#Pistachio [LC] | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

verfound · 5 years ago

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WIP Wednesday: 7/8/20

I was hoping to have this one done today, but...guys it was only Tuesday and had already been a WEEK. The fic itself is fighting me, and life has been fighting me. So here’s a preview of what I’m playing fighting with...

There was a nervous sort of energy thrumming beneath her skin. An anxious buzzing. Her sketchbook lay open and untouched on her lap. Her pencil tapped an agitated staccato against the page, eager to move, to create, but…there was nothing.

There hadn’t been anything for a while now.

Marinette pushed out a breath in a heavy sigh and looked up, her eyes staring listlessly out across the lawn of the Trocadéro. This place used to make her happy. Before.

The Trocadéro breathed life. It had always been an endless source of inspiration for her. She had lost track of how many hours, how many days she had spent on these very steps, filling sketchbook after sketchbook with countless designs inspired by the things she saw here

There, by the fountains, were the tourists taking a selfie. Before, she would see their bright smiles and the play of water behind them and see swirling, dazzling skirts the palest shade of blue. André’s cart was parked at the top of the steps on the other side of the lawn, a line of couples already queueing for their Sweetheart Ice Creams. Before, she would see the lovesick expressions and think of sweetheart necklines, pale pink dresses that would burn orange in the sunset and glow white with the moonlight. M. Ramier tossed breadcrumbs to his beloved pigeons a few benches away, a gaggle of kids giggling as they reached tiny hands into the bag to help. Before, she would see a little hood with kitty ears, or maybe even a frog with wide, innocent eyes staring from the top of unruly curls.

But that was before.

This place used to make her happy.

Now, it just made her sad.

She had filled entire sketchbooks on these very same steps. Before.

Now, she was struggling to fill a single page.

Before, she had hidden behind that column, waiting for the perfect opportunity to tell Adrien how she really felt. And when he had actually offered her a ride home, she had blundered something about couscous and waved him on. Before, she had sat in her room with the girls and plotted and schemed time after time how they would hunt down André and invite Adrien – a group outing with Nino and Alya, their best friends, so it wouldn’t be weird. And when she had finally managed to get a Sweetheart Ice Cream with Adrien, André had given her one scrutinizing look, glanced at Adrien beside her, and dipped his scoop in the pistachio flavor before dropping it on the scoop of blackberry. (She should have known then. André always knew, and he had already told her her love would come with peach for his lips and mint for his eyes. Adrien had never been a mint, anyway, and pistachio didn’t taste as good with blackberry.) Before, she had dreamt and hoped of first dates and hamsters and three kids in a future that seemed so certain, if only she could speak. And once she had finally spoken…

Loving Adrien Agreste had always been exhausting. She didn’t know why she had expected that to change once they had actually started dating.

Her fingers tightened around her pencil, stopping the incessant tapping. Her eyes burned, and she narrowed them in an attempt to keep from crying. She wasn’t going to cry today. She had promised herself that.

She looked back at the blank page, her pencil still hovering. This was stupid. She had a job to do. A commission…well, a favor to complete. She wasn’t supposed to be thinking about Adrien, not anymore. She had wasted enough time thinking about Adrien the past few years.

Her phone buzzed in her pocket. She hesitated only a moment before pulling it out.

JC: Hey.

JC: How goes it?

Marinette bit her lip. Her thumbs hovered as uncertainly as her pencil. There was nothing for Juleka, either.

JC: Band practice 2day. U coming?

No. She didn’t think she was.

…she hadn’t been to band practice in a while.

JC: It’s just Ivan wants 2 c the new costumes.

JC: …we all do.

Her page was still blank.

The showcase they needed the costumes for was only a few weeks away.

She had nothing.

Her phone buzzed again.

LC: ignore her. take your time.

Her gut twisted.

LC: we’ll still be here when you’re ready.

LC: our current costumes are FINE.

LC: no rush.

She was still staring blankly at the screen, blinking against the burn of tears in her eyes, when another message came through.

LC: …i don’t want to ask if you’re ok. you don’t have to say. you know that.

LC: …but are you ok?

She almost threw her phone down the steps. Instead, she muted it and shoved it deep inside her bag.

…she was a terrible person.

She had been avoiding all of them: Juleka, Rose, Ivan, Luka…especially Luka. It was easier to avoid Ivan, who didn’t go to the same school as them anymore. It was harder to avoid Juleka and Rose when they shared most of their seconde classes together. Luka was…harder, in a way, to avoid. She went to his school now. They didn’t have any classes together, but they almost always had lunch with him. She always felt his eyes on her in the hall between classes. He hovered on the periphery, like her pencil over the blank page. Close enough that she knew he was there and concerned, but always respectful of her wishes.

He knew she needed time.

He knew how guilty she felt about…

Just like she knew he didn’t care.

That’s probably what made it all worse.

She was the one who had chosen Adrien, even as she had been getting closer and closer with Luka. She was the one who had kept Luka in the background, a constant presence in her life, between time spent at the Liberty, time spent with the band, and time spent just because they were friends. She was the one who always went to Luka with her problems, simply because he let her and he cared. She was the one who had taken advantage of that, in the end.

…she was the one who had broken his heart, even as she was breaking her own. Even if he would never tell her that, she knew that to be the case.

She had never stopped Adrien from his open affections around the older boy, after all. She had never tried to keep Luka away from the disaster that was quickly becoming the Adrienette ship. She was friends with Luka, and so was Adrien, so even if Luka was in love with her he would be happy for his friends, right? That’s what she had told herself, at least. That’s what she’d tried to believe, even as time drug on and she realized more and more that Adrien had never really been in love with her, anyway. Not the part of her she needed him to be.

Things were supposed to be easier when they revealed their identities. Instead, it just ended up being one more thing Master Fu had been right about.

Her hand fisted around the spine of her sketchbook again, and with a frustrated cry she threw her pencil down the steps. She curled in on herself, hugging her knees and taking deep, steadying breaths.

Adrien didn’t love her. He never had.

And she was starting to think she had never really loved him, either.

So why did it still hurt so bad?

“Marinette?”

She froze, her fingers digging painfully hard into her sides. Probably hard enough to bruise. She knew that voice.

…she had been avoiding that voice, too.

“Are ye all right, lass?” Anarka Couffaine asked, kneeling onto the step beside her and laying a heavy hand on her shoulder. She was sure it was supposed to be comforting.

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bestketodiet · 7 years ago

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Atkins Diet Recipe: Low Carb Lasagna (*IF)

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Facebook Fan Site: https://www.facebook.com/AtkinsDietVideos/

In my first recipe back, I wanted to share probably the second most made personally recipe I make for my family. It is a quick and easy recipe for Low Carb lasagna. While others might make their own version of low carb noodles using cauliflower or similar to LC pizza crust. I use deli-sliced ham as that noodle layer to separate the ingredients. It works well and doesn’t affect the flavor of the overall dish.

As mentioned, I have lost 4 pounds this week, raising the overall total to 47 pounds in 12+ weeks. These videos are a bit tough for me to watch as while I definitely feel thinner. Seeing my side profile shows the amount of work left to be done. In the end, it is good motivation to get back to the gym and work off that frustration.

Low Carb Lasagna with Ham Pasta (*IF) 1 pound ground beef (85%) 1 cup onion (reduce to lower carbs if desired) 1 cup Pasta Sauce, no sugar added 4-6 oz deli-sliced ham 2 eggs 1 cup Ricotta cheese (exchange with cream cheese to make Induction Friendly) 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated 1 tsp garlic powder 1 tsp Italian seasoning 8 oz Mozzarella cheese

Serves 6. Nutrition Info (per serving): 554 Calories, 9g Carbs (1g Fiber, 8g Net Carbs), 41g Protein, 39g Fat

1. Preheat oven to 350F. 2. Brown Ground Beef in Skillet with onions. Salt and Pepper to Taste. Drain excess fat. 3. Add Egg, Ricotta cheese, Parmesan cheese, Italian seasoning, and garlic powder to food processor. Process until smooth. 4. Add 1 cup of no sugar added Pasta sauce to browned ground beef. 5. In 9×13 or Lasagna dish, layer Ham, one-third meat mixture, half egg-cheese mixture, and ~2 oz Mozzarella cheese. Repeat for second layer. For final layer, layer one more ham, final meat mixture, and remaining Mozzarella cheese. 6. Place pan in oven for 40-45 minutes until cheese on top is golden brown. Let rest for 5-10 minutes.

* Reducing the onion to 1/4 cup and exchanging cream cheese would lower the per serving net carbs to 5.5g net carbs.

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