Cross that one off the list

There are a few things I've wanted to do with Greta for a long time, and I've just been waiting for the right time. Here they are:

• Get afternoon tea at Hicks & McCarthy
• See the Nutcracker
• Walk around Ithaca and eat at Moosewood

We were able to cross the last one off the list yesterday. We had an appointment to see one house yesterday morning, but that was the only planned activity for the entire weekend (yay). So, yesterday, during breakfast, Pat suggested we take a day trip to Ithaca once we got the house viewing out of the way. Ithaca is our favorite place to go for a day trip, but we've never taken Greta. It just never seemed like the right time. Moosewood is my favorite restaurant, and I specifically remember a couple years ago staring longingly at their kids' menu and wishing we could take Greta Bean there. I mean, we could have done it before, but Greta was just too much of a loose cannon before, and the chances of it being a less than pleasurable experience seemed not unlikely (ie, it could have been miserable). Anyway, yesterday was the day, and it was great. Best day ever.

It did rain most of the time we were walking around the Commons, but we still had fun, and dinner was excellent. I think there is nothing better than really fresh, healthy vegetarian food. I have rarely seen Greta eat more*, which obviously made me happy. Yay for healthy eater toddlers.

Here we are, all smiles at Moosewood.

If you haven't ever been to Ithaca, it's a very interesting place. I don't think I would want to live there, but as I mentioned, I love to visit. We don't know our way around very well, and we're not terribly adventurous travelers, so we mostly stick to walking around the Commons, which is always chock full of people, even when it's raining (as we found out yesterday). In the Commons, you can commonly see many hippies (young and old), doom-and-gloom college students dressed all in black, preppy college students, and families. There are always a lot of other interesting characters who can't be categorized as easily. (Yesterday alone we saw a a guy who appeared to be a morbidly obese special needs man who may or may not have been an Eskimo, a guy with a meticulously coifed mullet and mustache who was wearing a magenta shirt and pushing a umbrella stroller that contained a very cute little girl, and a woman who appeared to be a former hard drug abuser that tried to sell me expensive shoes at an upscale clothing and shoe store.) That's Ithaca in a nutshell!

The rest of the weekend has been good, although not as productive as I usually like. You win some, you lose some.

*For reals, if you ever have a chance to go to Moosewood, you should. Dinner entrees are $16-18, but they're worth every penny (and this is coming from Frugal Fran), and kids' meals are $3.50, which is actually less than a kids' meal at Denny's (as if that makes any sense).

Fran