Our Cheap and Lovely VDay

I thought I'd post about the Vday stew and I shared because we managed to have an amazing time without spending a huge amount of money- something that I think everyone probably would like to do! We're pretty much over big extravagant gifts and expensive dinners at exclusive restaurants... our valentines day was simple, fun, and easy on both our wallets.

Our big event was going to the zoo... so much fun! 7 bucks a person, and stew paid. I took a bunch of pics on my new phone since I tragically left my camera at a friend's house in phoenix last weekend... but I think they're still pretty cool ^^

The tucson zoo is really awesome- it's divided into an Africa section, an Asia section, and a South America section. We saw tigers, lions, giraffes, elephants, monkeys, bears (polar and otherwise), lots of birds (including flamingos!), the largest known gerbil which looked like a HUGE ginnea pig (pic below but it's kind of hard to see), and plenty of other things. It was great!

this is the huge gerbil!!

monkey chewing on a stick! so cute

After the zoo, we went to a cute little greek place right down the street that we've talked about trying a zillion times but had never actually been to. We got a chicken gyro and a falafel wrap which was delicious- and the total came to about 13 bucks after tip. I paid, which put us at pretty much even.

I had to go to class, but that night I came home and we decided to go out to dinner. I wanted italian so i looked up some places on yelp and found a little hole-in-the-wall brick oven pizza place that sounded really good. It was absolutely delicious! Stew and I shared an antipasto appetizer (I was seriously full after just this!) and then a small personal pizza that had prosciutto, olives, mushrooms, and mozzarella- oh yeah, and they make their own fresh mozzarella. yum!!

We ended up taking leftovers home for lunch the next day. We split the check and it was about 12$ each- which puts us both at about 25 bucks so far :)

We then went to the fry's down the street from our house and bought a marie callenders pie (3 $ each), and we decided to pick out one present for each other, with the agreement that it would be less than 5$. I picked out a jar of nutella for stewie (can you say best present ever?) and he bought me a beautiful white rose. So, that puts us each at an additional 8$- equaling about 32$ each for a whole day jam-packed with delicious food and wonderful fun! I imagine some people spent 32$ each on just dinner- maybe even more!

It was a really wonderful day, and I'm glad we didn't try to over do it or buy really ridiculous things for each other. I had a great time and i can't wait for our next cheap and simple vday!

Hope yours was a blast as well :)

Love,
Em

Movie Monday: Valentine Edition

umm... please forgive me for not posting this on monday. i know it's totally not fair for me to post my movie post on a wednesday and try to pass it off as a movie monday... but hey, that's what I'm gonna do. :)

Seriously though, I was GOING to post this on monday. I really was! But sometimes it seems like between going to class, doing homework, cooking, cleaning, and watching multiple episodes at a time of Psych with stewie I just don't have any free time. It's quite frustrating. hopefully the load will start to get a little lighter as time goes on and i get used to it all!

Anyways, here is your belated valentines movie monday. I know love day has come and gone, but you can watch sweet romantic chick-flicky movies any day of the year in my opinion. Also note, this is probably the only movie monday I will post that features a straight up "chick-flick", so get 'em while you can ;)

For this very special Valentine's Edition of Movie Mondays, I'm going to post my top 7 (because 10 was too many and 5 wasn't enough) favorite romantic movies (in no particular order). You've probably heard of a few or all of them, but they're still great!

1. P.S. I Love You
Beautiful story about a husband trying to help his wife move on after he has died via letters and other such things. Very touching and amazing acting :)


2. The Time Traveler's Wife
You knew I was going to sneak this one in, didn't you? I may be a teensy bit obsessed with this movie and the novel that inspired it. I have valid reasons though: I love time-travel stories, I love love stories, and I love Rachel McAdams. To keep it brief, this is a love story about a man who involuntarily travels through time and the love of his life, who has known him all her life but is stuck in the present.


3. Moulin Rouge
There was a time in highschool- somewhere in freshman or sophomore year- when I watched this movie every single night. And man, did I weep. I really love musicals, and back then I was OBSESSED with them. Also I thought Ewan McGreggor was pretty darn cute and French Bohemia? break me off a piece of that time period! haha. Anyways, this movie is definitely comical at times, but it's also really sweet and sad and exciting, what with all the modern music compilations and can-can dancers and giant elephant bedrooms.


4. Center Stage
I first saw this movie when I was 11, and it was the cool thing to like. Yknow, when we all thought we might actually be professional ballerinas someday. Anyways, this movie has an AWESOME soundtrack, some spectacular dance scenes, and a really fun romance-triangle story. It's definitely light fare, but I like it all the same. Very cute and sweet.


5. The Holiday
I think I talked about this one during my christmas movie monday edition, but it's still a great love story any time of the year. In fact, it's got two love stories at once :) Iris and Amanda trade houses for the holidays (a cottage in Surrey, England, and a mansion in Beverly Hills) in an effort to get over their lost loves, but end up finding a lot more than the peace and solitude they were hoping for. Great script and really great stars in this film :)


6. Chocolat
A perfect vday movie :) It takes place in a teensy little French town, where a woman and her child settle down to open up a chocolate shop. The conservative religious people of the town don't initially take kindly to this free-spirited woman and her shop full of temptations, but as they begin to warm up to her the whole town seems to transform. Johnny Depp also shows up as a "river rat" (as imdb puts it) and of course a little love story begins to develop. Great romance story, but seriously the various scenes of chocolate making and delicious treats are enough to make me watch this movie!


7. Music and Lyrics
I saw this movie with my best friend in sophomore year, and we loved it! We came home and downloaded all the songs haha. It's such a cute movie. I think Hugh Grant is awesome in all his films, and this one doesn't disappoint. Same goes for Drew Barrymore. Basically Hugh Grant is a fallen pop star who is trying to reinvigorate his career by recording a duet with the current charts-topping pop star. He's got writer's block though, and can't figure out how to write something that will be a hit. His plant-waterer (bad english...) overhears his struggles and gives him some input.... and everything kind of falls into place from there as the two work together to write the perfect song :) Cute, funny, and sweet.



Happy belated valentines day guys! Hope you had a great one!!

Happy Valentine's Day Everyone!

V-day used to seem like a big deal to me back in highschool. I would make really sweet, personalized gifts for whoever I was dating at the time, we would go out to a perfect dinner, he would get me flowers and candy and all sorts of other cliche gifts- at least that's how I thought it should be. Now though, valentines seems a little silly. Why only celebrate your love one day out of the year? Stewie and I are always doing nice things for each other on a daily basis, so valentines doesn't seem like it should be that different.

Anyways, I still love any chance to celebrate a holiday so I'm decked out in a pink dress and grey and pink thigh high socks^^

I made stew breakfast this morning (egg-in-a-hole. have you had it? it's delicious. It's also called bird's nests I think), and in about 15 minutes we're going to go to the zoo. And that's our big valentines date! Cute, isn't it? Neither of us have a ton of money, especially since xmas was just 2 months ago- but the zoo is only 7$ a person, and seriously- so much fun.

Tonight we might go to dinner but we'll probably just split the cost :) simple, easy, fun, sweet valentines day. I'm excited! What are your guys' plans for today?

Anyways, I'll be back with a movie monday later today- probably a list of a few of my favorite lovey-dovey movies- but for now I just wanted to wish you a wonderful February 14th. Hope it's lovely!

Love,
Em