Happy Birthday Tina

Tuesday was Tina's birthday. I took her out to dinner last night to celebrate but first I took her to our own private Disneyland - the fabric store. We went to Patches, which is a little fabric store that specializes in quilting fabrics and is run by a really nice woman named Jennie. Patches used to be quite close to us but Jennie moved the store to a new location that Tina had never visited. I went there to check it out and get her a gift certificate on Monday. I didn't tell Tina where I was taking her but she sort of guessed when we drove up. The only problem was NO PARKING! I hate that! There was a total of 4 (count 'em 4) parking spaces and they were all taken. In fact someone had parked across the back of three of the other cars - I guess they got frustrated with the lack of parking too. Anyway, we ended up parking across the aisle in the camera shop parking and slinking back to the fabric store. You would think we would get tired of looking at bolts and bolts of fabric but it never seems to get old! I think Tina had fun. We love Joanns because you can get decent fabric at good prices (when they have sales) but there is nothing quite like the quality of the fabric at Patches. Fun day! And we topped off the healthy salads we had at dinner with a flourless chocolate cake!

Great Friends

I am so lucky to have the most thoughtful friends. My birthday was last Saturday and I had the most fun-filled weekend ever! I went out to lunch with my husband and 2 kids. Rob was his usual low key self....his quote of the day was "Happy Birthday, Rob's home." It was his first weekend at college. Then my friend Brenda took me to the movies and to dinner (Greek food - delish). Then on Sunday, Tina picked Mary Ann and me up to take us to a surprise lunch at Border Grill in Santa Monica. It was the best! I was with two of my most favorite people in the world and then we went shopping! Only I have gained some weight since I could fit in a size 2 so it was not as successful as it might have been :( Oh well, I like food, what can I say? If I drank nothing but water (not watermelon lemonade, which is what I had at lunch) and ate nothing but lettuce, I might be able to stay skinny, but I don't think it is in the cards. Not after the dessert we had at Border Grill. It was a white meringue filled with cinnamon chocolate mousse and topped with dark chocolate curls. I took the rest home, needless to say. Which is maybe why I am no longer a size 2.....

Fancy Stores for Skinny People

Yesterday, Karen and her good friend, Mary Ann, joined me for a day at Santa Monica. We started off with brunch at this wonderful Mexican food place called Border Grill. It was yummy. Then we decided to stroll down the Third Street Promenade which is super fun because there are tons of people, street performers and great stores! These are the type of stores which are outside of my norm for shopping... Anthropology, Abercrombie and Fitch.. stores like that... really expensive, but full of neat stuff. The thing that got me was that they seem to cater to the anorexic. The normal size was 2, 4 and maybe some 6's. Heaven forbid someone of my great size even try and find something to try on! There were jeans there that looked like they would only fit thighs with a diameter of 8 inches! I don't think I could get my upper arm into some of them! Don't people in Santa Monica eat! Too bad because they have some great restaurants! I just don't want to live out the rest of my life eating carrots and drinking water! Well, we returned to the Valley where the sun was blazing hot, there's no sight of the ocean let alone any ocean breeze, but at least we can find clothes for normal people in the stores!

Girls Nite Out

Well, Tina had a really tough day yesterday (filled with a screaming child, diarrhea, and no sleep - you get the idea) so we went out to dinner last night. It was really fun. I don't think we have ever done that - just the two of us. We usually meet to work or go over preparations for something or to shop, but we don't ever just go out and sit down to eat something someone else cooked for us. It was nice. Especially when neither one of us had to do the dishes! I finished another painting so I am putting that up as you can see. I am going to attempt to print the pictures at CVS today. Wish me luck.