Happy and Distracted

We all have defense mechanisms that trigger us to do things to either protect our hearts or our minds from either feeling something or thinking about something.  Normally I would say that you need to just feel what you feel and think about what you think about, but I’m not going to say that today.  Sometimes you feel something for so long and you think about something for so long that you just need a little distraction that tells your brain, ‘we are going to focus on something outside of YOU for a little bit!’  Some people go for a drink (trust me I’m one of those people), some people go to the gym (Lord don’t I wish I was one of those), some sit down and eat (yup, been there many times)…..blah blah blah….you get the point – we all do something to distract ourselves. 

For me, the two things that I LOVE doing are baking and crafts

Insert Banana Bread - Something that makes me happy and relaxed is baking and one thing that I seem to make more than anything else is banana bread.  Amazingly enough I have never ended up eating the bread (maybe a piece here and there) because I am always making it for other people and to be honest, 99% of the time I make it for my friend Bethany.  For me there is something so therapeutic in baking but then I don’t want to be left with the finish product so I must give everything away (well let’s be real here….I don’t give everything away) and Bethany lives literally 50 feet from my front door and banana bread seems to be something she really enjoys so it’s basically a match made in heaven….I bake…she eats.

You wanna now the recipe?   This one actually came from Bethany and I keep losing it and asking for it over and over again so maybe this way I will always have it =)

Ingredients:

3 or 4 ripe bananas (I normally use 5), smashed

1/3 cup melted butter

1 cup sugar

1 egg, beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon baking soda

Pinch of salt

1 ½ cups of all purpose flour

1.       Start with the mushy bananas that basically slide out of the peel…sounds super gross, right?!?!

2.       With a wooden spoon, mix the melted butter into the mashed bananas

3.       Mix in the sugar, egg and vanilla

4.       Sprinkle in baking soda and salt

5.       Add the flour

6.       Pour into a buttered (I use Pam) 4x8 inch loaf pan

7.       Bake 1 hour on 350 (unless you have convection then you can bake it for about 50 minutes)

SSOOOOOOOOO  good!!

And now on to crafting!! I love making things for friends and over the weekend a girlfriend of mine, Kimber had her baby shower for her 2^nd baby so it was the perfect opportunity for me to get a tiny bit craft WITHOUT overwhelming myself, because turns out I can do that to myself real easily.

Kimber and her husband have decided to not find out if they are having a boy or a girl, so I had to keep the gift gender natural and still manage to make something cute.  Kimber is also a pretty crafty girl and loves fun things and ideas that she can use in the future so with that I hit the internet in search of something cute, easy and something she could actually use once the baby gets here.  And this is what I found……CUPCAKE ONESIES!

I saw this picture and thought…..I GOTTA MAKE THAT!  I mean who can't use onesies and receiving blankets? Done and done!

Remember, since I couldn’t make these ones gender specific they lack COLOR oh and my camera sucks!  Either way Kimber said she loved the gift and it put a smile on her face so I was pleased =)

If you are interested in making your own cupcake onesies, which I think would be AWESOME baby shower decorations, visit http://littlebirdiesecrets.blogspot.com/2011/02/baby-onesie-cupcake-tutorial-and-sweet.html for a tutorial.