16-bean soup, a big garden salad, and brownie pudding with mint ice cream.  I secretly used half carob in the brownie pudding (I have an old container I need to use up) and no one suspected, hee hee.  It was actually just as delicious as always, but somehow less cloyingly rich, which was perfect.  Or it could just have been the mint ice cream...

I especially love the legwarmers and the little bag of hay

Yesterday my saving-money-ness manifested itself in spending forever trying to find a horse for Lucy's 18-inch knockoff AG dolls.  She got them last Christmas, and one of them was wearing riding clothes; we also saw a nice American Girl Doll horse at someone's house we were visiting recently; so naturally that's her request for Santa this year.  The internet can be really frustrating -- I was sure there must be a knockoff version, but searching for 'horse for 18" doll' and various similar things got me nowhere but way out of my price range.  Which is $50, by the way.  It turns out that if you search for "our generation paint" you'll find the horse I was despairing of finding.  Who knew?  So, happy ending, but extreme frustration along the way.  I also got a little foal set to go with it, but somehow it wasn't eligible for free shipping no matter what I did to mess with the cart and amount, so I had to eat a few dollars over budget.  But, I went to Target through my credit card's shopping portal, so I should get 5% back to help offset that.  (Money tip, look into that feature, don't let it go to waste if you have it!) And Lucy will LOVE this present.  Now if only I knew how I was going to fit it into our suitcases for California...