Magnolia and Honeysuckle

The other day we headed to south Austin to eat lunch at Magnolia. On our way inside, Jackson and Olivia had to stop for a pic with Blue Lion.

I had the portabello mushroom quesadillas. I know quesadillas are not a difficult thing, but Magnolia makes the best quesadillas in town in my opinion.

Honeysuckle was in bloom as we strolled through our old hood after filling our bellies. One of nature's finest scents.

We stopped at a park with workout equipment and Jackson had to get in a few reps.

Olivia was like, "I'm in my cute boots, no workout for me."

This happened.

We love visiting south Austin. I hope it never changes too much.

Round Rock Chalk Walk

One afternoon not long ago, we headed up to the suburb of Round Rock, home of the Round Rock Chalk Walk. This was our first time attending, so I wasn't sure what to expect, but I heard it was fun for kids.

When we arrived, the chalk artists were still getting set up.

 So we walked down Main Street and admired all the sculptures we passed.

Blocky thing.

Cat with fiddle.

Lizard friend.

Jackson and Olivia warmed up their artist fingers by making postcards.

Then it was time to draw. They each got a square to themselves.

"I am making the sun."

The messier it is, the more fun it is.

We had dinner at Magnolia. I had the Flamingo sandwich with avocado, sprouts, tomato, Swiss cheese, and hummus, with a side of home fries.

The kids had syrup with a side of gingerbread pancakes.

Grandparents

My parents visited last week. They are very close to buying a home here. It will be nice when they get moved and the kids can spend more time with them. Olivia loves to sit and have Grandma fix her hair.

When I was little, my mom would braid my hair before I went to bed, so it would be wavy when I woke up. She hasn't lost her touch.

My parents always like to eat at Magnolia whenever they're in town. I had the stir fry with veggies and tofu. Always a good pick, and plenty of leftovers for lunch the next day!

Being from Detroit, the Texas summer heat is always an adjustment for my mom and dad. We did a lot of indoor activities to stay cool. One morning we hung out at the mall play area.

On my parents' last evening in town, we had dinner at Kerbey Lane. I had the cherry cheesecake pancakes.

Olivia had French toast. "Mommy, take a picture of my food, too!" she insisted. Future food blogger right here.

Family Day

I wish Tony was off work today, but he had to go in. So we had our family fun yesterday. First we went for a nice walk. Jackson wanted to push Olivia in the stroller.

When we passed by the fire station, he quickly forgot about pushing the stroller. He is fascinated by any vehicle with a siren.

We came to a strange sculpture, placed right in the middle of an intersection. The kids loved climbing on it. We thought it was an octopus...or maybe a spider? This is something I love about Austin. "Stick a giant sparkly spider thing in the middle of the street? Yes! Let's do it!"

I really didn't mean to give Jackson horns in this pic, haha.

Next we went to a park with a nice playground.

Finally we ate dinner at one of my favorites, Magnolia. I would eat there all the time if we lived closer. Unfortunately we are in another part of town these days. It is a special treat now. Olivia and I shared the Love Veggies. It's a big plate of veggies and rice, cooked in a garlic sauce. Zucchini, green pepper, onions, summer squash, mushrooms, and spinach. So good.

It looks like our winter is over for this year. That's fine with me. I love springtime. I can't believe we have been back in Austin almost a year. At the time, we thought moving back would make our lives perfect. That was silly -- there are always challenges. I had a couple of really rough months dealing with illnesses, anxiety, loneliness, and family drama.  But as spring arrives, things are definitely looking up. We are all in good health, I've made some friends in our new part of town, and Jackson and Olivia have been thriving in their new surroundings. Can't ask for much more than that. Now I am ready for some lovely spring weather and many more days spent outside with my three favorite people.

Easter and Recent Restaurant Meals

Hey all. Thank you for your well wishes last week. Stomach bugs suck. I hate puking. I didn't even puke when I was pregnant. I hope I don't get sick like that again for a long, long time. I am feeling much better now. Thanks again.

If you celebrate Easter, I hope you had an enjoyable one. This year my parents sent some Easter baskets for the kids to tear into when they woke up. These were the parent-pleasing kind of Easter baskets -- full of clothes and toys, no candy. I'm sure next year Jackson will be old enough to know that there ought to be some candy in that basket, and we will have a hyper little monkey on our hands.

We also colored a few eggs. Jackson was super serious about the whole process. It was a big deal. I was smiling at his looks of intense concentration.

He was quite proud of the finished product.

Olivia didn't know what to do with a bunch of eggs. I'm with you, lady.

Since we are not a fully vegan home, the eggs didn't go to waste. Tony made them into egg salad to eat for his lunches.

Since recovering, I've been back in the kitchen a little bit. But today, I thought I would post some pics of restaurant meals that we ate while we were living in the hotel and getting moved into our new house. We ate out a lot. Typically we try to only eat out once a week. But I don't feel bad about it at all. There are so many great Austin restaurants that I missed.

This was my first meal in Austin. Yes, it has cheese on it. In my excitement, I forgot that the veggie enchiladas from Chuy's arrive covered in cheese. So I forgot to tell the waiter "no cheese." No worries; it was easily scraped to the side. Olivia ate the beans and rice.

Watermelon mojito on the side. Oh yes.

While Chuy's is Tony's favorite Mexican restaurant in Austin, mine is Polvo's. They are awesome. They have like 16 different types of enchilada sauces. Not all vegan, but still. There's also a self-serve salsa bar with black salsa. The charred skins of roasted tomatoes is what makes it black. I've tried to duplicate it at home but I think there is some kind of unicorn magic involved. I can't stop eating it. Jackson knows what I'm talking about. He needed his own bowl.

I am not normally a person who goes to a restaurant and orders a salad, but I have dreams about the Michoacan avocado salad. Can you ever have too much avocado? I think not.

Another day, we were driving around looking at houses and I stopped to get smoothies for me and Jackson at Daily Juice, my favorite juice bar. I used to go to the one on Barton Springs that is just a juice bar, but there's another one further north that is an actual sit-down cafe and serves raw food. I've not eaten there but I need to try their food sometime. I've never been to any kind of raw cafe. Have you? How was it?

I had the El Paraiso, with mango, pineapple and other good stuff. It was turned green from spirulina. Like sucking down a cup of sunshine. Green sunshine.

Jackson made short work of his strawberry-banana smoothie. In New York we rarely made smoothies, but I know we will be drinking more of them now that we are back in a hot climate.

Finally on my most-missed list, there is Magnolia. We used to live across the street from this 24-hour diner. After several days on the road, eating little besides Larabars and fast food was getting old. At least Subway and Burger King serve veggie patties, but I don't know if they are vegan, and I definitely ate too many French fries to count. I was craving vegetables like never before. Magnolia was there to help.

That is one of their dinner specials. It's tofu, spinach, summer squash, mushrooms, peppers, and spinach, cooked in a coconut curry sauce. Next to that lovely mess of veggies is half an acorn squash, with some kind of pecan topping baked onto it (in the picture it sorta looks like a portabello mushroom, but that's actually the blackened pecan crust you're seeing.) It is a huge plate of food and I was more than happy to take home the leftovers and finish them for lunch the next day. Tastes so good.

Well, I am off to check on the tempeh I am BBQing for dinner tonight, and try to clean the bathrooms before Olivia wakes up. I feel busier than ever these days so I may not be blogging as regularly, but longer posts like this one when I do blog. We shall see. Hope you all have a great evening.