Hello, it's been a while...

(Yes I totally went through the Adele song while typing this heading.)

Hi everyone! I am so sorry its been sooooo long since I've blogged. I have finally decided to do this. I mean REALLY do this. I have taken a turn in my life and want need to blog again. Seriously, its been a long time coming and I hoping you'll join me on this journey. 
I have been struggling with figuring out my identity since having kids. For the last 7 years I have mostly been known as Chase and Zoe's mom. Though I am still their mom, I am now realizing that I need to be Liz again. Somewhere along the way I lost myself to motherhood, everything I did or didn't do was based on my children's needs. I never made time for me. I felt guilty for wanting something for myself. Well, no more! Actually I am still struggling will feeling guilty but I now know that in order for me to be a good wife and mother, I need to know who I am and be okay with wanting time to myself. I am looking forward to starting this new chapter in my book, well in this case in my Blog. 
How about you? Did you too lose yourself to anything? How did you "find" yourself again? or are you still struggling? I love to hear about it. 


  

Buddy is 5!!

My first born turned 5! It is definitely bittersweet for me. I can't believe that I am a mother of a boy now, he is no longer a toddler, but a full blown rambunctious boy!! WAAAAA!!! It has been such journey for me and Papa Chef.

The day he was born

 His first Birthday

His second

 third

fourth

 and now fifth

Summer's almost over!!!

It's nearly the end of July and our summer is winding down. Buddy is going to be starting kindergarten in 2 weeks! That's right 2 weeks!! eeek! Where has the time gone? Oh that's right, it has been spent doing things like;

 Eating donuts at the end of year festival

 Lots of trips to Joe's for our favorite 'Joelatti' Which is Italian ice a.k.a. water ice to you east coasters and soft serve.

 Lots of time in the pool!,

 A Ridiculous Obstacle Challenge 5K,

 Plenty of ice cream faces,

And a Dance recital, which is happening this weekend.  

I have been also planning Buddy's 5th birthday and getting him ready for kindergarten. Which I'll be blogging about of course.  What have you all been up to this summer? Ours was definitely a short one but jammed packed! 

Happy Fourth of July!

I hope everyone had a safe and fun filled Fourth!! We (my kids and myself) went to a good friend's house to BBQ and celebrate! I was in charge of desserts so I made a variation of this cake from Smitten Kitchen, which she adapted from Martha Stewart, and these cookies from The Pioneer Woman they are always a hit! Then we got ready for the fireworks! Our friends live on top of a hill with panoramic views of Los Angeles. The only thing we missed was the hubster. He unfortunately had to work. *sigh* The life of a chef.

Strawberry Summer Cake

Malted Chocolate Chip Cookies

My promise to you all.

It has been such a long time since I blogged. I am REALLY REALLY bad at it and I'm kinda embarrassed because my friend Ruby over at mycakies keeps on mentioning me so everyone who clicks on my link gets an old blog post.

I AM SO SORRY!!

I promise to blog more and get things going over here for you all... Lets consider this a mid-year resolution to document my life as a crazy mom and wife just trying to make life fun as possible for my wee ones.

This past weekend we celebrated my youngest wee ones birthday. It was a themed party as usual and this year happened to be the Wizard of OZ. We love the movie and watch every year on Christmas. Here is our family photo. I will post more about the party soon!! We are still recuperating from all the festivities!

the easiest summer cake ever!! Thanks to Smitten Kitchen.

In the last few weeks I have been doing a late spring cleaning and trying to get the 'JUNK" out of my life, so I started with cleaning our garage (with help of course.) Two weeks and countless garbage piles later...I can actually see across my garage. I gave MOST of my baby stuff away.. still hanging on to the pack and play and a bouncer...wishful thinking or delusional? not sure which yet. :)  But in the mix of it all I was in dyer need of some home baked goodness, So I turned to my favorite cooking blog Smitten Kitchen and came across this awesomely easy and very delicious recipe summer strawberry cake. Needless to say it satisfied my hankering that I have made it twice again already! Not to mention some of my friends have also made it numerous times as well!! This is definitely a recipe I will be using again and again again:) I have tried it with black berries and raspberries, I wonder how it would be with peaches? if any of you do try pleas let me know!!

the fresh strawberries

the finished product

the blackberry/raspberry version
before the oven

the finished blackberry/raspberry yumminess