Irish Soda Bread

I'm not usually a huge fan of St. Patrick's Day. It seems kind of silly. But this year I felt the urge to make this yummy Irish Soda Bread, inspired by some samples at New Seasons. Also inspired by the samples at New Seasons... I will be making Reuben Casserole for the big day. Yum. I tasted some while getting groceries today and it was so good!!! I might even try to bake these amazing-sounding Chocolate-Guinness-Whiskey cupcakes with Bailey's frosting I saw on Sassy Radish made with three different types of Irish booze. Mmmmmmm.

So Ben and I made the bread together this afternoon. He likes to help cook, and he's a pretty good helper. It turned out yummy. But not as crumbly or sweet as the bread we tasted at New Seasons... which I think I liked better.

If you live in Portland, drink some coffee @ Floyd's.

I love Floyd's. First, it has a drive through. I don't know that there is another place where you can get Stumptown Coffee without leaving your car. It's pretty effing fabulous when you have a sleeping baby and don't want to wake him up and drag him into the coffee shop.

Anyway I used to drive by Floyd's every single day on the way to school, which was awesome. Now it's not on the way to anything anymore, but if I want coffee and Liam's sleeping and it's even remotely close to where I'm going I go through the good ol' drive through. And I just had to dedicate a blog post to Floyd's because the other day I got coffee there and they were so. nice. As usual.

I got my americano, and milliseconds after the girl handed it to me and said "Careful, it's super hot!" the lid came off and the ENTIRE thing landed on the floor of my car. Luckily I managed to swing my legs out of the way. But I asked her for some napkins, feeling like an ass, and she made me a whole new cup, for free. Yay. It reminded me of a couple years ago, when I forgot my wallet and the girl said to just pay next time. I thought it was because I came through every day, but she said she would have done it even if she didn't know me.

Anyway Floyd's also makes me feel all sentimental because it reminds me of living on Belmont, back when I was first falling in love with Jason. and with Portland. I remember when Jason had sleepovers at my house he'd call me on his way home/to work and he was usually going through the drive through at Floyd's to get his coffee. And I remember another time when I was getting coffee on the way to school and just marveling that I now lived in a place where not only could you get coffee that was not Starbucks in a drive-through, there were vegan baked goods to go along with that coffee. I'm not vegan anymore, but I still appreciate it.

I love Floyd's. Awesome coffee, awesome people... yay.

best french toast ever.

This morning I made french toast with challah bread.

It was sooo yummy. I don't think I will ever bother making french toast with regular bread again. I saw this challah bread with cinnamon and raisins in the New Seasons bakery when I was getting groceries yesterday and decided it needed to be my breakfast. I cut the slices pretty thick, and made the batter with eggs, milk, cinnamon, and vanilla. Yum.

This used to be a craft blog with a bit about my kids. Now its turned into a kid blog with the occasional crafty post.

Oh well. This is the only crafty thing I've done for a while, so I'll post it. It's a shrug... that I love, but I don't like the way it fits. It ends right at the armpits, and I was envisioning it having some boob coverage. I'm contemplating ripping some of it out and trying to add a little to the sides... but that might not work very well, so I think maybe I'll just try to learn to love it anyway. Or maybe rip the entire thing out (SAD.) and try again, and see if I can make it a little bigger. The pattern is for one size.

I LOVE the yarn though, and the fancy little pattern, it kind of looks like seashells or something. It's handpainted Dream in Color yarn in Black Parade. I made this shrug and you can see from the picture it looks like it should come around a bit more on the sides. Lies.

Anyway here it is. I couldn't get a good picture of it on, because Liam got tired of my photoshoot.

rollin'

Liam is already a roller! Yes, he's fabulous.
He did it once at 3 weeks old, not on purpose but totally with his own baby-power.
And then last Wednesday, at exactly 7 weeks old he did it on PURPOSE! And he's done it again 3 times since then, once a few days ago and twice in a row tonight. He's magical!
He's also found his hands and can get his fists into his mouth now. Amazing baby.

Ignore my crazy-mommy narration...


He's gotten much more accurate since this video was taken.