It is finally Mother’s Day. My first one. I have been looking forward to this day since Sloane was born. It still feels like a dream that she chose me to be her mother. She turned 6 months yesterday and she is growing so beautifully, being her mother is the most joyous thing in the whole world. I have so many amazing mothers in my life who have set the perfect example for me. They have created an incredible template and I am following it and adding my own as I go. So on my first mother’s day, I would love to say thank you to those who have come before me and have done it the best way they know how and continue to be fantastic role models for me and others.

My mom has such an amazing demeanor and a calmness that I see in Sloane. She is always there, no matter how tired or overwhelmed she is. She smiles through the worst of storms. She has taught me to live in the now and worry about tomorrow when it gets here. Though she lives in Woodbridge, VA, she spent 6 weeks with me in Ohio when I first had Sloane and really helped me get acquainted with being a new mother. While she was here with me, she was also helping Sidney write his essays for schools. She loves with all she has and is one of the most genuine people you’ll ever meet. She is successful at being a mother, a wife, a sister, a friend, and a career woman and I couldn’t have found a better role model in my own mother.

My mother-in-law, Betsy, is an angel walking among us. She is the most positive person I have ever met. She sees the good in every situation and always has the best advice. You can’t help but want to talk to her about your life because she is so trusting. She has raised  4 amazing men while also being a dentist. She makes you want more for yourself and I count myself lucky to be able to call her my daughter’s grandmother.

Auntie Becky, my other mother. She basically raised me and she raised 5 children of her own and so many others. One of the most generous people you’ll ever meet. She will starve just so the next person can have something to eat. She is very business minded and achieves success in everything she does. She is always praying for the absolute best for everyone, even people she’s never met before. I see some of her in me and that makes me very happy.

I could keep going because there are so many wonderful mothers in my life like Sama Darko who is such an incredible person, changing so many lives in Ghana, providing opportunities for anyone who is willing to work hard. She is so giving and has overcome to much to achieve tremendous success. Her kids have such an amazing role model to look up and she has taught me that you can achieve anything with hard work and perseverance.

To the new mothers, you’re already do so incredibly well and I am learning from you too.  Just know that we are all in this together and as long as our kids are happy and healthy, we are doing an amazing job.

To Adwoba, Becca, Amanda, Becky, Sally, Christine, Auntie Dorothy, Ama Cudjoe, Betti, Sylvia and every mother I know, you’re all phenomenal and your kids are blessed to have you.

To Nana and Arielle, I can not wait for you to join the club. I am so happy for you and I know you’re going to be the most amazing mothers.

To Sloane, thank you again for choosing me.

The flowers above were an early Mother’s day gift from my dad.

Sloane is 6 months today! Half a year. She is so beautiful, I can’t believe she is our child. She is growing very well, eating well. She actually tried her first solid food today; avocado! What kind of millennial will I be if I didn’t give my baby avocado as her first solid food? It was a super easy recipe that I will share at the end of the post.

Sloane has been scooting a lot, she can sit unassisted for at most 5 minutes. She has been trying to sit up by herself. She is reaching her milestones and is an absolute joy. She has one central incisor, so far it hasn’t been very uncomfortable for her so here is hoping the rest are the same way.

Apart from making Sloane Avocado puree, I also prepped blueberry puree and peas puree for the rest of the week. She will have more avocado puree tomorrow and Monday and we will move on to blueberries for 3 days then peas. I plan on introducing one thing at a time before I starting combining them. I will also be making my own baby food until she is 1. I bought this baby food freezer storage tray to store her food. It comes with a cover which I really like. My mom bought us an amazing blender for general use and it has worked perfectly for the blueberries and peas.

Here are 2 photos of Sloane trying her first ever solid food and a photo of the food I prepped today. I made a lot of peas so hopefully, she’ll like that.

Avocado Puree

2 avocados

3oz of breastmilk (you can use formula or water)

1. Mash avocados until very smooth
2. Add 3oz of breastmilk to 1oz of mashed avocado (you can add more or less oz)
3. Store the remaining mashed avocado in freezer for future use.
4. I only mixed breastmilk in 1oz of avocado not everything I mashed.

I can’t wait to share more of the recipes I make and how she responds to them.

Love always!

I like women who have done a lot and continue to do a lot for our world. We have our Eleanor Roosevelt, Florence Nightingale, Rosa Parks, Mother Teresa, Helen Keller and many more who are known to have had a positive impact on the world in so many different ways. This post is, however, not about the women we immediately associate with charity; instead, it is about the women whose names we do not immediately associate with anything in humanitarianism or activism but have done or are doing so much more for our world. All these women are/were wildly popular but not for the things I wish they are popular for. This post is about 5 impressive women and how they have been giving back:

1. Elizabeth Taylor: Extremely beautiful with that deep blue eyes which sometimes appeared violet. She was known for her glamorous lifestyle, her acting abilities and her 8 marriages to 7 different men (she married Richard Burton twice). Elizabeth Taylor may have been addicted to love but she was also very interested in helping people. Liz Taylor cofounded American Foundation for AIDS Research(AMfAR), helping raise over $270 million for the cause. She was a generous and consistent activist. She also founded the Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation. In 1992, she won a special academy award, the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award, for her HIV/AIDS humanitarian work. In 2006, she donated $500,000 to NO/AIDS Task force during hurricane Katrina. She passed in March 2011 but she did so much for the AIDS research that I want us to tell people about it. That is what is important, making the world better for generations to come.

2. Rihanna: She is a beautiful, super stylish (she reinvents her style almost monthly) and a talented singer, but those are really secondary. She is one of the women I admire so much in our generation. Her Believe Foundation was created in 2006 to help terminally ill children. She has partnered with charities by performing a number of concerts to raise money for the charities and her foundation. She also founded The Clara Lionel Foundation (named after her grandparents) which promotes education and arts all around the world. The Diamond Ball is an event that has been held yearly since 2012 to raise money for the foundation. Rihanna has also helped build a Breast cancer screening and treatment center in Barbados where she was born. Last year, Harvard university gave their prestigious Humanitarian of the Year award. These are just a few of Rihanna’s very impressive list of charitable endeavors. She has such a huge following so I know she is impacting the younger generations to give back to their communities.

3. Miley Cyrus: She is very charitable and she can’t be tamed! Miley founded The Happy Hippie Foundation whose mission is to rally young people to fight injustice facing homeless youth, LGBTQ youth and other vulnerable populations. She raised money for the foundation by performing Backyard Sessions which allowed people on facebook to donate money. When Miley was just 18 years old, she visited Haiti twice to distribute hearing aids to those in need. At an AmFAR in 2014, she donated $500,000 for the fight against HIV/AIDS. She supports a variety of charities including City of Hope, Habitat for Humanity, Amnesty International and she is also a very active participant in the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

4. Gisele Bündchen: She was the highest paid model in the world for more than 10 years. She is also very charitable. She donated $150,000 to Zero Hunger program in Brazil. To raise awareness for the lack of attention given to HIV/AIDS victims in Africa, she painted her face as part of the I Am African campaign. Gisele donated $1.8 million to Haiti to aid the earthquake relief effort. There have been other ways that Gisele has given back such as creating a flip flop line with a company in Brazil to raise funds to call attention to environmental causes. She is a Goodwill Ambassador for UN Environmental program and has undertaken several field missions in Kenya and Brazil.

5. Kim Kardashian West: Yes, she is on this list. She is known for her very glamorous lifestyle but we always have to give credit where it is due. Kim is very socially conscious and very charitable. She has always said that she gives 10% of her net earnings to charity. In 2017, she made $45.5 million in gross earnings according to Forbes, so no matter what her net earnings came out to be, you know that she gave a good amount of money to charity. She frequently visits LA Children’s hospital and brings gifts with her. Every Thanksgiving, her and her family donate full course meals to a homeless shelter in LA. Most recently, Kim has been focussed on helping a woman named Alice Johnson who is currently in prison for first time non-violent drug related offense. Kim has been in talks with Jared Kushner, an advisor to president Trump about a potential presidential pardon. Alice Johnson has been in prison for over 20 years. Here is hoping that things work out well for her. She has also been paying for the legal fees of Cynthia Brown, another young girl who is sentenced to life in prison. In 2017, her and her family, donated $500,000 to hurricane relief efforts.

Beyonce, Angelina Jolie, Selena Gomez, Charlize Theron, Taylor Swift and so many more are also some women who have been impressively charitable. I hope we are all able to give back in our own small ways. If you’re looking for a charity to donate to either one-time or regularly, my mom and her friends started a foundation a couple of years ago called ‘Asankrangwa Kroye Kuo’ which has a developmental agenda to reduce poverty and improve the quality of life for the people of Asankrangwa. Asankrangwa is the village my mother grew up in, I lived there for a while too. Here is their website for more information on what they’re doing. They held a fundraiser last weekend and below is a photo of the president of the organization, Mrs Gradis Addai.