Day Ten: Weekly vegan/art dates. Awful neon paintings. Wisdom.

 Today was such a great day. Here is a quick summary: cooking. Paramore. neon paints. huge canvas. snow. chocolate chips. ballet. movies. good phone conversations with my BFF. (:

Here's a great recipe that my friend Lindsey and I made today. We're going to do a weekly vegan and art date. This week was vegan lasagna and painting. Next week is guitar and vegan cookies and some main dish. It makes me so happy. I finally feel like I am doing things for me. I feel more like myself when I have lots of art projects in progress. And now I have a weekly art and cooking date to look forward to!
The recipe took a while to prepare, but it was well worth it. I'll take you through some of the steps, but you can click above to get the whole recipe if you want to try it out.

Most of the ingredients.

Cut or chop onions, carrots, mushrooms.

Drain olives.

Mix olives with spinach and pureed garbanzo beans.

Add sauce to pan (after braising the veggies and adding the onions and spices to the sauce). Lay noodles. Spread garbanzo bean mixture between layers.

Finished product of the food plus painting in progress.

I got a big canvas from Michael's yesterday. I don't normally plan in my head what I want to paint ahead of time, so sometimes (most often) it turns out weird at first. It's hard for me to do art projects over a long period of time, because I want it to look perfect now. It doesn't. My painting looks pretty awful. But I know where I'm going with it and I just need to be patient. I'll keep you guys posted on my progress.

Random thoughts:
-I saw so many great friends this weekend. Good lunch dates, thrifting/antiquing adventures, guacamole making, movie watching, chatting, etc. My heart is full.
-I keep having dreams of travel. Last night, it was Germany and Italy. I accidentally painted something that looked like the German flag on my painting today. It's a sign?
-Artistic people intrigue me. Especially ones who write or play music. I need more of them in my life. They make me feel normal.
-Black Swan is an interesting movie. I would recommend it... really creepy though.


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Writing Challenge Day 10
I'm doing a 31 day writing challenge, found on the Reverb website, designed to reflect on the past year and look forward to what's to come in 2011.


Wisdom. What was the wisest decision you made this year, and how did it play out? 
The wisest decision I made... hm. I think I'm sometimes really impulsive about decisions, and sometimes I overanalyze when I make decisions. Even though I don't often make the best decisions (especially, it seems, when it comes to relationships), I have learned not to regret anything. You are who you are because of decisions you've made, relationships you've been in, etc. You would be a totally different person if you made different decisions (ex: where to go to college). I think it's healthy to look back on those decisions and reflect on them, but not to regret them. They make you who you are.
Back to the prompt. The wisest decision I made this year is to be selfish. I know that sounds silly, but I suck at being selfish. I'm constantly thinking about others and how I can make people happy and how I can make their life better. I've been like that my whole life. I don't think it's necessarily a good thing. So now, I'm learning to be selfish. By that, I mean: Taking time for myself. Buying things I want. Saving money for trips I want to go on. Telling mean people I don't want them in my life. Letting guys know that I'm not putting up with crap. Going through phases that I think I needed to go through. (: Doing art projects when I really should be doing something else.
Now, I just feel like I need to learn to be more unreliable. More spontaneous. More reckless. More unpredictable. This is making me sound like a bad person. I'm not. ...It's probably just a phase. (: