Spaghetti - Woes

This week I appear to be having a little pasta crisis.
I don't know about you, but pasta seems to be served at just about every other dinner time around here
Last night I promised the kids spaghetti for dinner, everything was going well, the sauce smelt and tasted incredible, the salad was good and crisp, the garlic bread was ready for the oven and the water was ready for the noodles, the time came to pour the noodles into the water and Egads, no spaghetti noodles, I had enough for 1/2 a serving, I had enough Angel Hair for maybe a 1/4 of a serving, so I improvised and used Rotini noodles instead, of course I only had about 2 servings in regular Rotini and another 2 in wheat and so I threw them together thinking nobody would notice. WRONG, the first words out of Ben's mouth were "Why are the noodles different colored ?" I lied and told him I'd bought fun colored pasta, if the word wheat passed my lips, the dinner would have stayed on his plate. Sadly, Rotini and spaghetti sauce just don't taste the same as using good old spaghetti noodles, but they ate it with out too many complaints all the same.
Now fast forward to tonight, Marc is out playing Golf, Ben is eating at a friends house, Victoria doesn't eat until much later, so it was just Reagan to cook for, Mac and Cheese with tuna fish was screaming her name, had everything ready and what do you know ? No flipping macaroni noodles, BUT I did have Bow Tie pasta, so that's what I served her, she looked dubious at first, until I made up a story telling her this was special girl pasta,telling her to look at how pretty the bows were on her plate, she gave me a look that said "Mom you're full of it." But being the good kid that she is she tucked in and for the first night in days, maybe even weeks, her plate was cleaned. YAY, for girl food !!

So I have to ask all of you wonderful cooks out there, what is a favorite side at your dinner table ? Pasta in all shapes and sizes is getting a little tedious, potatoes get boring as does rice and I'm running out of ideas.