TWO MAJOR GOOD THINGS

1) My thesis defense is SCHEDULED! YES! November 16 at 2:30 pm. Mark your calendars folks. It will either be a really great day, or the worst day of my life. Let's go with the first. Either way I am going to buy myself a present.

2) We are leaving for INDIA this Friday! Long story short, my work is sending me for some intense abacus training, and Matt is coming with me. I am beyond excited. We'll be gone for 10 days, but it looks like our hotel has internet so hopefully we'll be able to touch base and post some pictures.

That's where we'll be!

To do: Clean out purse.

On today's to do list, Matt made me write "clean out purse." At the risk of looking totally disgusting, I am going to share this post with you.

What is this pile of trash? The contents of my purse, dumped on the floor.

But, wait! What looks like trash actually contains many useful items.

Including:

• A full meal with dessert (1 oatmeal, 1 nectarine, a bottle of water, and 4 pieces of candy)
• 5 spoons and 1 fork 
• A 10 year supply of lip products (4 lipsticks, 3 chapsticks, and 4 lipglosses)
• 1 nail polish
• 3 abacuses (abaci?)
• A small pharmacy (3 prescription medications, 5 over the counter medications, Neosporin, toothpaste, tampons, and sample-sized shaving cream)
• In case I need to jot something down, I have 8 pens, 4 pencils, and 2 whiteboard markers, and 2 pads of paper
• Surprisingly, I only found $1.71 in loose change, and in case I find myself back in Costa Rica- 700 colones
• Oh, and a dragon tattoo, 6 hair ties, some bobby pins, 4 old tickets, several tithing slips, grocery lists, and receipts
• And like a regular person I do also carry my keys and wallet.

Looking at it now, it looks like I don't really need to pack for India because I have everything a person needs right here already in my purse. Actually, Matt came out, looked at it and said, "Oh good you can throw half that stuff away!" and I had to say "No, this is the pile of things I'm keeping...."  Way to be prepared, self! I actually only put about 1/3 of it back in my purse :)

sunshine and food

Soooo here are some other things from last month:

Matt got me these super fluffy sunshine flowers! Don't you just want to nuzzle your face in them?

I know you probably all think we haven't eaten in like two months since I haven't posted any pics. Let me put your fears to rest. We HAVE eaten a few times since the last time I updated on our food. 

Some kind of farfalle creation with what looks like spinach and/or pesto and parmigiano cheese? 

Open faced tuna salad sandwich on toast. This was GOOD.  

Ok now this, this I had trouble eating because I just wanted to stare at its rainbow colors all night.  I was actually glad I ate it though because I loved it. It is naan bread, spread with garlicky hummus, then topped with roasted butternut squash, cherry tomatoes, kalamata olives, green bell peppers, and feta. (Also look how much better the new camera works)

This is after it baked, less colorful. Have I talked on here yet about how DELICIOUS baked feta is? When it gets that golden brown crust on top, and it is so gooey and salty in the middle. Melts in your mouth.

Chicken pita pockets. Can't remember what was in there.

This is Matt making me dinner: PB on celery :)

And THIS is the best chicken pot pie I have ever had. I am not lying. But also I think the only chicken pot pies I had ever had before were those mini frozen Swanson's ones. And I heard they went out of business... so the bar wasn't set too high for me...

fresh ginger and nutmeg, creamy cream sauce, I need to remember what else I put in there...

p.s. just to follow up on last week's super dramatic post. things took a major positive turn over the last couple days... :)