Anyone sensing a trend?

I am stuck in a food rut. Here's a brief recap of my dinners over the past few days:

Wednesday: taco salad
Thursday: quesadilla
Friday: burrito
Saturday: quesadilla
Sunday: quesadilla

Now, in my defense, I only made dinner twice - cheese quesadillas both times - and the rest of the dishes were eaten at (different) restaurants. And I do love Mexican food, so it is not that big of a deal. But I need to start mixing things up a bit.

Any good dinner ideas/recipes out there?

April showers

This weather sucks. I know that I shouldn't complain, that we need the rain and all that jazz, but seriously - this is a little ridiculous. According to our little weather station in the backyard, we have had over 5 inches of rain since yesterday morning. Roads are flooded, the little dog doesn't want to step foot outside, my hair looks like I stuck my finger in a socket, and I am thinking about building an ark in my backyard.

So to recap the weekend:
Saturday: went to Woodbury Commons with my mom to do some shopping - rained
Sunday: grocery shopping, out to lunch with hubby - still raining

But on the bright side...

today is her birthday - one of the best friends a girl can have. Happy birthday Babe!

Attention shoppers...

There are only 250 days until Christmas.

(Yes, I know that we are barely into spring.)

That is all.

Holiday traditions?

Last night, hubby and I were trying to decide what to do this morning for Easter. Now we always go to my grandmother's house for dinner (which we will be doing again today), but this is the first Easter that we have woken up in our own home, after years of traveling from NJ to NY to stay with my parents. In the past, we would have breakfast at my parents' house and just hang out all day - my brother was also living with my parents at the time, so we would spend time with him.

Now is the perfect time to start new holiday traditions with our little "family," but I am stumped for ideas. This morning, we talked about maybe going out for breakfast, but we didn't. Instead, I worked out, made breakfast and we took the dogs for a walk before I started baking cookies and hubby mowed the lawn.

So, what are your Easter traditions? Anything interesting, exciting or just plain fun that we can adopt as our own? Please share!

And to all of my friends, have a Happy Easter!

Ca-ching!

I am the first to admit that I am a shopaholic. I love to shop...way too much. In fact, after a stressful day at work, I find heading straight to the mall or to a fun little boutique - just to walk around - really calms me.

But I am a smart shopper. I never skimp on quality, but am always mindful of price. I use credit cards at stores that send you coupons for free or discounted merchandise. I will wait for an item to go on sale, even if it is something that I love. I shop at outlets. I only buy cards at Hallmark, because I get points for merchandise. About the only thing that I will pay full price for is makeup - I am addicted to Merle Norman (but I will buy mascara at the drug store - I mean, it's mascara - Cover Girl or Maybelline does the trick just as well).

But I had a small taste of the good life this weekend. Ducking into Bloomingdales to escape the cold rain, I find myself looking at sunglasses. For me, sunglasses are a necessary evil. I know that I have to wear them, but they never really look right on me. Not only that, but I tend to destroy them almost immediately after buying them. I scratch them up, I lose them, I leave them on the kitchen counter and the spaniel devours them.

So, I am just browsing when some nice associate stops over to see if I need help. After muttering "just looking," I continue trying them on. He proceeds to tell me that I am looking at the wrong styles (apparently round faces need square frames), selects a pair and tells me to put them on.

I take one look at the glasses on my face and I am in love. They are ridiculously trendy, but so flattering. I don't know whether it was the retail euphoria of being in Bloomingdales, the thrill of trying on sunglasses that probably cost many, many times what I usually spend, or the combination of sunglasses and my new trench coat (the look was very Katie Holmes, without the gigantic grin and the glazed-over expression), but before I knew it, I was buying them. And I didn't even open a credit card to save an extra 10 percent.

So now that I own them, I am almost afraid of them. Yesterday afternoon, after taking a walk with the dogs, I rested them gently on top of the refrigerator. When I got home from work, I didn't even take them out of the car - I just carefully put them into their little case, so they would be well protected. But I love them.

Maybe if I feel motivated tomorrow, I will ask the hubby to take a picture of me wearing my new shades (but don't expect a Katie Holmes grin... smiling with both rows of teeth exposed just isn't my thing).

So tired.

First, I would like to thank the moron who invented daylight savings time. Yeah, I know that it gives us more hours in the evening to enjoy the beautiful sunshine (which is a good thing) and that I love the part where we "fall back," but c'mon! I need my sleep! Here it is after 5:00 and I feel so out of it. Blah.

This weekend was a busy one. My mother-in-law came to visit this weekend... we took her to Vermont, went out for a nice dinner last night, and drove her around the area this morning.

My parents are also moving this weekend, so I spent all afternoon today cleaning and packing my stuff up and moving some stuff that I actually wanted to keep over to our house. Long day, and it's not over yet. Tonight we will be going up to my Nana's for a b'day celebration (mine and my Papa's were both last week). Pizza and cake - yum.

And speaking of my rotten eating habits - I need to lose some weight. Just a few pounds would be nice. I bought a bathing suit this weekend at the J Crew outlet (yeah, only $25!) and I scared myself when I looked in the mirror. Seriously. Does anyone have some motivation that I can borrow? Maybe the image of me in a bathing suit permanently burned into my brain will help.

Need to feed the dogs - obviously daylight savings time does nothing to the spaniel, as he is barking like we haven't fed him in days. Yawn.