I went on one of my ruthless closet cleaning rampages and donated more stuff last weekend. I need the closet space and there were clothes that I wasn’t wearing (and if I think about it too much I’ll probably regret giving some of the items up). I almost forgot that I bought these Loeffler Randall sandals last Fall when they were marked way down. I waited and waited till they went further on sale as the weather got colder, and then they were mine. I haven’t worn them yet and probably won’t for another week or so as there is rain in the forecast for 6 STRAIGHT days, including Flea day (seriously guys, not so funny anymore), but I really love them and cannot wait to pull them out of the closet for good.

Something about Spring and the fact that there is more room in my closet makes me want to shop for new and pretty things to wear. This will be the first summer in 2 years where I won’t be pregnant or nursing (you can’t really wear dresses without buttons when you’re nursing, for example) and I really want to buy some tops. I’ve allowed myself to make a birthday purchase recently, but I have to admit that I am trolling the online stores again, which is dangerous. Okay, am closing browser window to Shopbop right now so as not to tempt myself anymore, ugh.

Roast pork, scalloped potatoes (to use up some of the heavy cream that Mark accidentally bought too much of at DairyLand) and creamed spinach. Yeah, definitely not low-fat. Oh, and Claudine had a Polly-O string cheese for dinner (the only kind of cheese she’ll eat, by the way).

Just finished a piece of birthday cake that Mark baked today for Mala, our babysitter. White cake with caramel swirl filling and white chocolate buttercream. I feel a bit overdosed on sugar these days, but I do like me some cake. Mia, who usually licks off the frosting only and doesn’t touch the cake part, ate every little crumb, while Claudine refused her piece altogether (whose child is this??). People have been asking me if I’ve gained any weight since we started the business. Mark and I are fairly thin people with naturally high metabolism, so weight gain hasn’t ever been an issue, but after I tell people that I live with a pastry chef, the natural question that always follows is “and you’re not fat?”. The thing is, we don’t really eat a lot of sugar. And when you’re around it all the time, you crave it less. So weight gain, no, but the next visit to the dentist is something different all together. I am dreading it. Since we have to test taste each batch of sweets, we’ve resorted to brushing our teeth multiple times a day and have even gone so far as just tasting the sweets and spitting them out. Yeah, I know, sounds crazy.

Our kids don’t eat much sugar either. I feel like the sugar nazi most of the time because they never drink juice unless they’re at a party (Claudine has yet to have a sip, actually), and cookies and treats are given only a few times per week, if that. You’d think that having all these cookies around would make them crazy, but I think they’re used to it by now ’cause we’ll have whole baking sheets of cookies and brownies out and they pretty much ignore it. It’s like part of the landscape now and blends in with everything else.

I was hoping the cake would give me a sugar rush but I am very tired. I’ve got a lot of work ahead of me still for a deadline tomorrow, but I think I’m finally crashing from all those days of little sleep. Had a good day today. Art directed a photoshoot for a project (love watching professional photographers work - I mean, I like taking photos, but I’ve got nothing on them), and then came home and packed some cookies for the post office. Our gift boxes are selling and we’ve got a lot of work ahead for the weekend so I’m trying to get my freelance work done now. But of course I am still here…

You may already know this, but our daughter Claudine has evolved into quite the picky eater. It has gotten to the point where I now have to disguise some of her previously favored foods - she is that fickle. Her major food groups have narrowed down to plain pasta, rice, apples, and cheese-flavored snacks. Breakfast, however, is her favorite meal of the day so I do my best to cram as much nutrition into her breakfast as possible. She has not been liking bananas lately, but I always buy them anyway, so I made muffins with some overripe bananas the other morning. Muffins almost never get rejected by Claudine and with the addition of some whole wheat flour I actually feel like she is eating well.

Whole Wheat Banana Muffins (makes 12 muffins)

1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
2 bananas
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Combine flours, baking powder and salt in a bowl. Set aside. Beat the egg and bananas in an electric mixer with the paddle attachment until the bananas are coarsely pureed. Mix in the oil, milk and vanilla. Add the flour mixture and mix until just incorporated. Spray your muffin pan, or line with papers. Spoon the batter into the pan to fill each cavity two-thirds. Bake until done, maybe 15 to 20 minutes (I never use a timer, I just seem to sense when they are done). Cool for a few minutes before removing from the pan.

It wasn’t too long ago that I wrote this post about Claudine. But in a blink of an eye, she’s completely changed in the past month. Claudine was a late walker - she only started walking about 3 weeks ago at 17 months - and she never learned how to crawl (she did that funny butt scoot thing that no longer looked cute when she got bigger and taller). She’s more clingy and shy than Mia was at that age, and because of all these things, she just seemed to stay a little baby for a while longer than Mia, who walked at 11 months. But in the last 3 weeks she started walking, her verbal skills, which have always been good, has exploded, and she stopped nursing. I always thought it would be a nightmare to wean her, but it’s like she decided to grow up all at once when she learned how to finally walk.

I LOVE this age - and she is so much fun now. With only 3 weeks of standing upright behind her, she’s trying to run and chase her older sister in that funny, stiff way that toddlers do. They think they are running, but before they really learn how to run, they hoof it by walking really fast without bending the knees, arms often straight out in front of them. The girls are finally playing together now (and yes, fighting), giggling during after-bath naked chases around the apartment, twirling together in ring-around-the-rosie and having “conversations”. But with growing independence comes defiance and lately when I ask for a kiss, Claudine will turn around, toddle away and throw a “nooooo” over her shoulder as she glances back at me with squinty eyes. It’s bittersweet, really. Such a fun, fun age, but sad knowing that they won’t ever be this age again.

Our gift boxes for Mother’s Day are finally up in our etsy shop. We liked those rose and black thumbprint cookies Mark made the other day so much, we decided that those were going to be our special Mother’s Day cookie for our gift boxes. We’re thinking of adding it to our regular list of products when Mother’s Day is over (which means printing more labels, gah!). We haven’t gotten around to posting pictures or listing our sampler gift boxes over at the shop, but we do sell them at the Flea so this is a spin off of those, with extra goodies tucked inside and different packaging for Mother’s Day.

Speaking of Mother’s Day, we have never spent any Mother’s Day as a family since the kids have been born. Mother’s Day was one of the busiest, craziest, stressful days at the Boathouse and Mark would often leave for work super early and come home late (as opposed to Father’s Day which was like any other Sunday at the restaurant). So it was always just Mia and I at the playground, surrounded by mostly dads with their kids. Not that I minded spending the day with my kid, but, you know…would have been nice to have celebrated the holiday instead of looking on at other families having nice brunches or picnics together. Ironically, this year we will both be working at the Flea on Mother’s Day, so I suppose my wish for having a leisurely Mother’s Day brunch with our family is once again just a wish.

Mark has 2 kinds of handwriting. His real life handwriting is legible, but it’s not pretty. His chocolate writing, on the other hand, is. Weird, right? He’s made many custom cakes and birthday messages during his 5 year stint as Executive Pastry Chef at the Central Park Boathouse and I suppose with all that practice, and the fact that you have to write in script and take your time, you get pretty good. Mark’s not a sentimental person, but I am, so even though he doesn’t get nostalgic over his restaurant days, I do. We talked about him getting out of the biz for years, and I know it was the right decision now, but I can’t help but feel a wee bit nostalgic whenever I look at old photos of us at the Boathouse. We had 2 babies during his time there and many nice family meals. It really is one of those places in NYC that is transporting, especially in Spring when the park starts to paint itself green. It’s always awkward to go back to a job after you’ve quit, and maybe because I know we really won’t be going back - for awhile at least - it’s making me unreasonably nostalgic. Even Mia asks when we’re going back. I’m such a sap.

We’re trying to figure out some new cookie ideas for our Mother’s Day gift boxes. At the Flea, we sell sampler gift boxes with nice wraparound paper, a ribbon and a stick of cinnamon with small packages of all our products (except marshmallows). We’re planning on slightly different packaging for Mother’s Day and hope to have a special new product inside. Yesterday’s experiments didn’t turn out so great: a chai cheesecake brownie (too much going on), the macaroons (good, but really need to be baked in a professional oven with even heating so they get crispy on the outside) and a rose financier (fancy word for tea cake).

Mark decided to go back to the drawing board and made a rose & black pepper thumbprint cookie. The cookie is a shortbread with a hint of black pepper for some added spice with a rose jam filling. So far, so good. They’re suppose to cool so we can see how the jam firms up, but I snuck a piece while Mark and the girls were at the playground across the street. Hmmmm…I wonder if it needs some more black pepper…hmmm….better taste test one more to see…