Birthday Dinner 2013

 I had to work on my real birthday, but much to my delight, Sean made reservations Saturday night at Circa 1918, a restaurant I've been dying to try since it opened several years ago. We have a bad habit of always trying to go without reservations, and that never works out. Happily, it lived up to the hype.

I sipped on a delicious Ava Gardner — Stoli, St. Germain and berry compote.

 For dinner, I had perfectly cooked beef tenderloin, with garlicky green beans and the most DIVINE butternut squash gouda gratin. I will be dreaming of that gratin for years, seriously.

 I also had a great pear martini!

And we finished up with warm pumpkin donuts with walnuts and an Irish Cream sauce. So good!

Afterward, we went to see "12 Years a Slave," which left me in shambles, but was profoundly moving. I spent the rest of the weekend relaxing to the max, which is what I truly needed after working and socializing at a breakneck pace lately.