Birthday Dinner

Being Evan's birthday and all we went to Bottega last night for dinner. We had been once before in late spring/early summer and I was somewhat underwhelmed. I had some kind of seafood risotto which, though good, was not really interesting enough to warrant the price. But last night's food made up for it. I had a parmesan soufflé with mushrooms and prosciutto for an appetizer. Delish, but really rich, so I'm glad it was little. My entrée was halibut with citrus and pistachio on olive oil crushed potatoes. Awesome. Seriously. Evan had some kind of braised beef stew appetizer and a beef tenderloin entrée (also very tasty). Unfortunately I spent my entire food budget for pretty much the rest of forever and will be living off canned soup for the foreseeable future. Try not to hold it against me if I start smelling like beef and barley, ok?

Procrastination

Have I ever mentioned that K-Fed reminds me of my step-dad? Sorta trashy, knocked up some rich lady who turned out to be a lunatic. They're practically the same person. I'm reminded of this fact because I've gone back to reading The Superficial. I stopped for a while when I realized I was only indulging the qualities in myself that I don't like (like being negative and judgmental). And anyway, LiLo hasn't done anything awesome in ages. So, I haven't changed my position on the subject, but I do have a lot of homework that I'm avoiding and I'm running out of ways to avoid it.

Speaking of which, I made these apple zucchini muffins just now. I used this recipe, substituting a muffin tin for a loaf pan, and reducing the baking time to 45 minutes. (In case you're wondering, I used one large zucchini and one granny smith apple.) They taste sort of like mild carrot cake? Anyway, it's part of my effort to eat more vegetables. I was pretty good about it back when I had time to cook, but my diet has gotten a lot worse these days. As part of the same effort I roasted some beets the other day. I ate them cut into chunks with poppyseed dressing and goat cheese. A pretty awesome way to consume beets, but I think it turned my pee pink. 

Oh, and one of my pillows was on the Etsy front page today! Yay!

Deadlines

I've been putting off tons of schoolwork to finish a couple of pieces to submit to the Stitch Spectacular art show in Savannah. The criteria for submissions was that the work be an original design (i.e. not from a commercially available pattern) and the main feature of the piece be embroidery. I've been working on a couple of pieces of embroidery that aren't meant to be functional (like the pillows I do for Napoleon) but I didn't think they were up to par. So I did a couple of brand new pieces that are pretty different than what I'd been working on. I doubt they'll get into the show, but it was a nice exercise.

Anyhow, the deadline was midnight on Friday, so I'd been stitching away, ignoring all sorts of other work. Now that that's done, it's time to catch up. I have two term papers to work on, one of which I haven't even picked a topic for and neither of which have been researched. I've been dreading this all semester, pretending that I was going to get an early start, not put things off like I did in college. I'm not yet in dire straits, but I can't continue to procrastinate. And if I just go ahead and do it I'll feel so much better (a fact of which I'm always aware, but consistently ignore).

Before initiating full-time schoolwork mode, I had one last hurrah shopping in Atlanta yesterday. Yes, going to Atlanta to shop is kind of ridiculous, but Evan needed work clothes and H&M and Zara are practically the only stores with clothes that fit him. We shopped to the point of exhaustion but were pretty successful in our mission. I almost find shopping for other people more satisfying than shopping for myself. I still get to be stoked when I find something amazing but without all the guilt of frivolous spending.

So, goodbye for now. If you don't hear from me for a while, blame Bernini's Papal tombs. I'll be back as soon as possible.