Critic's Choice Friday!

My weekly "Critic's Choice" post will always feature a review of some sort.  Could be a movie, book, product, TV show, whatever!  And I'll be looking to you, dear reader's, to share YOUR reviews as well!

I've felt considerably better the past few days... my nose is draining like none other (that's a good thing, right?!) and I still have daily stomach upsets that I will not discuss here... but other than that it seems I'm on the mend!  JUST in time for a one and half hour drive to a six hour Saturday class non "Budget & Accounting for Non-Profit Organization's" class tomorrow... oh joy!

Other than my sickness, one of the most exciting points of the week (this indicates the general excitement level of our life, lately!) is that Travis and I joined Netflix!  Yes, yes, I know Netflix has been around for YEARS and the novelty has quite worn out for most of you... but it's all brand new for us!

You see, in general I wouldn't call us movie people.  We don't go to the movies often, and we don't even rent them too often.  Except that last month, we rented about six movies (because it was the holidays, perhaps?) and then last week we rented two in one week.  We were just appalled with the fact that for two new releases at Blockbuster it was more than $10 after tax.  Yikes!

So we checked out Netflix.  We're on the basic plan with one movie in and one movie out at a time... and our first month is free.  Maybe I'm a dork... but I've had  a lot of fun searching through the databases and strategically planning the order of our "queue"... and we were BOTH excited when our first movie came in the mail!  Yup... it's never-ending excitement here at the Roehm's!

Plus (and I never knew this before) with a Netflix subscription you can watch all kinds of things (tv and movies) instantly on your computer.  Love it!

I bet you're just dying to hear about our first Netflix movie, aren't you?!  Drumroll please...

Julie & Julia

Ha!  Were you expecting something a little more cutting edge?  Thrilling, perhaps?  I think Travis took pity on me because I was sick and let me choose the movie.  He's nice like that.

Seriously though... I've wanted to see the movie ever since it came out at the theatre, so I was really glad to have the opportunity to finally watch it.  I love Amy Adams, and Meryl Streep is a legend of course.  And the movie appealed to me a)  because although I wouldn't consider myself a cook by any stretch of the imagination, I have been rather "into" baking over the past year or so... and could see that maybe developing into an interest in cooking someday and b) because the storyline revolves around a blog.

In case you've been under a rock and don't know the storyline... Julie Powell (Amy Adams) started a blog in 2002 where she challenged herself to cook every single recipe in Julia Child's (Meryl Streep) "The Art of French Cooking" in 265 days.  The blog was released in book from in 2005 and then was re-written into a movie by Nora Ephron which tells the story of BOTH Julie and Julia simultaneously.  Neat-o!  The original blog is still online here:  http://blogs.salon.com/0001399/2002/08/25.html

Anyhoo... it was a good movie.  Full of laughs and life... and I could definitely relate to Julie (during the kitchen meltdowns, perhaps, Travis?!)  I certainly recommend this to all of you... cooks or not!

What movies have you seen lately?  And are you a Netflix friend?  Let me know the secrets of the Netflix and movie rental world!

Have a great weekend!

Critic's Choice Friday!

My weekly "Critic's Choice" post will always feature a review of some sort.  Could be a movie, book, product, TV show, whatever!  And I'll be looking to you, dear reader's, to share YOUR reviews as well!

I'm a planner girl.  No matter how far technology has come and how much I utilize a million forms of online communication, I'm still bound to pen and paper when it comes to mapping out my schedule and to-do's.

This year I dropped the ball a little bit and didn't pick up a planner until (gasp!) mid-January.  When I finally did set about picking one up, I did it rather haphazardly.  I stumbled into Barnes & Noble and picked up this teeny little thing (I generally go for over-sized, way too much info, will not fit in my purse type of daybooks!) for 50% costing me a whopping $4 and some cents.

And you know what?  It's seriously the best planner I've ever owned.

And not just because it's little, and cute, and pink (watermelon, actually!) but because it's so much more.  You see, it's made by a company called ecosystem...

And it gets better.

There is a handy-dandy pocket inside the back cover (along with daily calendar space and a notes page for every week!) and on that pocket is an ID number.  Now, if someone were to find my planner, they could go to the company website, plug in the number, and get in touch with me.  And if I login to the site, I can find out EXACTLY what my planner is made of, where it was made, how many people are employed at that location, and more.  It's incredible, really!

So if you're a planner person or even if you're not (they also have lines of journals and other books) head over to ecosystem and learn what they are all about.

And in the meantime - tell me about YOUR planner, or lack of one.  How do you keep yourself organized?  Leave me a comment below!

Happy Weekend!

Critic's Choice Friday!

Welcome to the first edition of Critic's Choice Friday! 

My weekly "Critic's Choice" post will always feature a review of some sort.  Could be a movie, book, product, TV show, whatever!  And I'll be looking to you, dear reader's, to share YOUR reviews as well!


This week, I've got two delicious food items to recommend to you!

No matter how yummy and satisfying my dinnertime meal is, I'm almost ALWAYS left craving something sweet to finish it off.  In my half ass effort to slim down a little before our trip to VEGAS in May, I decided to search out some low-fat ice cream while grocery shopping last week.

Edy's ice cream was 2/$4 at Meijer (apparently Edy's and Dreyer's are the same company -- I was confused by the differing names on my container and the image below I pulled off of the internet.  Good ol' Wikipedia can tell you more HERE) and I picked up some of this...

Yup - black cherry vanilla swirl!  I was a little hesitant, because usually anything that's frozen yogurt-ish tastes less ice cream-y and more sorbet-y, but this was rich and delicious!  And the best part?  100 calories per serving!  Now I just need to stick to one serving!  : )

And here's my second food recommendation... Folger's Gourmet Selection Creme Brulee coffee.

 

My addiction to taste for coffee has only come into play in the last couple of years.  Before then I wouldn't touch the stuff, and couldn't stand the taste!  Even now I'm one of those girls who likes the froofy drinks at Starbucks that are actually very little coffee and lots of other really high calorie sugary stuff. 

That being said, when we buy coffee for home I insist on something with a bit of flavor.  A lot of times we'll buy bagged coffee and it will smell delicious but you can't really taste the flavor when it's brewed.  This stuff is quite the contrary!  It smells AND tastes yummy!  It's so good I can drink it with only a little bit of creamer.  Yum!

Want to do a review for me on Critic's Choice Friday?  E-mail me at joanneroehm(at)yahoo(dot)com and we'll get you on the schedule!

Have a wonderful weekend!