a school night

Mr. Charming spends many weeknights going to school right now. I am so inspired by this man and all he is accomplishing and has yet to accomplish.  He works so hard for our family all day and at night he goes to school as he works towards his ultimate goal of getting into dental school. While I work away at my dream as a writer/singer/nutritionist, I watch, awe-inspired by a man who dreams of helping others. He is smart, gentle, driven and capable and I fall in love with him constantly, over and over again. 

So, on this particular night, feeling positive and energized, I wanted to do something extra special for dinner. Only, at 4pm and on a writing deadline, I had zero ideas. After finishing my piece on exuberantly priced handbags for a new fashion blog (& pinning way to many expensive shoes in the process) I decided to head to the market, hoping for inspiration.

The local gourmet market is down the street from our house and I always love to go there and peruse the aisles of beautiful floral arrangements, charming decor and decadent treats. As I grabbed some butterflied pork chops from the very kind butcher and headed to produce, I was inspired by some gorgeous carrots to make a delicious side dish to accompany my pork chops. Arn't they pretty?

So, after I had made my way through the store, taking time to peruse the candied nuts (which are full of processed sugar,  but it inspired me to make crockpot cinnamon nuts of my own for Christmas!) and Christmas decor (never too early, I say),  I decided to not go home, and take myself on a mini-date. The weather right now is AMAZING and I visited some charming little boutiques. I even treated myself to a sweet little piece of jewelry. 
Who can resist little bows? Or rose gold? 

Now... onto our delicious dinner. The pork chops were simple. I baked them for an hour on 350 with Earth Balance Dairy-free, soy-free butter, garlic and sea salt. The carrots were the stars of the dinner. I made Vanilla-Honey Carrots, they were SUPER easy and SO delicious. We both wished I would have made more.

The recipe to these sweet & savory little vegetable gems can be found here. 

It makes my heart beam when I can do something simple for someone I love and see that it brings them happiness. These are lifes sweetest moments. 

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