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My First Mommy's Day

It's important I write about my very first Mother's Day, because for one, I said I would last week but didn't get to it and two, it's exactly the special day that I'd like to read about years from now. Also, I can see myself wanting to mention it next month or something and how stupid would it be to talk about Mother's Day on Father's Day? It was such a sweet day. Guav did a great job making me feel so loved and special the way every mom should on Mother's Day. Way to go, Bot. ::High Five::

It all started with Brixton waking up like he always does: by tossing and turning over about five times until he decides to officially land on his hands and knees and open his big brown eyes. A half second later, he smiles (everytime) and then starts chanting his da-das. They usually start as whispers and slowly progress into loud babbles and variations of "da". I love it. I'm of course awake after the first couple of tosses and am there to smile back and fully greet him with good morning kisses once he gets into his crawl position. He woke up Guav by doing some combination of nudging his face into his back and wacking his head with an open hand.

Once we were up, Guav insisted on making a run to The Cinnamon Snail to get me something delicious for breakfast. He brought back a breakfast burrito, a smokey portabello sandwich, a vegan donut and cinnamon twist. Everything was quite yummy, but the cinnamon twist was exceptional.

Soon after our breakfast, I was given a couple of presents to unwrap. I got The Big Ass Book of Crafts (a book I owned some time ago but managed to misplace), a veggie cook book and an issue of Mothering Magazine. We all cuddled on the couch for the next couple of hours-- I flipped through my books and magazine while Guav and Brixton took a nap.

Guav had plans for a Mother's Day picnic for us, but unfortunately, the weather wasn't awesome enough for it. So when they woke up, we went to the craft store and Marshalls Home Goods. I got a few things at A.C. Moore and a pair of boots at Marshalls. Brixton, for the very first time ever, did not cry one single bit on the way there or on the way back. It was so weird and wonderful.

Once we got home, I was already thinking about food. I asked Guav what he would like me to prepare for dinner, and he said, "I don't even know why you're trying to worry about that. It's Mother's Day. I've got everything under control." And he certainly did. He prepared an amazing dinner for us-- some sort of herbed unchicken, potatoes and veggies with wild rice and a mango and cream popsicle from Trader Joe's for dessert. My husband is the best.We were hoping Brixton would bust out with his first "mama" that day, but that didn't happen. Still, it was such a lovely Mother's Day. Yummy food, crafts, books, shopping, cuddles and kisses all from my two favorite guys ever. I am so lucky.

Guav pointed out that for the last five or so weeks, the only time I post anything is on Mondays. He's right. It's the only day of the week I feel obligated to post anything, and I think I've done a good job being consistent with it. So good in fact, that I think I'm ready to take the next step and introduce another series later this week so that I'll get to posting at least two times weekly. Yay!

Today I made a list. I'm turning 29 in about three months, and I wanted to write down some things I'd like to accomplish before I meet the final year of my 20's. So here we go...

As I previously mentioned, my baby boy will be turning one in just under three months, and I've been quite busy planning his birthday party. Let me tell you two things I've decided we must have at this party: balloons and cake. The challenge here is that I can't very well make a cake that Guav can't eat with Brixton on his first birthday, so the cake will have to be vegan. Oh, and I should probably mention that I've never baked a cake before. Well, there's a first time for everything, and today's the day for my very first cake.

I did some internet digging and found some vegan cake recipes I'd like to try out in advance so that I don't ruin his cake the night before his first birthday. I wanted to start with something simple so I decided on this cake recipe and used this for the frosting, because I recognized and had most of the ingredients on hand.

It's amazing how such a straight forward recipe can really be quite complicated to a first time cake baker.

Step one: Preheat at 350.
Did it. Good for me. I'm awesome.

Step two: Line pan with parchment paper. Grease and flour pan.
Umm wait... what?

So after watching a video on how to line a round cake pan with parchment paper and reading tutorials on how to grease and flour a pan and also invert a cake, I made it happen.


I was pretty proud of myself after I inverted the cake and spread the frosting on top. I was like, wow, my first cake and it doesn't look half bad. Then I went to slice a piece for Guav. Resistance. Oh ya. I forgot to remove the parchment paper. Asshole. I blame it on the distractions:
Guav and I laughed about it, I took off the paper and re-iced the cake. Delicious. I can't wait to make another.

I know there are a ton of tried and truly amazing vegan cake recipes out there so if anyone has any suggestions, I'd love to hear them! Happy Makeday people! I think tomorrow I'll post about my very first Mother's Day.
xxoo.

I guess you can say that I've been kind of obsessed with gathering plans for Brixton's 1st birthday party. Confession: I've actually been planning since his half birthday. I mean, not really planning, just bookmarking my favorite ideas and getting inspired. Well anyway, apparently, I'm not the only one in my family who does this. My sister's been planning my nephew Micah's 3rd birthday party since February-- his actual birthday isn't until July.

So Micah's going to have a superhero party, and my sister wants to make each guest their very own cape. She asked me to search around for a good pattern for her to use, and I stumbled upon a cute tute I decided to use for today's makeday project.

I used an old t-shirt, some felt, scissors and embroidery thread and put it together while Brixton watched Raffi. It took me a little more than half an hour but only because my neighbor Liz came by and distracted me a little. Also, I had to cut the letters and sew each of them on. The cape itself took very little time to cut. It's pretty brilliant actually-- easy and sooo cute. Check out my little superhero.


Being a superhero is serious business which calls for a serious face.

Did anybody else out there make something today?

Brixton and I are feeling much better this week. Last week, he started forming some sort of rash on his arms and for a minute we were worried he had gotten something called the coxsackie virus (worst name for anything, ever), because his girlfriend who lives next door had it the week before. I took him to his pediatrician, and she assured us it wasn't coxsackie and that it was probably just an allergic reaction. We haven't changed laundry detergents and he still only takes breast milk so I still have no idea what caused it, but it didn't seem to bother him and now it's almost all gone. Anyways, here he is going crazy on the paper they use to cover the benches in the exam room.

And here's a picture from this weekend just because. Aren't my guys so handsome?

Now on to makeday. I love mangoes. Like, really love them. Fresh, dried, freeze dried, pureed, pickled, frozen, whatever. I love it all, but today had me wanting it in ice cream form. Problem with that is that I don't know how to make ice cream. Don't you need an ice cream maker machine of some sort to make ice cream? Whatever. I figured mango popsicles would be easier and satisfy me just the same.

I found a bag of frozen mangoes in my freezer and threw them into the blender with soy milk and mango nectar. This is when I discovered that my Brixton absolutely hates the blender. The sound of it scared him to little pieces, and he cried every time I turned it on. So I picked him up, held him through it and I ended up with a batch of cold mango yumminess that I had every intention of pouring into ice trays to make popsicles. Until of course I realized I'm not that picky. Why wait hours for popsicles when I can have a delicious mango shake right now?

So that's what I did. And that's what I made. It was perfect, and I was very pleased with it. Brixton didn't even try it, but he looks to be pretty pleased as well.

So I pretty much was ill all weekend long, and I guess I passed whatever bug I had to Brixton. My poor little guy. I was ready to admit that I didn't get to make anything today seeing as I've been attending to my sick baby all day, but then I realized that's not exactly true. Today I was making my baby feel better.

This is pretty much what we did all day long:

Snuggletown. Population: 2