May 18 Friday Fave Five

Time for another Friday Fave Five.  Once again, it needs to be quick, I guess the end of the week is a busy, busy time for me.  Forgive me any editing errors, it's pretty much going to be a one shot deal.

In no particular order, five of my favorite things from the past week:

1.  Mother's Day.  Being a parent, and, okay I'll say it, being a mother in particular, at least the kind of mother I am, is a big job.  A lot of the time, ideally, it's a somewhat selfless job.  You give and give and give and give and I'm completely okay with that.  I love my kiddos and I love that I get to do this my way and (at least mostly) be the kind of mother I want to be.  However, it is so wonderful to have a day like Mother's Day come around where my kids and my hubby stop and say thank you.  It means a lot.  We hosted a Mother's Day brunch and my parents and three of my four kids were there, plus my two grandkids.  I thought it was wonderful.  We all had a good time, the food was good, the company was better, it was almost perfect.  Rebekah and Lori being able to be here would have been the icing on the cake, but it was wonderful as it was nonetheless.  After spending the day relaxing and enjoying each other we went out to eat at one of our favorite special occasion restaurants.  It was a perfect way to end the day.
2.  Flowers.  Look how pretty!  For Mother's Day my parents brought me a few goodies, and this planter is probably my favorite.  So beautiful.  I smile every time I see it. 
3. New Recipes. I tried 8 new recipes last week, 7 of which I reviewed here.  I didn't think a whole lot about it until a friend commented on that being a lot of new recipes.  She's right!  Cooking and baking have turned into creative outlets for me and I really enjoy seeking out new things to try.  It's a lot of fun and finding something new we appreciate is very rewarding.
4. Baking.  I have wheat sandwich bread rising, pizza dough chilling in the fridge and cookie dough ready to be baked later this weekend.  A very successful baking, well, dough making, session indeed.  I enjoy it so much, it's very calming and de-stressing for me.  For Valentine's Day I told Jacob and Julianna they could pick any treat they wanted.  Julianna picked chocolate lava cakes and I've been too intimidated to make them, though I'm getting closer.  When we chose the restaurant for Mother's Day we picked the place that makes an incredible chocolate lava cake and they definitely lived up to their reputation.  Jacob, smarty that he is, has been biding his time "trying to decide" while I made all kinds of treats.  Finally, he decided he wanted decadent chocolate chip cookies.  That's the dough that's chilling and I know when he gets home from a boy scout service project tomorrow clearing weeds, invasive plants and poison ivy from a local prairie, he's going to be awfully excited to eat them.  :)  Likewise, he's been hinting for quite a while now about how much he enjoys homemade pizza so even though Mark and I have a date tonight and it was tempting to give the kids the quickest, easiest thing for dinner I could think of.  I knew how much Jacob would enjoy a pizza though and it won't take that much longer than something else, so the dough is resting away.  Again, a little thing that will bring much joy.
5. Dates.  So exciting!  Mark and I have a date, a birthday gift card and no idea what we'll do, but we'll have fun together doing it and, with a little bit of luck, we'll be out past bedtime, a very rare treat indeed.  I'm very much looking forward to stealing away for a few hours.

Hope you had a wonderful week filled with favorite things too.  Thank you to Susanne for hosting.