11-24-2013 Girls Day Out

We left our husbands at home, and I (Cara) went with several of my female friends (Annette, Denise, Cheryl and JoEllen) to Cincinnati for the day.  Our first stop was IKEA, and we arrived around 11am.  I'd never been, but Cheryl was over the moon excited about it because she was shopping to furnish her new house.  Truly, the place is a-maze-ing!  You wind your way through the showroom, following the arrows on the floor.  You pass by decorated room after decorated room, and everything that is for sale has a price tag hanging from it with info on where you find it.  They even had a whole 960 square foot apartment set up, with a furnished kitchen, living room, bathroom and bedroom - very cute.  I saw some good ideas.

I like the balance of the off-kilter shelves and the "bird cage"

This is a cute way to show off photos (and change them out easily).

Just getting through the showroom took about 2 hours.  After that we definitely needed something to eat, so we stopped at the IKEA Restaurant & Cafe.  It's cafeteria style service, but much better than cafeteria style food.  Plus, it's cheap (my meal cost about $5) because you are supposed to bus your own table, which I don't mind a bit.

I had a nice Cranberry Walnut Salad with mixed greens, plus some nicely cooked veggies.
My friends like the Swedish Meatballs, and they all shared the desserts, which they said were fabulous.

After lunch we hit the "Marketplace" to pick up the items we all liked.  We all found several things, but the big spender was Cheryl, whose purchases included a bed frame, artwork, wine glasses, decorative pieces, and more.  By the time we finally got out of IKEA it was nearly 5pm!  We hightailed it over to Cincinnati Premium Outlets, with only 2 hours to shop.  We started together at The North Face Outlet together, then split up.  We all found some good deals and shopped until the stores closed.

After a long day of shopping we were all hungry, so we stopped for dinner at Ruby Tuesday before heading home.  I had steamed veggies and the salad bar (called the Farmers Market), while several others had burgers, and Annette had seafood.  The burgers were liked, but Annette's seafood was overcooked, as were my veggies.  In addition, the salad bar has gone downhill because it has fewer toppings in general, and some of my favorites were gone altogether (like garbanzo beans).

Cara's "Farmers Market" veggies at Ruby Tuesday
(lots of butter on the squash and green beans, but no apparent seasoning on the broccoli)