Monday, Munday, Mondae

What I love about Monday:

Opening the mail twice (Saturday's & Monday's)

Quiet in the office while Monday morning meeting is going on

Prospects for the rest of the week

Clean office and empty trash cans

Yoga

There is a yoga studio about three blocks from my house. It caught my eye right away. For the past nine months that I've lived there, I've driven past it at least twice a day. Finally, I made it to my first class last night.

Maybe yoga is a little less trendy than it was several years ago, but living in the midwest it's not unusual to be a little behind trend. Yoga still meant fresh, young, fabulous, and female in my mind, and a month ago I decided it was time to sign up.

Let me back track a little. I'm the only woman in my office. Mostly it's fine. I have great friends and two sisters that I hang out with all the time on the weekends. But sometimes I do feel a little gender isolation. I go to work for eight hours with five guys and then go home to my husband, a different kind of guy, but still a guy. So I was hoping yoga would be a way to reconnect with the gal pal in me during the week and forge a few new friendships.

So before I went to class, I had this whole fantasy giggling with the other girls at something funny the yoga instructor did, our bonding eventually turning into a ritual to go out for drinks after class ever week. Of course going out with my new friends would open some doors for me and eventually land me a new fab job where I could work with equally cool people who did trendy stuff like yoga/hot yoga/power yoga or whatever the latest yoga trend is supposed to be.

My plan hasn't quite panned out yet. Last night during class I began to suspect that maybe I don't really even like other women. I guess what I was looking for was the fun, independent single girl type. Instead there was the mom who smelled like an ashtray and her daughter who was still in highschool, the girl who is potentially close to my age, but just had a baby (eww!), the middle aged lady, and the boy who helped me set up and then did this weird upside down triangle pose hanging from a strap on the wall. I just don't see any friendships being forged here!

In conclusion, my alterior yoga purpose has already been defeated. However, the actual work out was fantastic. My whole body is sore today, but in that almost pleasant post-work out way. And I didn't have to break a sweat or anything!

Baby Shower: DIY Diaper Cake

Looking for the perfect centerpiece or memorable gift for the next baby shower you throw or attend? Try making a diaper cake so delectable, you'll want to eat it all up, and the mom to be will just eat it up too. Both functional and whimsical, a diaper cake is a thoughtful and fun shower gift you can put together in one afternoon.

If you are a bit on the creative and crafty side, you can really take your diaper cake to the next level with colors, themes, and accessories. If you're not so craftily inclined, it's still an easy project and you may even surprise yourself with your creation. When putting together materials, you might draw inspiration from the colors that have been picked out for the nursery, the style of the shower invitation, or maybe the shower has a theme with which you can coordinate.

Supplies you will need:
· White disposable diapers, in size of your preference (around 100, depending on the size of your cake)
· Wide Ribbon (1 1/2 to 2 inches)
· Rubber bands - large, medium, and small
· Diaper pins or hot glue gun
· Colored tissue paper or paper shreds
· Round or square piece of cardboard to act as the base of the cake

Optional:
Cake accessories/toppers - these are up to you. Cake accessories could range from a teddy bear or doll as a cake topper to several smaller objects placed around the cake such as socks, onesies, diaper cream, thermometer, rattle...infinite possibilities here!

You will also need three or four cylinders of various sizes to act as the frames for your cake layers. Different sized bowls, paper towel roll, or any other cylindrical shaped item you have in your household.

Step 1 - Making the Layers
Take your largest bowl, turn it upside down and place an extra large rubber band around it. Place the first diaper under the rubber band, hugging the bowl horizontally. The bottom edge of the diaper should be flush with the lip of the bowl to facilitate easy removal.

Place the next diaper under the rubber band. Have the smooth edge (where the baby's bottom would be) overlap the first diaper. Continue this pattern so that only the smooth edges of the diapers are showing until they are fanned out evenly around the diameter of the bowl.
Roll up a diaper lengthwise and secure it with a rubber band. It should stand at the same height as the diapers around the bowl. Roll several more diapers and place them in a tight circle around the first diaper. Continue to make the circle larger until it is about the size of the opening of your bowl.

Place the bowl over the circle of diapers. Now, remove the bowl by lifting it up and sliding off the outside layer of diapers. The rubber band should hug the pretty outside layer to the inside layer. This is the base layer of your cake. Add or remove diapers to the inner circle to make the base larger or smaller.

Repeat the steps above using sequentially smaller and smaller bowls. A paper towel roll may suffice for the top layer, depending on the size of your cake.

Step 2 - Decorating
Use your ribbon to cover the rubber band that secures each cake layer. Secure the ends with colorful diaper pins or hot glue.
Stack layers on the cardboard plat form. You may want to wrap the platform with wrapping paper to match the cake first.
Put paper shreds or tissue paper between the layers to act as the "icing".

Step 3 - Final Touches
The icing on the cake will be those other little items you picked up for the nearly-newborn. Get creative with placing around the cake little socks, hair bows, bibs, pacifiers or whatever goodies you have for the new addition. Some items can be tucked into the rubber band behind the ribbon. A cute teddy bear or pretty baby doll can make great cake toppers.

Step 4 - You Take the Cake!
Get ready to be showered with compliments on your creation as you walk into the festivities for the little newcomer!

Brunch: Hodak's

Somehow, I managed to make it out on a Friday night. I was very reluctant to go, but sometimes you end up making the best of a bad situation and end up with a fun night. And sometimes you end up compensating for your lack of expectations for the night with beer.

Luckily, our brunch plan for the next day was Hodak's for fried chicken. Nothing helps a hang over like fried chicken, crinkle fries and a giant pepsi. I really thought I might throw up on our way there, but I knew what awaited me was sweet releif. So, I just gripped the door handle and took really deep breaths until we drove far enough down Gravois to get there. After two drumsticks encased in a crispy shell fried to perfection and about five pepsis, I was cured. I was a new woman and the house was spotless by the time my in-laws arrived later that afternoon.

Brunch: Rooster

My friends and I have been on a brunch streak lately. When Friday night plans kept collapsing on themselves over and over again due to our inability to stay awake past 10 anymore, we resorted to a mid-Saturday gathering. And sometimes Saturday afternoon begins to look a lot like Friday night.

A few weeks ago we decided on Rooster in downtown St. Louis for crepes. I will eat just about anything, and I eat fast, so I can't really critique food. Mine was delicious, but I will say that about a lot of things. Probably the stand-out at Rooster was their extensive list of Bloody Marys and mimossas. Also, it was a really cute and cozy place with exposed brick and several sketches of roosters and chickens everywhere that looked like they were done by school kids.

After round one of drinks we were feeling pretty wonderful, so we decided to head up the street to an irish pub for more drinks. Things probably would have escalated to a full-blown bar crawl had some of us not had other engagements that day. The point is, Saturday day can be just as fun as Friday night. Besides, who doesn't love a little day drinking?