LOVING FEBRUARY!

What's to love about February you might ask.  Well, there's something about the romance in the air, the days getting a tad longer, knowing spring is around the corner, a nice balance of cozy snow days and slushy sunny afternoons.  Sugar cookies baking and chocolate hearts.  Flowers in vases, lace paper doilies, the rush of cold fresh air through an open window.  These are just some of the things I've been feeling as we turn the calender page, just grasping time and holding it tight like the string on a kite.  Choosing happiness above all else.

Now, let's move on before all of you think I've gone bonkers!  The weather here has been crazy as usual; freezing cold, mild and sunny, snowy, slushy, rainy...I guess we have just learned to roll with it.  Today it's 37 degrees and there is the faint hint of spring in the air if that's possible, maybe I'm imagining it.  But I do like opening the windows every morning for about ten minutes to let the cold air in and blow the nasties out.  We are finally all healthy here and I want it to stay that way. 

Today was finally a day where I could stay put in the house.  I'm fashionably dressed in brown yoga pants, a purple sweatshirt and an old green cardigan.  I hope the Queen Mum doesn't pop over.  I did make cookies as you can see, it was either that or eat all of those little Dove chocolates myself!  It's hard to see but they are heart shaped.  My edible Valentine's Day decorations (the best kind!).  So, I'm just puttering and fluffing and listening to a rerun of The Real Housewives Of New York City.  I may squeeze in a nap before dinner.  Decisions!

Seriously, I have been busy.  I cancelled my dermatologist appointment Monday morning, the snow was coming down like crazy and it's a 50 minute drive out past the suburbs.  But I did go grocery shopping later in the day and that prompted me to clean out the fridge and some cabinets.  How did I end up with 6 cans of refried beans?  Yesterday The Husband and I went car shopping and Ta Da, I found one!  I would show you a picture of it but I let him take it to work...I'm nice like that.  I still have to share a car with Abby until the weather get's nice enough for The Husband to drive his little sportster, but I don't mind.  Now I have to get my leased car cleaned up, the oil changed and back to the dealer.  And the good news is, my payments are actually lower with the new car.  Gotta love that!

Now I have some birthday celebration pictures I want to share with you.  It was actually Sunday but we went out Saturday night to my nephew's bar.  There were about 18 of us and we had such a great time.  I wonder why I don't go out more!  Doesn't it look like I have two left arms in this picture?  I ordered this flouncy sequined number for the holidays and it came in mid January so I thought since I was the birthday girl I could sparkle a little!  I didn't know that my camera batteries were dying so the picture quality is not that great. 

Abby took a lot of pictures with her cell phone.

Here we all are except for Jeff, who was out of town.  Did I say we had a good time?  I played the jute box and danced in my seat, we talked and mingled and laughed.  I managed to have 4 glasses of wine without getting wobbly and although the kids stayed out until the wee hours of the morning, The Husband and I were home by 11:30.  Did I say we had fun?!

In keeping with the absolute randomness of this post, we are on another adventure of healthy eating around here.  No, I'm not on a new diet or following a new fad, It was The Husband who decided he wanted to start eating more fruits and vegetables, cut down on take out food and wants to see me try some new recipes instead of the same old meat, potatoes and vegetables every night.  I had been feeling a little of the guilt in having so many cookbooks in my kitchen that I rarely use and thought about clearing them out to gain the wall space back.  Anyway, The Husband perused the shelves and chose this cookbook and earmarked a few recipes.  Don't you love the title?  I mean, he could have picked, "Difficult, Time Consuming Recipes With Ingredients You Never Have On Hand".

It consists of 15-30 minute main dish recipes (excluding cooking time), and they all look really good.  Tonight I'm making Italian Meatloaf with Pesto and Sundried Tomatoes.  I'll let you know how it turns out.

I picked up this little menu planner book for five dollars.  I grocery shop every two weeks so I wrote down every dinner I would be making for 14 days and then on the right side you have a grocery list where you can add the ingredients you need for the meal.  I'm hoping this will keep me from standing in front of the freezer at 4:00 p.m., scratching my head and eying the take out menus.  It's also nice to balance out simple meals like soup and sandwiches with more substantial dinners.  And I can keep track of how often we eat not-so-good-for-you red meat and fried foods and alternate them a bit.

The Husband also wants fruit with every meal so I loaded up on melons, bananas, berries, apples, oranges, etc. and cut them up and put them in plastic containers.  Deborah from With All My Heart posted a quick fruit dip...2 T. sour cream, 1 t. brown sugar and 1/2 t. vanilla.  Just mix it into your fruit and enjoy!

Well, that's about all I have for today.  I'm going to make dinner and afterward, shower, douse myself in body cream and crawl in bed with a new book.  I finally finished a mystery series (very light reading) and I'm starting the book on my sidebar that is getting good reviews.  I'll be back soon with some fabric samples I have for the two chairs I'm getting recovered, some news about the new home Emily and her fiance found and a new bedroom project.  Hope you are all having a wonderful week! :)