Spending Some Time With My Bride: First Bed and Breakfast of 2012

Jamie and I finally worked in some time alone this year, thanks to Groupon. We stayed a night at the Hattie Mae Inn in Ft. Worth. As part of the deal from Groupon, we got the Romance Package (which included a bottle of wine and some chocolate covered strawberries) and one night in the Oriental Oasis Room, all for a very reasonable price. (It would have been cool if it was snowing as it is in the picture.)

When we arrived at our B&B we were greeted by the owner's cat, Fred, who walked us to the front door.  After checking in and getting a brief tour, we left the Inn to purchase advance tickets to watch The Hunger Games, which we plan on watching as a family on Caleb;s birthday (the 24th). We used two free tickets from Rave Cinemas, that I won by entering a contest sponsored by the Coffee News.

After that we tried to find an On the Border restaurant to eat at, but road construction in the area made it difficult to find. We ended up eating a place called Buttons. It was a little pricey; however, the food was very delicious. After Buttons, we went back to the Inn and enjoyed our chocolate covered strawberries and a glass of the wine.

Our delicious breakfast was scrambled eggs, bacon and some little fried pancakes. Juice and coffee of course came with the meal. While eating our breakfast we talked to Trish, the lady who made breakfast and cleans the Inn, who told us about the "ghost" stories the Inn has and showed us the bullet hole in the side of the house, where the original owner of the home was shot and killed during a robbery. We did not experience any ghostly activities during our stay.

We had a great time!

New Movies of 2012

As I have mentioned in earlier blogs, Jamie (my beautiful bride) and I are trying to keep up the number of movies we have seen for the first time ever, during 2012. It can be on DVD, TV or at the Theaters. So far I have seen 13 new movies this year. They are:

1. Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows -- Which I blogged about here.
2. A Hard Days Night 
3. Help! -- Both Beatles movies I blogged about here
4. Super 8 -- Which I blogged about here.
5. The Smurfs -- Which I blogged about here. (One of the dumbest movies I have ever seen.)
6. Red Riding Hood -- a very interesting take on the fairy tale. I enjoyed it.
7. The Help -- One of the best movies I have ever seen. Currently #23 of my Favorite 100 movies ever.
8. Cowboys and Aliens -- Good but not great! I did like the way the intertwined the classic Western with Science Fiction. Still could have been better.
9. Superman/Batman: Apocalypse -- good movie
10. Rise of the Planet of the Apes -- good movie; I like how it set up the "original" Planet of the Apes movie.
11. Batman: Year One -- very dark reboot of the Batman animated series. Detective Gordon is a real bad-ass in the movie. Loved it. Not for younger kids though.
12. Get Low -- really good movie, just didn't make my top 100.
13. Source Code -- Very interesting movie. One of those "makes you wonder" movies.

Upcoming movies I plan to see soon: The Lincoln Lawyer, and (Steven Speilberg's first movie) Duel are both on their way from Netflix. We are going to buy advance tickets to see The Hunger Games tomorrow. My family also really wants to watch Dr. Suess's The Lorax, so I have a feeling we might try to work that into the budget very soon as well.