Category: Date Night

A Hidden Gem

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Date NightLeave a comment

I know I’ve mentioned it on here before, but for a while we have been trying to go to the Morris Theatre in Daningerfield, TX. I checked the weather and on Thursday, it was supposed to be right above freezing. Hannah happened to be off and it’s Donny’s normal day off so we decided to make it a family night of going out to dinner at Arnold’s in Lone Star and then driving a few miles down the road to Daingerfield.

Hannah ended up not feeling well and Jackson was into doing something with his friends online so we decided to make it a date night. After grabbing the kids some Sonic, because I hadn’t planned on dinner since we were going out, Donny and I got a late start. Arnold’s was too crowded for us to be able to make the only showing that night, which was at 7:30. We drove to the theatre and everything was dark. Granted we were there 40 minutes before the show started. Donny peaked in and said, “Hey, they have hotdogs”, so we just decided to press out luck and have a movie concession dinner.

As we were getting out of the car the marquee lights came on.

When we got up to the ticket window we were told that our movie was playing in the upstairs theatre and the heating had gone out for that space. She told us it’s about 55 degrees, but if we didn’t want a ticket she’d understand. Oh, hell no, we were going to see a movie in this theatre. Luckily I had brought a pretty big wrap so we gave the go ahead.

At the concession we bought a large popcorn (freshly popped and it was divine), 2 hotdogs, 2 good sized drinks and a box of candy. Are you ready for it? The total was $20. So for a movie and concession it cost us $23.

When we walked up the stairs and entered the theatre, there was no one there. It was a little spooky.

We were about 30 minutes early so we just sat there munching away on our food. I know I already said it, but if you know how much I love popcorn, this stuff was AMAZING.

About 10 minutes before the movie started people started showing up and all in all there were about 15 more people. How were the previews you might ask. They don’t show previews. Instead there are little commercial ads for businesses in the town and little nearby towns.

Although we could tell when the temperature started dropping outside because it kept getting colder and colder while we watched Wolf Man. We still had such a good time and will definitely be back.

P.S.

If you are wondering how the movie was we both enjoyed it. I absolutely adore Julia Garner and will see anything that she’s in. Ozark is probably one of my very favorite series and her character was by far my favorite.

If you like the older movie, The Fly with Jeff Goldblum, it is shot very similar to that movie. If you are expecting the Wolfman to look like what you remember from older movies you will be disappointed. The special effects are very well done though. Donny and I both said that the theatre being so cold actually added to the ambiance of the film.

Birthday Concert

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Date Night, Road tripLeave a comment

Several months ago Jackson decided that for his 17th birthday he wanted to go to the Hatsune Miku concert in Dallas. We kept the kids out of school on Thursday and headed to Dallas. Luckily our oldest daughter loves to go to concerts and happens to live in Dallas so she was escorting Jackson and Hannah to the concert in Deep Ellum.

Of course, we had the obligatory stop.

Since it was Jackson’s birthday (well, the next day was his actual birthday) he got to choose where he wanted to have dinner before the concert. He wanted to try Jollibee. We had never heard of it, but it was on the way, so that made it easy. He actually asked me to take his picture with the bee.

Here’s the whole gang.

Jake and Phoebe headed back to their house and Donny and I dropped Nikki and the kids off at The Factory in Deep Ellum. The doors opened at 7 with the concert starting at 8. We got there at 6 and the line was wrapped around the building. Deep Ellum has gotten a lot sketchier since I used to go to concerts there back in the day. I’m so glad we decided to have Nikki go with them. The concert is not your typical concert. It’s an anime hologram with an actual live band, but the hologram does the singing. Jackson was right when he said, “Mom, you will not like going to this concert”.

Donny and I decided to hang out in the West End. It’s not far The Factory, but a safer more walker friendly area. We decided to get a drink and some chips and salsa at RJ’s mexican restaurant. This was the HOTTEST salsa. Donny loves super spicy food and even this was almost too hot for him.

The weather was nice, even though it was a bit muggy. There was the world championship high school robotics competition going on so we got to people watch. It was funny seeing people from other countries coming out of the western shop next door with cowboy hat boxes.

We had a few hours to kill so we decided to go shop around the western shop

I really wanted this Tshirt, but they didn’t have it in my size

We found this park that was just in the middle of all the buildings. There were swings that seemed just right to sit a spell.

As it got dark we heard live music and ended up at Jack Ruby’s. The guy playing was really good and I was able to drink about 4 glasses of ice water to try to cool off my digestive track from that salsa we had earlier.

There were only a handful of people there, but we had a lot of fun singing along to the music and chatting with the bartender and other customers.

Finally it was time to go pick up the crew. It’s so strange being in a big city with super tall buildings. I think our tallest one is 7 stories.

Anyway, Jackson had a great birthday. They all had fun at the concert even though there were only 100 light sticks (bad planning on the company that puts these shows on) so they didn’t get one. But they did get a concert Tshirt and they were really happy with that.

Prom 2024

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Date NightLeave a comment

Hannah’s last high school prom was tonight. It’s hard to believe that she is a senior and will be graduating next month. The theme of the prom was exotic enchantment. She voted for Old Hollywood Glamour and was a bit disappointed when it wasn’t chosen. The tickets were very interesting and for some reason I kept referring to it as erotic enchantment. I mean, c’mon, just look at those tickets.

The students were released at 11:50 so everyone would have time to get ready. Hannah wanted big hair. This took a lot of hot rollers.

Because it was so muggy outside, I pulled out the big gun.

We were headed to the school to take pictures because their campus is beautiful. It has a pond and gorgeous landscaping. Unfortunately it started sprinkling, so we headed downtown to see if we could find a dry place to take some pictures.

First stop was outside of the Children’s Theatre.

Outside of the coffee shop downtown. Gavin is 6’6″ so it worked out well with her standing on the step.

The best pictures were taken outside of Cheddar’s where we had dinner.

Yes, we sat in the booth across from them. No, they didn’t mind one bit. Shout out to Cheddar’s because the food was so good and the server was amazing. It seemed to be a popular prom dining spot because they ran into other couples from the school.

I sure hope they are having fun. I guess we’ll find out in a few hours.

Oktoberfest + Randomness

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Date NightLeave a comment

Today was Donny’s early Saturday where he gets off work at 5:00, so we decided to catch the tail end of Oktoberfest in Kilgore. The historic downtown is only 10 miles away and it’s such a fun little area when they have festivals going on.

There was a band playing some good German music.

There was a pretty big crowd sitting under the tents listening to the music, eating and drinking.

Unfortunately almost all of the food was already sold out. We managed to get a chicken schnitzel sandwich and some elote corn, not exactly German, but both were very good.

We found the beer tent and grabbed a cup.

Our son, who hates having his picture taken, made it into half the picture. It was so windy and this was right after my plate blew away.

We found the Texan theatre where there is going to be a film festival next month that we’re excited about going to.

There were a lot of craft booths. My favorite was the soy candle tent where I picked up an apple harvest scented candle. It smells so good. Donny got a car air freshener, which I thought was a little strange for him. He immediately put it in his car when we got home and I swear that something has died in his car. He says it’s from a spilled water bottle, but there is no way. I’m going to be investigating that tomorrow because we have to figure out what’s causing it. It’s bad. I also picked up Hannah a bath bomb since she had to work and couldn’t go with us. It was a lot of fun and hopefully we’ll be going back next year.

Now for a few random things. Have you tried the Fusia frozen sushi from Aldi? It’s surprisingly good. I’ve found everything this brand makes is quite tasty.

Also Donny is the chicken whisperer. The chicks just love him and yes, they are still in our living room, but they are getting their feathers finally.

Our cat, Monkey, gets very jealous when we pay attention to the chicks and must curl up on my lap.

And last, but not least, my friend sent me this picture of the eclipse that his granddaughter took with her iPhone. How cool is that?

Fall Artwalk

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Date NightLeave a comment

Today started off with misting rain. I texted work to see if it was a go or a no. My boss texted me back with, let’s give it a shot.

Of course, the one today was my nemesis. One of the very first ones I ever did when I started a year ago. It’s a 3 wall obstacle course, that when I started I couldn’t even unroll and unfold by myself. I’m proud to say that now I can unroll, blow it up and I’m not even winded climbing those walls a dozen times. Progress. It started raining harder though so it just got a thorough vacuuming. I did not find the frog they thought they rolled up in it. I really wish he’d tell me these things before I finish.

Tonight our downtown cultural district had their Fall Artwalk so Donny and I made a date out of it.

We found out that we had a visitors center. I don’t know how we’ve never seen it before. It has the coolest stuff.

We saw someone REALLY into the Halloween spirit.

We’ll definitely be back. I saw a few Christmas ornaments and other goodies I want to get.

One of our other favorite places to go during Artwalk is the Longview Museum of Fine Arts. They had live music and some new exhibits.

I love Mexican art.

We stopped to listen to a school choir.

There were so many craft and art booths. It’s amazing how far this event has come. The weather was perfect and everyone was in such a festive mood.

Our very favorite table was Jack’s bakery and Annie’s jellies. Two of the cutest kids who make everything from scratch. We bought orange jelly, that we were told tasted like sunshine in a jar, and cranberry orange bread. I can’t wait to try them both.

If you happen to find yourself in Longview on December 5th you should head downtown for our Winter Artwalk. You won’t be disappointed.

Sad/Happy Date Night

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Date Night1 Comment

Donny and I decided that we were going to have a date night. It’s been a few months and restaurants are opening again and with it being a Tuesday night we figured it wouldn’t be too crowded.

There are two restaurants I’ve been wanting to try. I work part time for Waitr. It’s like grub hub and door dash. Anyway, it lets me see a lot of restaurants and the food they offer. It was between Roma’s, a relatively new Italian place downtown, and Kumori, a Japanese sushi bar restaurant.

Donny was fine with either, so I chose Roma’s because, although I’m not a huge Italian food fan, I loved the cozy feeling of the inside, and it was popular with Waitr. I thought it would also be fun to take a walk around our downtown area afterwards.

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We were seated in a booth across from the bar. Our server came to the table, asked us if we’d been here before and told us he’d be there to answer all our questions. He took our drink order, gin and tonic for me and vodka cranberry for Donny. We ordered stuffed jalapenos for an appetizer and he brought us the courtesy bread and olive oil dipping sauce. And then we waited and waited and waited and waited. Appetizer was brought out by a different server. Still no water or drinks. We could see our server making drinks for the only other couple at the restaurant that were sitting at the bar.

We finally asked a random server walking by if we could at least get our water. By this time 45 minutes have gone by. I was not a happy camper. Our original guy FINALLY brings our drinks. I am by no means a bartender, but I at least know that a gin and tonic has a squeeze of lime in it. I mean c’mon, how hard could the drinks we ordered be to make? We already knew what we were going to order as an entree, but by the time our server got back to our table, we were done. We asked for the check and he asked us if we would be coming back? Yeah, that’s a big ole nope.

I was not really hungry and was feeling sad because I had been so excited to try this Roma’s. Donny was still hungry so he suggested we go on to Kumori.

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Until I got a Waitr order here a few weeks ago, I never knew Kumori existed. It’s on a little side street with no big sign. And to be honest, the outside sends a little iffy.

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The hostess was friendly and our server was happy and smiling. We ordered sweet tea and it was the BEST sweet tea I’ve ever had. The young woman who was our server turned out to be the tea maker. She said she makes it with sugar and love. I believe her!

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We put our order in and she asked us if we wanted the complementary soup and salad. Our salad dressing choices were sweet and creamy or gritty (???) and tangy. We chose the former, but next time I’m going to HAVE to see what that grit is about.

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Although the soup and salad were really good, I SO should have passed on them. Our usual sushi place is Fuji. Their rolls are small (and pricey). We ordered 4 rolls. Two Texas rolls, a scorpion roll and a Kilgore roll.

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Yeah, definitely not Fuji size. This is only three of them. The other Texas roll was still being made. It was delicious! So delicious that I ate so much I felt sick. We ended up taking almost two whole rolls home with us. Luckily the kids love sushi. I even scored a to go cup of the love tea.

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After being so sad and disappointed after the first restaurant, we left happy and stuffed at Kumori. Please excuse Donny’s reading glasses. I think he was midway taking them off when I snapped this.

We finished watching season 2 of Dead to Me. I am slightly obsessed with Linda Cardellini’s character’s hairstyle I think a visit to Charley, my hairdresser, is in my near future.

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How cute is she? We’ll see if I chicken out or not.