Desperately avoiding my closet

I am desperately avoiding my closet for many reasons- right this moment, it is because my dressing is a complete disaster, with clothes piled everywhere, shoes kicked into all the corners, belts and scarves knotted up together on the floor, plus a box of summer clothes has exploded in right in the middle of everything. I have the mother of all clean-outs to do this afternoon and I am Unmotivated.

And suddenly I am inspired to blog! (Coincidence?)

The party on Friday night was fun and the chateau was just as beautiful as in the photos. The only bad surprise was arriving and finding half the guests dressed in jeans, including the birthday boy's wife. I wish someone would have written 'casual dress' on the invite because the 3 hours of standing in 4 inch heels for cocktails and hors d'oeuvres just about killed me. Thank goodness that I had plenty to drink so that I very quickly lost feeling in my feet. The dinner went on until 1 in the morning, and there was the expected river of champagne, so unsurprisingly, we both had massive hangovers and were not ready for our 9:30 am wake-up call. It was nice to not have the girls screaming us awake but it would have been nice to have been able to lounge around in bed for a bit longer. Sigh.

Of course, on top of a hangover, I realized that I probably should have been a bit more careful about what I ate. There were so many gorgeous things put out for hors d'oeuvres! Every 15 minutes, a waiter would come by with a new tray full of tiny little treats. So I tasted them all, some of them twice- thinking to hell with the diet for one night. I had been working hard so that I could indulge sometimes. But after weeks of eating low-fat/ low-cal my poor tummy wasn't used to rich foods. At all. Lets just say, I have learned a lesson that I won't forget...

I've done another bit of shopping despite my self-imposed ban. But! But! But, it was for a vintage YSL black drapped skirt, with the tags still on! Who could walk away from that, right? I found it at a shop on rue Birague, just near place des Vosges, called Delphine Pariente. It looks like there is also a shop on rue Charonne. I'd loved to go see it but I am afraid that there will be too much temptation- besides clothes that had so many pretty necklaces and right now, I feeling like I need to find the perfect necklace, something a bit quirky and maybe a bit sparkly that I can just wear everyday. I think that this shop probably has just the thing, if I would let myself look a bit. Best off staying away, I think .

We saw the last episode of Season 1 of Mad Men on Sunday night and I am totally hooked. Obviously, we are going to have to download the next season from Itunes because there is no way that I am going to wait til French tv gets its act together and puts it on the schedule. I kind of hate all the men, and yet, its kind of sexy too the way that they are all so macho. Its fantastic the way you both love and dislike nearly all the characters in equal measure. Betty? Sweet but also sort of annoyingly so. Joan? Gorgeous, but also a little too slutty. Peggy? Crazy, but also the underdog. And also the male character, but you get the picture. And I LOVE how everyone is always smoking and drinking- in the office, in bed, while pregnant, the nurses in the hospital while walking in the halls. I sort of wanted to download the episodes to watch while on vacation but I don't know if I can wait 2 whole weeks.

I think that this post is just pointing out how much I need to work on my willpower.

On a more positive note, I found a great healthy salade for summer that B and I have just been loving. I originally started out making this recipe, but there were a few things about it that didn't work for me. I don't tend to like eating raw onions, first of all, and it calls for two different spice mixes that I imagine you can only buy in the States so even if I wanted to fall the recipe, it would be impossible. Still, I was inspired so this is what I came up with:

Quinoa Salade

1/2 cucumber, peeled, deseeded, and chopped
8 fingerling radishes, chopped
1 avocado, chopped
1 bag prepared quinoa from Bjorg

sauce:
1 lime, juiced
2 tbsp colza oil
2 tbsp pistachio oil
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 tbsp gomasio
1 tsp agave syrup
salt to taste
tabasco to taste

Mix the vegetables and slightly heated quinoa in a bowl. In a small bowl, mix all the ingredients for the sauce and adjust seasoning as necessary. Pour the sauce over the vegetables and stir well. Chill and serve.

Its fantastic! I think that you could really play with the seasoning for the sauce and I might even try adding diced tomatoes one time to see how that works but personally, I think it is already perfect that way it is. And with the pre-cooked quinoa, you can throw this together in about 5 minutes.

So Ella had been begging me to let her invite two of her friends after school. With all the holidays its been difficult to arrange but we made up invites for her two friends (with my phone number, asking for them to phone me to arrange things) and the next day I brought them to school with me. It turns out that one girl was away on vacation for the week so we only gave the second girl the invite. She was staying after school for gouter, so I told her to be sure to give it to her parents when they came to pick her up. They never called. The little girl told me that she had given it to them and she chattered to me about coming to our house every day when I came to get Ella (so clearly she hasn't forgotten about the invite and must have talked to her parents about it) but I didn't see her parents to check that they got the card. The first little girl came back to school yesterday. I gave her the invite to give to her parents, and they called a few hours later to arrange a playdate for today. Easy as pie to sort that out. Which leaves me wondering about the first invite.

Now the question is, do I send ANOTHER invite home with the first girl and just assume that she never gave the card to her parents? Or do I drop it, assuming that they got the invite but don't want her to come to our house? I pass them occasionally in the neighborhood as they only live a few streets away but they don't really act very friendly- although they have never been outright rude. Sometimes, I think that there are parents that are worried that I only speak English since they see me at school only speaking English with the kids. People get nervous that I might make them speak English to me so they just sort of nod and run when they see me. B says drop it. Ella tells me that she and the little girl discuss the visit constantly at school so I feel a bit bad for the kids by not trying harder to sort this out, but I also just want to drop it because it is sort of a bother to have to entertain someone else's kid.

Hmm. To be decided.