Day 13: My Earliest Childhood Memory

Beautiful graphic from Orange You Lucky

I remember living with my Mom and Dad in a little blue house in Clinton, MD. My Mom would watch one of our neighbor's little girls from time to time and we would play together. Her name was Mary. I remember one very vivid memory from this time, and I'm not sure what about it makes it stick out as it felt to me like a pretty normal day. I must have been about 3 years old.

Mary and I were sitting on the couch with my Mom and she was watching TV. Mary and I were doing my Mom's hair. We must have put at least 20 barrettes and hair clips in her hair and both of us agreed that the more barrettes we put in, the more beautiful her hair was turning out.

There was a knock at the door and my Mom got up to see who it was and then realized her appearance in front of the adult staring at her from the outside of the door. Mary and I were giggly little toddlers on the couch. And I remember my Mom being not embarrassed, but proud of her hair do.

I can imagine being in my Mother's place now and turning beet red in her situation, but not her. To this day, not much embarrasses my Mother.

Looking back at this day now, I think it taught me to wear my children's creations proudly. And I do, my kids have artwork proudly displayed all over this house. <3

.....

Being Mother's Day and all, I've been thinking a lot about my Mom. Growing up, I remember my Mom working a lot. She has always been a selfless person and all her hard work has always been for someone else. For her family mostly, but she's also a big sucker and will give to random people that ask, children's charities, and find ways to help out local families she's heard are in need.

And when she did have a day off of work, she did not rest. She spent her quality time off work doing something fun with us, dressing us up and heading out for some dance performance (we were a family of cloggers), or going to one of many family functions.

My Mom taught me the value of family, the importance of hard work and that being a mother means making sacrifices. But what I didn't learn until after I had my own children was that those sacrifices are made willingly and happily and we, as mothers, wouldn't have it any other way.

Happy Mother's Day to anyone that can be called Mommy. xoxo

<3, Tabi :D

Vegan Pizza!!

I know, Lisa already told me... it looks like a giant goldfish shaped pizza.

This isn't a food blog post, so I won't post my recipe yet, but...

This was one yummy pizza I put together tonight. It was A LOT of work, but all that work made me super duper proud of my awesome vegan pizza.

Whodathunk that pizza would be 'hard'?? Well, the sauce was homemade. I made the 'mozzarella cheese' (a concoction of cashews, tofu and a bunch of other spices). I made the 'parmesan topping' (walnuts and nutritional yeast concoction). And then chopping up veggies is always a challenge for me. It did take me about 2 hours, start to finish...

I realized, while taking a shower tonight, that I did accomplish a lot. I'm proud of what I did today. I should forgive myself for being a little yelly today to a couple of children who refused to listen.

Not only did I spend 2 hours cooking a pizza (not including the big vegan mess in the kitchen that needed to be cleaned), I also did Body Pump this morning, fed the children a healthy lunch, waited in pick up line, went grocery shopping, stopped by 'Lilly's Garden', washed all the sheets and put all the beds back together, cleaned up the children, read two bedtime books and had them all tucked in and asleep by 8:00.

That's why right now I'm indulging in a glass of Chardonnay and not feeling guilty about it.

My next planned vegan adventures: Stuffed Shells with Garlic Bread and then Seitan Stroganoff with steamed Brussels Sprouts.

At this pace, I don't see how I'm supposed to be a skinny vegan eating this way. ;)

<3, Tabi :D