Spring Break

It's Spring Break week!

I was happy to have tea with Christina - with her working nearly full time, we don't see each other often enough. It was great catching up at a new tea room on Main Street in Newhall.

In the evening, I had dinner with Christina, Tiffany, Liz and Melissa.

Meanwhile, Stace has caught the cold that went around our family, and was sick enough to need to stay home! Very unusual.

Thankfully he recovered enough to be able to attend the Stereophonics show he and Jim had tickets for, also at the Wiltern.

We spent part of a day on a tour of New York Film Academy, an acting conservatory and college she's considering for the future.

It was a great afternoon, followed by some shopping in a part of Burbank with a lot of vintage stores - and Porto's! - an L.A. favorite Cuban bakery. I picked up goods for dinner and a nice coffee.

 NYFA had an amazing library with film scripts and movies - you can take out a script, and there were hundreds, and watch the film after reading through the script. Great way to see how things come together, and what changes are made.

Violet got a pair of pants she'll wear to Ren Faire at a thrift store in Burbank. The girls are spending this week getting their outfits ready - while watching shows, they're creating their own chain mail jewelry.

On Thursday, Colleen and I got together with the girls and went thrifting. We ended up going to a few stores, and also to San Fernando Coffee Co. 

Stace and I got out to see Cats, the Musical, at the Canyon Theatre Guild. Our friend Jill was one of the lead cats. 

We also went to the Cowboy Festival for a couple of hours, getting our favorite peach cobbler and watching a bit of music.

I also went through some of the stuff that had been under Violet's bed, and discovered my collection of cloth diapers. The ones that were in good shape, I was able to send to a mama who covered the shipping cost. Hopefully they can get some more use.

Stace got the cat treats out, and, surprise, found himself popular.

JT and Jim and the kids stopped by on their way home from Yosemite on their spring break. Callie had fun with Winston.

Saving and Splurging

Since Stace wrote about his favorite hobby, I thought I'd write about mine... stretching his paychecks!

Ralphs was having some great sales already this week, and then they offered to double coupons up to$2, so that $1 off coupons became $2 off.

Those combined helped me get $156.27 worth of groceries, shown pictured here, for $33.07.

And then I thought I'd show a couple of splurges.

First is this diaper cover, my favorite at the moment. It is so well-made and the fabric is just too cute, and it will last until she's potty-trained.

And, Violet's new outfit...

We received a gift card to Baby Gap for her, and for some reason I felt compelled to spend it all at once.

The dark blue jeans are great, and I think they were a good buy that she'll get to wear a lot.

The shirt... Well, it is really cute (if a little too big)!

I'll just say it cost more than what I normally spend on my own shirts.