Last day of freedom.

Tomorrow is my first day back to work with the school district..
and I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it. I am excited
to see the kids but not excited about the
daily grind of working and all. I really have enjoyed my
summer vacation. So since today was my last day of
summer, my darling and I decided to spend the day in our
favorite place: Pasadena. It was the perfect day. I'd say it was
almost comparable to this day. The weather was completely
out of the norm of this past week, so cool, clear and breezyyyy.
Loved it. We enjoyed lunch at Noah's Bagels and coffee at
Peet's and then went to the happiest place on earth,
Anthropologie. (Did you think I was going to say
Disneyland? Hehe.)
We spent a great deal of time in there. I'm glad that
Paul likes to look at everything too and sit and
read their books. Remind me next time NOT to try on
pretty clothes that I don't intend on buying -- bad idea.
I did buy myself a little something though and got to use my
15% off birthday coupon, yay! That made me happy.
We then walked around and shopped in some other pretty stores
and then sat in Barnes and Noble and read for
a while. We love doing that. :) It was so relaxing.
We came home and I made us dinner and we enjoyed a glass
of wine and we talked. And talked. We talked deeply
about our future, the L-rd and what He is doing for us,
and what we want to see happen in the months coming.
My husband is a very deep thinker and I love to hear
his mind unravel. It's so beautiful.
Then Chad came over for a visit and talked about school,
girls, jobs and his life.. I love when I get the
big run-down of what's been going on in his life since we
last chatted. He's pretty great.

And now it is time for bed. The summer is officially over.
G'night.

Fried Zucchini Flowers

These beautiful little sweeties are in my top 3 most most most favorite foods.
They are incredibly easy to make, it's just a shame that they are so
hard to find in regular grocery stores. You can find them in specialty food stores,
we get ours at Claremont's farmer's market. I have to be sure to get there
early because they go quickly in the morning, they are quite
the popular item. Now, these pictures aren't very fancy or good quality because I hadn't
really intended on taking pictures. But in the midst of making them,
I decided to whip out the camera so I could share them with you because they are
just that tasty.

Fried Zucchini Flowers

• Fresh zucchini flowers
• Flour, 1 cup
  
• Cold water, 1 cup
  
• 1 egg
• Veggie oil, 2-3 cups (extra virgin olive oil will do just fine as well)
• Salt

Heat the oil in a pan. It needs to be hot enough to be able to fry the flowers to a golden brown color. (I like to toss a little piece of bread in before to make sure it's at the right temp. If it floats to the top and starts frying nicely, you're there. But if it starts to burn right away, turn the heat down...I guess that's kind of obvious. Hehe.) Pull out the stamen from each flower before dipping in the batter (this takes a few minutes). Wisk together the flour, water and egg until smooth, no lumps. Gently dip the flowers in the batter, letting the excess run off into the bowl. Put into the oil and let fry 2-3 minutes on each side. When they are ready to come out, put them on a plate with a paper towel to drain the excess oil. Salt immediately! And enjoy. :)

There is so much you can do with these flowers. They are great just
by themselves with salt but they also taste great dipped in ponzu sauce or soy sauce.
You can also put a small block of parmesan cheese in the center of each
flower before frying, yuummmm... or any kind of cheese mixture. Make a tomato
dipping sauce too! Paul and I have enjoyed them many times and look
forward to asking the farmer every Sunday, if he has
any flowers left.

Flowers in the Window.

These white lisianthus are also from the Claremont farmers market. (I kind of love
lisianthus.) Pretty cute with the pink tips.. and they lasted so long!

That's Mr. de Partee in the background, watering the lawn. Cute.

P.s. He texted me this today:
"6 years ago today I was in class and wrote a letter telling you that I loved you.:)"
He never did give it to me. He took me to Pasadena and told me a month later...to the day.
:)

Yesterday.

Paul worked yesterday, which is not normal for a Saturday, he normally has weekends
off.. so that left me with the day to myself. I woke up late, lounged around the
house, read, gave myself a manicure, got ready and took myself
to the movies to see Eat Pray Love. Just me, and it was perfect, the perfect day.
I felt like the picture looks up above: alone, peaceful, free. The
movie was exactly what I was in the mood for, almost two and a half hours of
pure goodness. I want to go to Bali. I almost feel like I need to go to Bali.. the movie
makes you feel like you do anyway. I hope that you go see this movie,
and that your mouth waters over the food in Italy the way
mine did. I'm trying to think up a time that I can go watch the movie
again.. but this time, I'll take my husband.

Happy Sunday to you. :)

Better late than never.

This little card was sent to my parents' house for me, for my birthday.
I look forward to my birthday card from Anthro every year
because they always write something sweet and cheerful and include
a little gift (like this birthday candle necklace). Now I have to figure out what
I'm going to buy.. 15% off... that's pretty good if you ask me. :)

The weekend is over.

This weekend was so busy but so so so so fantastic. Mal drove down Friday
and stayed with us for the weekend, which is always the highlight.
Saturday was Chelsea's bridal shower. It was a bridal wonderland and
I can't believe how beautiful it was. It was a lot of planning
and hard work but it was so worth it to see her face when she walked
in. I'm honored to be able to stand by her side on her
special day. The day (and the weekend) went by so so quickly. It was
great to have everyone together. Mal and I went to the movies
on Saturday night and drove around in the late evening,
going to places that we used to frequent in our late
teens and early twenties (I say that like I'm 45 or something, but it
felt so nostalgic, fun, exciting, scary...). Then, Sunday morning
breakfast in Claremont and then we waved goodbye and Mal
went back home. Paul and I had a relaxing afternoon/evening, watching
Netflix, napping, grocery shopping, playing with
the doggies, etc. It went by so fast and the new week is almost here.
Tomorrow is my first day nannying at my new little
part time job. I'm pretty excited, a little nervous too.
Here are a couple of pictures from the shower on Saturday.

The beautiful outdoor living room.

Chelsea underneath the paper pom poms. (I made 15 of them, with a little help from
my friendsies.)

And this is the before picture. We were in the midst of taking
silly pictures (because we always do) and we didn't notice the spider on the back
white pillow.. do you see it?! It's a monstrosity.

And this is after.. once someone pointed out that it was in our midst, about to pounce.
By far, thee best picture of the day.

Happy Monday everyone. :)

Venticinco

I turned 25 a couple of days ago.. and I feel different. Every other time

I heard someone say they were 25, my initial thought was "Whoa, old". So when the day

came around for me to turn 25.. I'll be honest, I wasn't thrilled. In my own head

and heart, I still feel like a 15 year old girl in high school. (Can anyone relate?.. Pretty please?)

Now that I'm here, I feel good. I celebrated the day with my closest friends (missing

Mal and Jonathan of course), with family and my love. On the evening of my

actual birthday, I came home to a candlelit picnic in the living room

and a homemade dinner prepared for me by my love. It was beautiful, romantic,

lovely, yummy and everything I could have asked for.

So, all in all, 25 is feeling pretty good right about now. I am blessed.