Friday, July 22, 2011

Running thru life.... Parallel Wine Bistro

My parents have been wanting to take Joe and I to this Wine Bistro that they found in Ashburn, VA for months.  Last Friday we finally went.
43135 Broadlands Center Plaza
Broadlands, VA



On Friday nights they have happy hour until 7.  
The happy hour consist of a selection of twelve wines at $4 a glass and about 10 specialty beers ranging from $3-4.  They also had a happy hour menu that consisted of about 10 items each around 5 to 7$.  I had a Zindfindel from California which was excellent!  Joe had a spanish wine which was also excellent.  For dinner we split some small plates on the happy hour menu.
We had Bruchetta
Smoked Salon
Duck and Feta Pizza
and a Meat Plate.
My favorite was the Smoked Salon and the Bruchetta.

We finshed it with a chocolate mouse dessert that all four of us split.  

The price was reasonable.  I had 2 glasses, Joe had 3 glasses of wine, splitting the small plates, and the desset our bill with tip was less than $40 dollars.  

My review:
Food- Good
The plates were a good size, ideal for sharing with friends.
The quality was good- interesting tastes that came out with the wine.

Wine- Excellent
I loved my Zinfandel
Atmosphere- Good
It has nice music playing and was packed by the time we left.

I would go again however, you have to go early because after 7pm the prices change and it would be expensive. 

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Running thru life...Bring on the veggies

The veggies are in.....


The squash is doing great!

The tomatoes was crazy

The basil is out of control- growing on our deck and in the veggie garden!

The mint is growing crazy. 
Yeah for mojitos!

The bell pepper is the only thing that did not take.
=0(
So in the future I will not be planting bell peppers.

This week we made homemade stirfry with all the veggies and some shrimp. 
Tonight we are making Basil and Tomato Pizza. 
Very yummy!
And very Free.

I have already calculated what I spent on all the plants. 
Around 30 dollars for 2 tomato plants, 3 squash, 1 bell pepper, onions, 1 mint, 2 basil.
It has already paid off for itself just in the mint department. 
We were having to buy mint once or twice a month last summer at 3 bucks a pop.  
This is something I will be doing next year with a couple of changes.   
And if you live near me I might end up having to share =0)

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Running thru life... Easy Eating

 Sunday night Joe and I decided to try a food experiment with a couple things in our fridge.
As an effort to decrease our eating out, going to the store when we have things in the house, and just trying make more healthy food decisions.... we came up with.

Scallop Basil Avacado Salad

We cut avocado (left over from two weekends ago),
tomatoes (From our garden), 
Red onion and
placed scallops (left overs in the freezer) 
with a little bit of salt and pepper,
fresh basil from our garden, 
olive oil and
lime juice on top. (left over limes).

We pan seared the scallops with some white wine. 

It was amazing and very refreshing!!!
Definitely something we will have again.
Amazing meal on a couple of left over things we were trying to use up!
Next time we would not put as much onion on it. 

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Running thru life... Financial Planning

Earlier this week we had our first conference call with our new financial planner. 
He is actually Joe's parents financial planner and since Joe's parents are retiring early at the age of 60 we figured he must have helped them do something right.  

WOW- can we say overwhelming. 
My brain hurt when I got off the phone. 
Maybe that is because we were on the phone for  1 1/2 hours or maybe because every 5 seconds he brought up our plan to have children..... seriously!!!!!

He went thru everything from our salaries, our insurance, what we are thinking about as far as life, what we are thinking about as far as retirement, etc.

So right before getting off the phone with him, he gave me a list of things to get him before he can put together a package full of IRA opportunities, investment options, and his recommendations, (Which I just finished and faxed to him Thursday), and a list of some quick recommendations for us to get started on the road to thinking about working towards retirement.

After, I got on the phone I sat at my desk for about 10 minutes having an out of body experience.  It is hard to think that I am not even 30 yet and I am stressing out about this. 
I am suppose to be a twentysomething this year!!! 
I quickly reminded myself that we are doing whats right and getting our finances in order and set before we introduce any changes (if they happen) into the picture later in life. 

So here are his current suggestions:
1) Turn back on paper statements.
He said this forces you to look thru everything with a fine tooth comb every month.
This is something I normally do- but Joe does not and I think he needs to. 
So they are back on....

2) Sit down together each month and review our spending.
I do this and probably can tell you down to the penny what is in our account. 
My husband is clueless- I pay the bills, balance our accounts, manage our monthly spending, etc. 
He has no idea!! 
So he does not get it when I get upset about some of his spending habits like $20 on a pair of goggles when he could have used his amazon gift card that has been sitting in his desk.... urrr... i digress.
Anyways, I think this will help us as a couple target more ways to cut back. 
 
3) Increase our contributions to our 401K thru work. 
Right now Joe and I are both contributing 15% of our income.  We increased it to the maximum of 16500!! 

4)Making Wills
Up to this point everyone I have talked to states we do not need a Will until we have children or start to have more assets (even some lawyers). 
Our financial planner kind of agreed with this for us because our house is the only debt we have- cars are paid off, college is paid off, no credit debt. So this I will be holding off for the time being. 
However, we do have advanced directives so he was happy to hear that. 

5) Life Insurance
Fortunately, thru my work I have life insurance for twice my annual salary and Joe has it for one time his annual salary.  He suggested taking out a term policy on Joe to increase his life insurance thru work.  This is actually something we had talked about early this year when I was getting our finances in order to meet with the planner.    However, we can not do this till open season which is not until November. 
He also stated when we have children, "as soon as Laura is pregnant," to increase our policies...again with the whole baby thing!!  =0)  Can you tell I am anti-baby right now? 

6)  Forcing us to both sit down and look at our benefits.
I did this at great length earlier this year and I have a folder for Joe and I. 
However, again my loving husband is clueless on this!

7) Changing our financial planning spreadsheet a little... Yes I am a spreadsheet person because it lets me keep track of my spending in one place and I can compare months. 

All and all I think these changes will be good. 
I will keep you updated on how they work out.