twenty two

Yesterday was my birthday! As you can see from the picture I snapped with my phone, it was a beautiful day. It was actually the first time since I turned 17 that I had to go to school on my birthday. I went to Coachella on my 18th birthday, my 19th and 20th were on a Saturday and Sunday respectively, and last year I turned 21 in Amsterdam. (Which you can read about here)

Wednesdays are my busiest days, it's pretty much non-stop from 8:30 am to 5:30 pm, but I had a lovely day. One of my coworkers surprised me with some candy and a rice krispie treat, JT embroidered me a beautiful quote, and Estrella painted me the amazing watercolor painting that is now my header! After class/work Ali, Estrella and I walked to get Thai food at this place we just discovered three blocks away from campus, which was delicious. It was also my first time in long time that I didn't have a social media site reminding everyone it was my birthday, which made the calls & texts I did get that much more special. All in all I had a great day, and I'm continually thankful for the love I'm surrounded by.


And now the countdown begins! Today is officially one month to graduation!

Spontaneous Order

One of the more exciting things about living on a college campus towards the end of the semester is the flurry of artistic events that happen in the last few weeks of school as everyone is presenting their theses.

Last weekend my friend JT's senior art exhibition 'Spontaneous Order' opened at the Art Museum. It wasn't a solo exhibition, so I knew a few other Studio Art seniors who had work on display, but in my humble (and biased) opinion JT's work really stole the show. All of her pieces were embroidered; she embroidered a take-out box, a cup of noodles, a writing exercise book, and a text piece translating a phrase from Chinese to English with Google Translate. The detail is incredible and I was so proud of JT and so happy for her. Of course, the other work on display is also amazing, and if you're in the Bay Area I highly encourage you to come check it out.

I am often completely blown away by the sheer beauty of the things my friends create, whether I'm looking at JTs art, or listening to Estrella's compositions or hearing Ali sing. I'm so lucky to be surrounded and inspired by such amazing ladies. 

let's talk music

I thought I'd talk a bit about music, since I haven't really done that on this blog yet. I love music, but I have a tendency to stick with what I know. Mostly what happens is that I find various tracks from artists that I like and I play those on repeat for forever, or I buy an album that I fall in love with and play on repeat for forever. You see the pattern here. I also have a tendency to buy/receive cds and then not listen to them for years, and a prime example of that would be Bright Eyes.

In like 2005/2006 when everyone I knew was going crazy over Conor Oberst, my friend gave me a cd with the Bright Eyes discography on it and I NEVER LISTENED TO IT. It wasn't until much later, like 2009 that I actually started listening to some songs when they'd show up on shuffle and I didn't actually sit down and listen to the entire thing until around 2010.

I don't know if this will really make sense, but I don't think I was ready for Bright Eyes when I was fourteen. Songs that I skipped over then are now some of my all-time favorite songs, and I'm able to appreciate the lyrics and the raw emotion so much more now. So even though sometimes I want to punch my past self in the face for missing out on this, I guess it's better late then never right?

If you haven't heard anything by Bright Eyes before, my favorite albums are "LIFTED or the Story is in the Soil, Keep Your Ears to the Ground" and "I'm Wide Awake It's Morning". If you happen to check them out, or have heard them already let me know what you think!

And let me know what other music I've been missing out on.

goodbye spring break

Today is the last day of my spring break. I'm back at school now and back in the library catching up before classes start tomorrow. It was so hard to leave home this morning, but at least I know I'll be back in just a few weeks (seven counts as a few right?)

April is going to be busy. Aside from all the assignments I have to do it'll also be my last full month of school. Crazy!

i made a pie!

I made an apple pie y'all!
I've always thought of pies as extremely complicated things to make, and I don't actually know why it is that I thought that except maybe for the fact that I had never seen a pie made from scratch before. This past year one of the things on my "21 before 22" list was to make a cheesecake in a springform pan, but I think that making a pie is a worthy substitute. I had an early birthday dinner with my family tonight, so I thought it would be a good opportunity to try out pie making. I used this recipe from A Beautiful Mess, and I used vanilla instead of bourbon only because we didn't have any bourbon on hand. I also used Trader Joe's frozen pie crust, because it was my first pie ever and I felt like I was entitled to a shortcut.




It was actually a lot easier to make than I thought it would be. I used my Mandoline to slice up the apples after I peeled them and from there pretty much all I had to do was whisk together the other ingredients for the filling and pour them over the apples.

Next time I will definitely make the crust from scratch as well. Got any pie recipes to share?

a coconut breve and an americano with room

I'm home for spring break this week and very much enjoying relaxing and not writing papers. I spent the weekend hanging out around the house with my mom and my grandparents, and today I met up with Lena for coffee.
We went to our regular spot, Jameson Brown. Lena introduced me to it a few years ago and it has (in my humble opinion) the best coffee in the world. I'm hooked on their Coconut Breves.
I hope your Monday was as lovely as mine. :]

Bittersweet

It may be the first day of spring, but it's rainy here so Nicole and I decided to make a spontaneous trip to Bittersweet today.

If you live in the Bay Area and like chocolate then you have to get a hot chocolate from Bittersweet, it is the best hot chocolate I've ever had.