Tag: Casa Mama

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The Weekend Report

Jane Sadek

TRAVEL HERE: LOW PROFILE EASTER WEEKEND

Let’s Start with Spring Cleaning

So, sometime during the winter, Bill built a bunch of shelves in my attic. Yes, we have separate attics. What that means is that I get most of the larger attic. Now he built those shelves so he could navigate more easily to his stuff, but I’m not going to complain, because shelves are shelves and I love them.

However, winter is not an optimum time to reorganize your attic, so I used the shelves to make Bill a path to his stuff and went on with my life, waiting for better attic weather. While winter is not optimal for attic cleaning, summer in Texas is impossible, so when spring hit, I started on the project. I began with a corner of the attic with books and games, but lo and behold my shelves were broken. So, I unloaded everything on Monday, but Bill didn’t get around to fixing them until the last thing Sunday evening.

That left my guest bedroom looking like a storage room, but to tell the truth, it had already been leaning that way, which was the second impetus for reorganizing the attic. Frustrated in my efforts to complete that job, I started working on summer-izing my closet. A lot of my clothes can be worn year round, especially since this is Texas, but I do have seasonal stuff and I keep the off-season on a third row of hanging bar in my closet.

Switching out the season in my closet is a big job and I made it bigger this year by forcing myself to actually try on everything that was going to stay in the to-wear area. Last year I lost down to my goal weight, but before I had any time to enjoy it, I got a monster case of hives, which threw all my discipline out the window. I couldn’t exercise and the meds turned me into an eating machine. That made me angry, which caused me to eat more and for months I just hid beneath those finger tip sweaters and coats I love to wear, trying to ignore those extra pounds.

In March, I worked on a serious attitude improvement program and at the end of it, I bit the bullet and started back on Noom. I’d say I know at least ten health and fitness coaches, but I’m just not into smoothies and supplements, so I go it alone with a little app to make me accountable. I’m having a rough start with a lots of up and down, but that’s the nature of weight loss at my age, so as long as I stay on the plan and the overall direction is down, I’m trying to suffer the spikes with grace.

A lot of people go on diets so they can buy new clothes in a different size. I go on diets so I can get back into the clothes I already have. After my time in the closet last week, I have four feet of summer clothes I can’t wear and at least four feet of clothes that I wish were too big. Segregating the too small stuff saves me time when I’m getting ready, but also provides a great motivation to stay on track with my diet, because those clothes I can’t wear are my favorites.

But wait, just going through my clothes did not satisfy that urge to purge. Next, I attacked the drawers and cabinets in my bathroom. On Good Friday I woke up with the same organizing bug, decided to skip the new networking meeting I had intended to attend and headed back into my closet. The hanging clothes were all organized, but the rest of it also needed a purge. All of this resulted in more stuff for the attic. So, Saturday night I moved all that next to the stairwell and carried it upstairs on Sunday. No, you do not want to see my upstairs right now, but Bill finally fixed the shelves, so guess what I did with all my “spare time” this week!

Good Friday

When I was a little kid, my parents did the whole Easter thing, but somewhere along the way, my dad quit going to Christmas and Easter services. He said he went the rest of the year, so he was going to make room for all the visitors. For years, we stayed away from church on these big attendance days. Once I was on my own, I did not follow his lead, but this year I was going to.

If you’ve been keeping up, Bill and I are church shopping, again, a job we don’t particularly enjoy, but becomes necessary from time to time. We’ve visited several churches with varying degrees of success, but haven’t found the one. Last week, Bill just wasn’t up to it and this week I wasn’t. So, when my bestie called and invited us to join her for Good Friday services, that was a good way to work in some worship without visiting a strange church – her church is my old church. It was a great service and I enjoyed seeing my friends.

Afterwards, we went to Casa Mama, again. It’s her favorite. I’m on a diet, so I didn’t care.

Good Saturday

My plans for Saturday underwent many changes. Initially, I was going to meet my Dot friends, of the local Polka Dot Powerhouse chapter, for a walk. However, the organizer got sick and I was the only “for sure” attendee, so I redirected my exercise endeavors to my gym. Then I came home and organized my earrings for a while, which was the last job in organizing my closet.

I had been going to go meet my bestie on the other side of town after my walk, which would have been at the end of her dance lesson, but without the walk, it made more sense for us to meet on our own side of town. So she came and picked me up. For lunch, we went to one of my favorites, Fable & Fire. Yes, I know the service is slow and they’re a tad bit expensive, but I love the vibe. It was my first Saturday visit, so I was pleased to discover they have live music on Saturday afternoon. It made for a pleasant lunch. I had the salad with the fruit and nuts – yummy!!

After lunch I got back to my earrings and finished up the closet job. Hubby was taking a nap on the sofa, so I sat down to read a little, which turned into a lot.

Good Sunday

Since I always wake up early, so matter whether I need to or not, I used the time to get ahead on my weekday tasks by doing some social media stuff. Bill and I shared a quiet coffee time together, then we went out in the yard for some of that unpleasant, but necessary stuff that needed to be done.

Afterwards, I got cleaned up, because we were supposed to be going out to run some errands, but when I walked out cute and ready to roll, someone was relaxing on the couch. So, I started reading again. He changed couches and I moved to the couch he vacated to continue reading. I was getting chilly and thought about changing clothes, but it seemed as if we were going to have an at home day, so I decided to just change into lounging clothes. The minute I sat back down on the couch, he was ready to roll, so I changed again, but this time into something a little warmer.

We needed to buy a birthday gift for a nephew and the last time I’d been to the Dallas Museum of Art, the gift shop had a good assortment of cute kid stuff. So, we went there, only to discover all the cute kid stuff had sold out. Nada! So, we just enjoyed the museum for awhile. We spent most of our time in the European Art, something we hadn’t done in a while and I must say I liked what was on display. Some old favorites were in different spots and there were other items I either hadn’t seen in a while or didn’t remember ever seeing.

From the museum we went to Fadi’s. He likes the schwerma and I love the veggies. It was delicious as always. Next stop the grocery store, then home again, home again jiggedy jig.

For a girl on a diet I sure did eat well this weekend, but it was a lot of salad and veggies, so nothing to feel guilty about. Come back next week for some more of New York and the usual Memory Keeping 101. Then we’ll see how I did on my diet this week and if I got my attic back together!

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The Weekend Report

Jane Sadek

TRAVEL HERE: GADABOUTING

Eat, Shower and a Show

After a hard week in the networking trenches, I decided to give myself a morning off. The first thing I did, bright and early, was to hit the scrapbooking table. Recently, most of my memory keeping business has been digital. I have some traditional albums on the books in March, but for now, I have the opportunity to work on my own albums – but I really can’t call it work.

The current album is my 2022 Travel Album and I’m putting together the pages for my NYC trip, which you’re reading about on my Wednesday Travel There posts. Have you ever been having so much fun that you forget to take pictures? Raising my hand as the guilty party. What was one of the best trips of my life will have less pages than some day trips I’ve been on. I got in a couple of hours, but then the phone intruded and I had a shower gift to wrap. After having coffee hour with Mr. Bill, I got ready for the day.

First up, lunch with bestie at Casa Mama. Deb loves their brisket and spinach quesadillas. I’m still looking for my dish. Because I just pointed at an item with Tex-Mex in the title I ended up with sour cream on my entree. Not what I wanted, but not their fault. It wasn’t like the frittata I had ordered once, drizzled with sour cream which wasn’t mention on the menu. So I ate the sour cream enchilada, begrudgingly and promised myself I wouldn’t order it next time, because as much as Deb loves those quesadillas there will be a next time.

Next stop, a baby shower for a soon-to-be mama from church. She’s a delight and it was a joy to see how happy she was with every gift which was offered. My hand-made card got more mileage than anything else I had for her, so I was grateful for my scrapbooking skills. After the shower, I had a little more time for my NYC album before we headed off to the theater.

As a Christmas Eve treat, Bill and I went to SIX at the Winspear. It was a great show and we didn’t fall off the balcony, but the ticket price and parking cost did take a bite out of our budget. Still we’d decided we wanted to see more live theater in 2023, so we bought tickets to a show at the Mesquite Arts Theatre (MAT) – Neil Simon’s Plaza Suite.

Now, MAT, is community theatre, so the actors and actresses are all amateurs, as are many of the tech folks. Hence our tickets were $18 a piece. Quite a reduction from the triple digit nosebleed seats at the Winspear. Of course, Plaza Suite is a much scaled down type of performance – no music and no fancy costumes, even when the pros are doing it.

The play was presented in the Mesquite Arts Center Black Box Theater. Other black box theaters have offered theater in the round, but this is just a ground level stage with tiers of seating and we sat on the front row. No complaints. We certainly got our $18 money’s worth. Some of the comic timing was a little off and the costumes look as if they came from the thrift store, but we were entertained.

The second act had a little faux pas that made it a little funnier. The characters were supposed to be getting sloppy drunk, but as the water/drinks sloshed all over the actors and the stage, it was apparent they’d gotten a little sloppier than they intended.

There was also a little costuming mishap in the third act. I’d noticed the strappy pumps on the actress didn’t fit very well and being a shoe freak, I was distracted by how she was handling her blocking with misfit shoes. Then it got worse, one of the straps broke. The blocking required her to fling herself from one end of the stage to the other with great drama and I anticipated her shoe tripping her up somewhere along the way. She stayed upright and the shoe stayed on. She has my undying admiration. I’d have had to find someway to kick those offending sandals off my feet or I’d have been glued to one spot.

All in all, it had been a great Saturday. I spent time with people I love and enjoyed some of my favorite activities. That’s what a weekend is about – even if you do have to field a few business calls and texts.

A Sunday Adventure

The first thing on Sunday is usually the same old thing – church. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, my pastor is leaving, so I am thinking about changing churches. Nothing against my old church, sometimes God just has some place else He wants you to be. I’d been feeling some restlessness before I found out the pastor was leaving, so it made sense to follow my instincts, especially since this church had never felt like home to my hubby.

So, this Sunday, unlike it has been for several years, Mr. Bill and I headed out to church. Bill and I come from very different religious backgrounds. He grew up in an orthodox liturgical church with all the incense and ritual. I grew up in no frills evangelical churches. It beats me how people from really diverse religious associations ever make it through marriage – say a Catholic and a Jew or a Muslim and a Baptist. We just have a difference in worship, not beliefs, and after 28 years we still haven’t gotten it all figured out.

We visited Christ Church, an Anglican Church almost around the corner from us. We’d belonged to another Anglican Church at one time, but Bill had gotten tired of the rector’s preaching style – a little too much on the personal sharing side for him. When he quit going, I did, too, because it was way off on the liturgical end of things for me to sit through by myself. It was one thing when he was with me, but by myself it was all stand-up-sit-down-fight-fight-fight. However, we thought there had been enough commonality there, that a different teaching style might make it work.

Long story short, we like Christ Church Rockwall (which happens to be in McLendon Chisholm). The sermon was really good. The music would do. It wasn’t all the chants I’d hated in the Episcopal Church, but it wasn’t traditional hymns either, which is what I like best. While it was contemporary worship music, it wasn’t the flavor that drives me mad – rock and roll music with hours of repetitious choruses focused on how wretched I am, instead of how wonderful God is. I’m also not big on hand-waving and thumping drum beats.

So, it stays on the list of potential churches. We’d have like to see more diversity in the congregation, but that’s not a deal killer. We are working on what our next target will be. He’s thinking Methodist, which I usually call ‘church light,’ but I’m keeping my mind open.

After church we went on one of out rambling adventures. First we tried Downtown Rockwall forcoffee, but Fire & Fable was closed and Book Club Cafe was too crowded. After coffee at yet another Starbuck’s (Don’t you get tired of Starbuck’s?), we headed towards the Dallas Museum of Art, but never made it. We hit a couple of Deep Ellum spots, thinking to get lunch, but the volume killed our appetite. (Does this mean we are old?)

Then we happened on Uptown, looking for sustenance. We stopped in West Village and took a stroll. We decided we were definitely old, because the trendy gluten-free, veggie heavy venues didn’t sound at all like what we wanted and Thai is just not a fave with us. Thank goodness for the Village Burger Bar. Home again, home a gain jiggedy jig, to follow up on calls we’d gotten during the day and I did a little more scrapbooking.

That’s it for the week. Next week, there will be more NYC, more Memory Keeping and another Weekend Report. Please come and keep me company on my adventures.

DESTINATIONS, DFW Metroplex, Restaurants & Bars, Road Trips, Shopping, TRAVEL

The Weekend Report

Jane Sadek
Photo Snipped from The Republic website. Link below.

TRAVEL HERE – THE FIRST WEEKEND IN OCTOBER 2022

Happy Hour at My Place

We don’t entertain much. We’re busy people and when we’re not busy, we relax. It’s a shame in some ways. Our home just begs for a big party and I’ve inherited pretty much every serving dish and implement known to man, including 36 place settings of Gorham Chantilly sterling flatware. Salad scissors anyone?

However, the completion of the sunroom was a milestone, so we decided to have at least a few neighbors in. Since the sunroom is a small space, we decided to do it in phases, inviting a pair of couples in at a time – this end of the cul de sac one night and the other end the next night.

Invitations sent and accepted, I woke up Friday morning, did the necessary tasks for our business and then Bill and I went errand running. Bill went because he’s always afraid I will overbuy when we entertain, and sometimes I do. I had a list ready of what we needed and a set of priorities, as well as reasons for my priorities. I had to take that list, tear it up and throw it away. Bill rearranged everything in the exact opposite order I had planned and threw in a trip to Costco for our Covid boosters, which hadn’t been on my list at all. Only wives will understand.

Aldi and Costco

Aldi is not my go-to grocery store. Heck, out here in Heath, I don’t have a go-to grocery store. I remember fondly the days in Dallas when I could get to one of virtually everything within five minutes – Central Market, Whole Foods, whatever, but Market Street was MY grocery store.

When I go on a normal grocery run, I want to go to someplace that will have everything on my list. My mom spent her life chasing bargains and would visit several grocery stores in a week. That is not my life and that’s the reason I am not a regular at Aldi, because they will not be able to fill my whole list. However, I’ve learned, when I entertain, Aldi has more of what I want, in the quantities I need, for amazing prices.

So, we went to Aldi and found what we needed. Three different exotic deli meats, sliced thin, all in one package. Two cheeses. One of those boxes of fancy crackers with several varieties in it. Some hummus and Bill picked up some flatbread thing he wanted. He’s a bigger shopper at Aldi than I am. He loves their chocolates and their kettle chips, so we got those, too, not for the party, but we were there, right?

Along with our Covid shots, we picked up wines at Costco. My next door neighbor loves Aldi’s Winking Owl wines, but for wine, Costco is the go-to for us (when we don’t have time to get all the way to Trader Joe’s). I picked up Prosecco, which is what everyone ended up wanting and Bill chose a few other things for those who might not.

Bill drops me at home, so I could get things and myself ready for our guests. One of the things I needed to get ready was my nails, so I ran off to the salon for a new set. By the way, my go to is Signature Nails, next to Kroger, here on the south side of town. That’s when I got a text which threw my party plans in the air. I’m trying to resolve them via text with the hubby, who is determined to wait until I get home.

When I got home, we did resolve the issues, probably to no one’s satisfaction, but the show for Friday night went on and who knows when we’ll get around to the rest of the street. In spite of the storm in my teacup, Friday night went well. It was one of the first times we’d connected socially with our neighbors since the pandemic. It felt like we’d redeemed one more chip of our lives.

Working Weekend

So, Saturday was given over to work and making a trip to the discount fabric stores on Harry Hines. We’d borrowed a tasseled tieback from an upstairs room for out Friday night soiree, but needed to get one. If you’re decorating, I hope you know about the discount fabric stores. On Midway there’s Childress Fabrics and Cutting Corners. Over the years we’ve been successful at both, but for the sunroom, the drapery material came from Cutting Corners. However, we never buy any fabrics until we’ve been to the corner of Harry Hines and Perth. The names change, but the savings all along Perth Street stay the same. Need fabrics – go there.

Listing photos taken and tasseled tieback bought, it was time for a late lunch. We went to Republic Texas Tavern on Inwood Road near Forest. I’d been for a business meeting once and saw enough to think it was worth another visit. As we sat admiring the restaurant, my husband, (who I claim will try to tell God how to improve the streets of gold) asked, “Guess what I don’t like about this restaurant.” I confess, I rolled my eyes and asked what. “Nothing.” That’s high praise folks!

He had a beer and I had their version of a margarita, which is Texas Ranch Water. He loved his Pastrami Sandwich and I enjoyed their Truck Stop Burger. Every sip and bit was delightful. We’ll be finding reasons to go back, even though it is on the other side of town. You should go, too.

Casa Mama

So, after church, Bestie and I wanted to grab some lunch. It was a late lunch, because Deb sings in the choir and it meets Sunday afternoon. My criteria were Tex-Mex and a patio. Deb sort of leaves the choices up to me, because she says I make more exciting selections.

After cataloging the usual possibilities in my mind, I remembered there was a new restaurant downtown. Anything called Casa Mama was probably Tex-Mex and I knew they had a patio, so that’s where we went.

Deb loved it. She raved over the choices on the menu and thought the brisket enchiladas with spinach were delicious. I was a little more picky. The patio is right on the main road, which even on a quiet Sunday afternoon meant it felt like we were eating in the street. My cheese enchiladas were good, but not the ridiculously gooey mess I love at El Fenix or El Chico. (Yes, I like El Fenix and El Chio – that’s real Tex-Mex with lots of Dallas tradition on top.) The interior cheese on my Casa Mama enchilada was melted but not runny, gooey. Some people might consider this an improvement, but give me the goo.

Their margarita made up for any lack of gooey cheese and yes, I will be happy to go back. I will not sit on the patio and I will not have the cheese enchiladas, but I will go back and you should visit, too.

So, this is the Weekend Report. This one’s a little longer than most of them will be, because it was a busier weekend than most are. I have challenged myself to do this every week as a counterpoint to my Travel There series on Wednesdays, but I can’t promise I will always make it, nor which day I will post it, but keep an eye out! I have also challenged myself to start posting scrapbooking tidbits, but that’s not ready to roll out.

So, the next post I can promise is on Wednesday and we’ll be in Las Vegas!