On a recent weeknight, I was really in the mood to go have a drink at the Fireside Lounge outdoor patio at Willows Lodge here in Woodinville. It had occurred to me that with autumn approaching, it will soon be too cold to sit outdoors in the evening, and the hotel will safely store away their patio furniture until next year. This might be one of my last chances to enjoy drinks and a meal on that beautiful patio!
I swung into action and texted a few friends who might be able and interested in meeting up after work. Three of them took me up on the idea, so around 5pm I packed away my work for the day, freshened up a bit, and fought the traffic on 202 to get there.
I arrived around half an hour before my friends, hoping to secure an outdoor table. There were several empty tables (however, the seats around the fire pit were, understandably, already full). The Fireside Lounge staff were very gracious when I explained my friends wouldn’t be joining me for a while and that I felt bad monopolizing a table for four. They kindly assured me it wouldn’t be a problem, so I settled in and ordered one of their expertly made specialty cocktails. It was called “Garden” something or other, and was so delicious and refreshing, I ordered another later on in the evening.
While I waited for my friends to join me, I enjoyed petting people’s dogs – there were several pets accompanying their people on the patio that evening. I also admired the ornamental pepper plants arranged so beautifully in a flowerbed by my table.
A friend joined me at last, but she was too shy to have her photo taken. She ordered the same cocktail I’d started with, and requested the short rib tacos.
I ordered the hummus plate to share with my friends. It came with the freshest of vegetables; an earthy, tangy hummus; crisp apples and piping hot pita bread.
The fruit and cheese plate I ordered included dried apricots, Marcona almonds, grapes, apples, fig jam, and more cheese than we could finish, actually!
This is my friend Carole, who is a ketogenic nutritionist. We met through a Meetup group, Eastside Social Club. She had just come from a spa services company’s launch party, and was still up for going out with us too! I love people who just keep the party going! She ordered a bottle of local wine from Willows Lodge’s carefully thought out wine menu. Carole had no problem finding keto foods she could eat on the menu, and the staff was happy to switch out a couple things for her in her meal.
Carole had been to Willows Lodge before, but only for a meeting. When I heard she hadn’t ever explored the beautiful gardens on the property, I begged our other friends to hold down the table so I could take her on a tour.
She really got a kick out of the little stone (castle? wishing well?) until she saw a giant spider hanging inside it!
If you want to learn more about what a ketogenic nutritionist does, see Carole’s social media info in the Resources section at the end of this post.
I can’t speak for Carole, but I felt a bit guilty for leaving our other friends behind while we lingered so long enjoying our exploration of the gardens. When we got back, I promise we encouraged them to go on their own walk too!
These purple flowers weren’t here last time I wandered around the gardens. The landscaping team must switch things up fairly often, I assume. They do such a lovely job here!
These colorful flowers are just perfect for this transition period between summer and autumn. Love how vibrant these are! So stunning.
Willows hotel guests can use this patio to unwind and reflect upon the gardens at the end of a long day.
The Herbfarm looks utterly magical at twilight. I’ve never eaten there – as a vegetarian, I’m reluctant, though their website says they can usually accomodate dietary preferences. I wouldn’t want to put them through that much trouble just for me, to be honest!
I haven’t been to Barking Frog for dinner in quite a while. I’m taking my sister to her birthday dinner there at the end of September – looking forward to it!
Fireside Lounge has live music a couple evenings a week. Check their events calendar for details on upcoming performances. The night of our visit, the performers were Caety Sagoian and Michael Bresloff. We really enjoyed Caety’s voice and her songs.
We were impressed when Michael asked for requests – we asked for a Tom Petty song and another table requested a Stevie Nicks song. We were delighted to hear “Landslide” and “Free Falling,” both beautifully executed. That made the evening even more magical!
I put my camera away as the night grew dark, not wanting to be obnoxious. I really enjoyed chatting with my friends between music sets, seeing the stars come out (as much as we can see them here in Seattle), confiding a few secrets, eating delicious food and indulging in cocktails under the stars. What a fabulous evening!
We have good weather forecast for the rest of September, and I hold out hope for nice weather in October as well.
I will still enjoy the indoors part of Fireside Lounge this autumn and winter when the patio is closed, but I’ll still look wistfully out the windows and dream of Spring when they might open the patio back up again.
Thanks to the fabulous staff at Fireside Lounge for making our evening so wonderful, and to my friends for joining me on short notice!
-Carrie
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