Quotes from Jen Lancaster

This way, when I do have something like special-occasion engagement cake, I can enjoy the whole damn thing without a twinge of remorse. I

Nothing gives me greater pleasure than to say yes, only to have my plans fall through at the last minute and I can take off my regular-people clothes and redon my paint-splattered yoga pants.

But how come no one says anything to my face? I do dozens of events per year and I've met thousands of readers, and every single person I've ever encountered has been lovely. Why is that, I wonder? Am I more charming in person, or is it that face-to-face blunt-force-trauma honesty requires a modicum of courage?

You don't have to be a writer, though, to know that making fun of yourself is a good way to deflect being made fun of. Like many people, I am hypercritical about myself so that I beat the haters to the punch. When I acknowledge my foibles first, no one else can use them against me. I've taken away everyone else's power to make me feel less about myself by doing it first.

Let me phrase it like this—do you want to live in the kitchen for the next four days, sweating your ass off while you make a meal it will take twenty minutes to eat? Do you want to attack a pile of dishes for three hours afterward? Do you want to spend a week eating old turkey and cranberry sauce because

Although they're doing manual labor, they're both wearing tailored slacks and dressy leather shoes, which

In terms of being smart, Libby is very, very pretty.

Sometimes compromise tastes like caramel macchiato.

This toffee tastes like war or Lucifer's tears. This toffee is a molten pool of broken Christmas promises. If sadness had a flavor, it would be the contents of the Pyrex.

What about my Girls Gone Mild life leads you to believe I'm a body shot shy of debauchery? Is it the pearls?

If I had a family crest, it would read Please Don't Make Me Be an Asshole.

and World Cuisine educations are on temporary hold since I'm on my way to

all it took to succeed was to stop listening to my internal critic and to just start doing.

Until he started watching The Walking Dead. Yeah, AMC. Thanks for that. He keeps telling me that I'd enjoy the show, but judging from all the screaming, shooting, and breaking glass I hear from my office every

We are middle-aged. This is what happens. All the same nonsense that comes with puberty occurs again during perimenopause—the hormone surges, the moodiness, and the hair appearing where there wasn't hair before. Except instead of filling in under the arms and on nether regions, these coarse follicles of hate are showing up on our freaking faces.

During this crisis, I've discovered that I would thrive under house arrest. So there's that.

I've come to realize this isn't "real" and there's no substitute for actual interaction. The difference between social media and a social life is the difference between eating a marshmallow Peep and dining on a tomahawk-cut rib eye: one is substantial and nutritious; the other is just a momentarily satisfying puff of sweetened air, offering no long-term benefits. I can enjoy the fluff, but I can't subsist on it.

You know what else I haven't seen? Home stores. I've not passed the equivalent of Restoration Hardware or Crate and Barrel or Pottery Barn, so I get the feeling that no one's killing themselves working double shifts so they can consume stuff to make their homes Pinterest-perfect. Maybe the Roman message is to not let your stuff own you.

you know that peanut butter's now considered a hate crime? Because it totally is.]

Anyone who grew up in a household where carob passed for chocolate and apple pies were actually filled with zucchini will feel me here.

worry that younger women are striving so hard to present a compelling story via images that they're ignoring the substance that makes the story true. Ultimately, they're going to end up really bitter later in life (and not the good kind of bitter that sells books). My message to these women is this—if you want to avoid regrets later, give yourselves a break now and just be real. Enjoy the mess. Revel in the imperfection.

That which went wrong, and that which went right, would have been made easier if I were more focused on my goals.

I can't state this clearly enough: basic needs are a bitch and a huge anxiety trigger.

Shout long enough in capital letters and, eventually, people start to tune you out.