Friday’s are Family Movie Night in our house. We try our best to do this every Friday night, although as the girls are getting older it is getting harder to keep them all home on a Friday. Still… we love spending the time with them… and we know we are creating special memories for them.
This week, we had the opportunity to rent Monte Carlo from Blockbuster Express for our Movie Night. Then, I was going to make dinner for the family for less than $25.00. You can see my shopping experience HERE.
I was disappointed that Redbox didn’t have the movie. When I checked into it, I found out that they wouldn’t be renting Monte Carlo until November 15, 2011. Blockbuster Express had released it as a rental on October 18, 2011. A full month earlier. I don’t get it. That just didn’t make sense to me. I love renting from Redbox because it’s only $1.00 a night. As of October 31st, they are going up to $1.20 per night. Still… a lot less expensive than Blockbuster Express at $2.99 a night.
I did like that Blockbuster Express has an In-Stock Guarantee. For popular new releases, they guarantee that the kiosk will have the movie or they will send you a promo code for $1.00 off your next rental. Now that’s something that Redbox doesn’t do.
My dinner menu consisted of…
Puree of Sweet Potato Soup
French Roasted Chicken
Roasted Potatoes
Garlic String Beans
Homemade Challah
Wine
Homemade Pound Cake for Dessert
I always keep a lot of staple ingredients at home, so I had plenty of baking ingredients to make the challah and pound cake. My $25 was spent simply on the chicken, potatoes, string beans and a bottle of wine. I also bought some fresh lemons and rosemary to cook the chicken in. I came in at just under $25 for my shop. I also purchased an organic free-range chicken which cost a little more than a regular roast chicken would cost.
Fresh baked challah
Homemade puree of sweet potato soup
Roasted potatoes
French roasted chicken
Garlic string beans
Pound Cake
Dinner is served
Family at dinner
Amanda enjoying her favorite soup
Lauryn sneaking some more challah
Time for the movie. My girls have a huge love for Selena Gomez. They have been watching her on Wizards of Waverly Place since the show first aired and they have seen all her movies. We wanted to go to the theater to see Monte Carlo but the movie didn’t do very well in theaters and wasn’t in town for very long. I surprised them with the movie and they were super excited to see it.
Monte Carlo with Selena Gomez
Watching the movie
Kids on Movie Night
Over all, the kids really liked the movie. It was fun and entertaining, but I can see why it didn’t make it in the theaters. The scenery was beautiful and the storyline cute, but the movie was lacking something. It was completely unbelievable and the men that the girls were paired with… well, they certainly didn’t have much chemistry. Selena is always fun to watch and I think she’s a good actress, but the other actors didn’t do a lot for me. The husbands response: “It was all right.” I think it’s definitely a tween-girl kind of film.
This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias. All opinions are my own. #couchcritics #cbias
Glad you had fun with your girls! My daughter is only 7 and a HUGE fan of Selena Gomez. We saw the movie in a special reduced rate run and had a good time, but I too didn’t buy the chemistry between the girls and boys in the movie. I think they played it down for the younger crowd and missed the mark.
And your dinner! Yum. The pound cake sounds so good.
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Yes, they totally downplayed it for younger audiences. The problem is… this wasn’t really a kids movie. It was rated PG but small kids wouldn’t be interested in it and it lacked flair for the older kids. Probably why it didn’t do so well.