Cheap Food Items To Buy When They’re On Sale – Making big batches of beans in the slow cooker and then freezing them in freezer bags was a game changer for us. They taste much better than the canned kind. Nicer texture. And practically free.

The royal gossip is MASSIVE right now, but I’m trying not to read it all. I’m trying to detox this week from beef and wine, so this might be a good week to also go on a royal gossip fast. Maybe not immediately though!

We took Ian to one of those new mega-malls last night, where its more about entertainment and food than shopping. It was god awful. We live 30 minutes from Manhattan, which has the best entertainment and food in the world. I just don’t get this. Except Ian had a great time, and it was definitely a good destination for young families on a cold and rainy weekend.

This year, we decided to plan a year’s worth of vacations and trips in January, because we wanted to prioritize those experiences and make a yearly budget. So far, we’re doing a ski trip in Vermont in February, taking Ian to Orlando for his 21st birthday in April, and traveling to Italy in June. Jonah will join us for the ski trip in Vermont, but it will be just Ian and Steve and I for the other trips. I might join Steve for a work trip to Chicago in May. That’s it so far. The rest of the year will be probably be small stuff – camping and day trips.