. We agreed on one of my Mexican favorites in Downtown Lake Orion, Sagebrush Cantina!

Their famous chicken rice soup is out of this world, you guys.

I have picked up on the fact that there is a good amount of Michiganders who read the blog (holla!), so if you ever find yourself anywhere near the Lake Orion and Sagebrush area, do yourself a favor and pay it a visit.

Then order this soup.

Straying away from my usual order of chicken fajitas, I mixed it up and ordered the shrimp tacos with corn tortillas instead.

Um, YUM!

We got home from our spontaneous fun-filled day around 7 p.m. and both Scott and I each spent a good hour drifting in and out of food comas while we watched Untold Stories of the E.R. (<- Have you seen it? Always interesting!)

Soon after, we got an invite to go hang at a friends house, and I was thankful when my friend Alex showed up to keep me company.

We took over the theater watching Frozen (don’t hate) while the guys played some intense games of FIFA Soccer, then ping pong. It got pretty loud. Crazies.

I guess you could say it was a pretty busy Saturday! I’ll be back tomorrow to share the rest of our fall festivities packed Sunday.

Have a marvelous rest of your Monday!