Well, it may have started out feeling more like January than April, but my favorite month of the year sure ended on a beautiful note. The past week or so has been gorgeous, and I’m hoping that May will bring even more sunny spring weather. Here are my favorites from the month.
Favorite dinner – Shawarma-Spiced Grilled Chicken with Garlic Yogurt Sauce from Skinnytaste. This chicken had such good flavor and I love a yogurt sauce. We made ours into wraps with naan bread but I think these would be good over some rice too.
Favorite breakfast – Oatmeal Power Breakfast Muffins from Life According to Steph. My ideal breakfast is something I can make ahead, something that is freeze-able if I have extra, and something that doesn’t leave me wanting to break into my chocolate stash before 9am. These muffins fit the bill on all counts–I made a batch on Sunday afternoon and had breakfast for the week plus several to freeze, and these little muffins were nice and hearty. Plus, the chocolate chips make them feel like a treat. Jona gave them two (chocolatey) thumbs up as well.
Favorite dessert – Flourless Oatmeal Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies from Ambitious Kitchen. Can you tell we’re big peanut butter people at my house? These cookies, made with no flour or butter, were a little healthier than your average cookie (although still had plenty of chocolate and brown sugar) but were delicious. To me they taste like a peanut butter cookie and an oatmeal chocolate chip cookie had a love child.
Favorite beer – Boulevard Cranberry Orange Radler. When it’s cold out all I want to drink is red wine, but when the weather starts warming up I start craving beer and crisp white wine. I went to dinner with some friends this month and they had this Cranberry Orange Radler on the menu and it was so refreshing! It was fruity but not sweet, which is what I like.
Favorite podcast episode – The Nos of Spring from The Popcast. While I disagree with Knox and Jamie’s sentiments about spring (which happens to be my favorite season), their conversation had me cry-laughing at times. I’m not really up on pop-culture but I find this podcast so entertaining and fun to listen to.
Favorite book – Siblings Without Rivalry. My Happiness Project focus this month was parenting, and chose this book to read as I heard good things about it from many sources. It was filled with helpful, practical advice on how to encourage healthy sibling relationships. There are several things I’m trying to implement now with young kids (like not comparing them and not letting them get stuck in “roles”–like Jona being the “helper” and Violet being the “destructor” even though that’s often what happens). Also, I’m glad I bought the Kindle version of this book (rather than having to return it to the library) because I know I’ll be referring to it again and again as the kids get older.
Favorite picture book – Animals Should Definitely Not Wear Clothing. This was a picture book win. It’s pretty short, a perfect mix of clever and silly to please both adults and kids, and the illustrations are perfection.
Favorite brunch – Waffle Sliders at Urban Table. Breakfast is my favorite, so for my birthday I wanted to try somewhere new (to us) for Sunday brunch. I had Waffle Sliders with a Midnight Espresso to drink, and Aaron had Yellow Cake Pancakes with Fried Chicken. Yum! Violet took down a mini waffle and a big plate of fruit and Jona also had yellow cake pancakes but his had chocolate chips.
Favorite post on Shea Lennon – 35 at 35: A Year’s Worth of Fun. I’m excited for this fun-things-only to-do list to help me feel more excitement about celebrating my 35th year. I already checked off two things on my list (new brunch discovery and Royals game) this weekend!
Favorite wardrobe additions – The most-worn award goes to my new American Eagle jeans, but I’m most looking forward to wearing my J. Crew Factory striped skirt.
Favorite book-club pick – The Four Tendencies. I finished that book in March, but my book club bud Becky and I had our “meeting” this month over breakfast. The book itself was just an okay read for me, but we had such great discussion about our own tendencies and the tendencies of our husbands and other family members.
Favorite self-care splurge – Pedicure. On my birthday I took the day off and treated myself to a pedicure so my feet are ready for sandal season. It’s not something I do too often, but it was really nice!
Favorite social outing – Royals game with my girlfriends. Over the weekend I had a girls day with some of my friends I’ve known since junior high. We have been trying to plan an outing a couple of times a year (with some more impromptu dinners in between when we can). Last fall we went to a couple of local wineries and did wine tastings, this time we decided to go to a Royals game. Unfortunately, our team is pretty terrible right now, but we had fun tailgating and enjoying the gorgeous weather. We didn’t watch too much baseball, so there wasn’t much to be disappointed about, other than our sunburns from sitting too long on the hot blacktop!
