Memorial Weekend

We had a fun, busy weekend. We started off Saturday with our 5yo playing on daddy's ipad and mama and baby sleeping in a bit. After the baby woke up, she and I cuddled and "talked" on the bed. As I was talking, she gave me, not one, but TWO big ol' smiles! After that, we decided to go to the zoo! We'd been to the zoo part here in Cleveland, but not the Rainforest, so we figured we ought to go check it out. We took the double stroller to put both kids in, but, naturally, the baby didn't want to (and really, who can blame her, when the other choice is being all cocooned in the Moby right up on mama?). So our 5yo was in the stroller and the baby in the Moby. We had quite a trek just to get to the gate - it being Memorial Weekend, everybody and their uncle had the same idea - THE ZOO!!! Not as many went into the Rainforest, it wasn't very crowded so was nice and relaxing. They have misters in there to make it seem all foggy like you're actually in the Amazon or some such place. There was so much to see, the thing that tickled me the most, though, was the "lipstick tree"

Yep, that’s it’s real name *grin*. I also loved the bats and spiders and snakes :)

None of my spider pictures turned out very well :( My daughter loved the fish:

After the zoo, we went downtown to check out the guitars for “Guitar Mania”. Different companies sponsor local artists to paint them, then the guitars will be put on permanent display around the city. This is the one for Marine Week:

I love the detail on this one called “Steampunk Six String"

And I like the antique-ish look of this one:

After that, we searched for Honey Hut to get some ice cream, but no dice. Instead we found Mitchell’s Homemade Ice Cream. It was yummy, but I don’t think the dairy agreed with my baby’s stomach…a few hours after I had the ice cream, my baby was crying and not very happy. This isn’t the first time it’s happened, so I desperately NEED to find some place (even a grocery store would work) that sells soy ice cream!!! I can’t have a summer with no ice cream! And apparently I can’t have dairy :(.

Sunday we went to the Greek Festival. It’s difficult finding vegetarian fare at places like that, but we did have spanakopita, orzo and roasted potatoes…and, of course, BAKLAVA! My 5yo loves salad, so guess what she got? Yep, and all the ladies serving up the food were super impressed *pats self on back* *cheesy grin*.

We decided to have a picnic on Monday, but figured every park would be filled to overflowing and getting a grill would be next to impossible, so we had a “porch picnic”. I made yummy vegan potato salad, and we had vegan hotdogs.

I found a recipe for vegan brownies – they’re super yummy and moist, and you’d never guess their secret ingredient – black beans! Yep, surprised ya, didn’t I?

It even has chocolate chips in it :), you can include walnuts if you want, I just didn’t feel like chopping them at that moment. They whip up in about 10 minutes, if you have all your mise en place.

After our picnic, my hubby took our 5yo to the pool and the baby and I chilled at the house. All this excitement and go-go-going over the past few days has worn the poor little girl out – she’s been sleeping and sleeping, and doing it so peacefully *happy smile*.