As the coronavirus pandemic continues, you may be like us - trying to find ways to stay connected with your family and friends during the stay at home orders. From work sessions to e-learning with the kids to happy hours with friends to family chats, Zoom is where millions of us are heading to stay connected. Thanks to Uncle John and Aunt Missy who live in Iowa, we are having Sunday late afternoon weekly family sessions. Most of our family lives in Illinois while our niece, Molly is logging in from Dallas and our nephew Alex is joining from San Diego. We've had several happy hours and played trivia games on Zoom together and it has been a great way to help us stay connected. After the fun trivia game session we tossed around ideas for our next Zoom and my sister-in-law, Liz suggested a cake contest. We all thought this sounded like a delicious idea!

Since my other sister-in-law, Holly is the author of the amazing Together cookbook, we all quickly decided Holly would be the judge. We all had to make a cake for this past Sunday's Zoom call. ​We all joined the call with out cakes out of the camera. Judge Holly called on various family members to show off their cake. Each baker had to share the "name" of the cake, the kind of cake and why they chose to make that specific cake. It was such a fun Zoom call!

Holly started with my sister-in-law, Liz. She made my grandmother's carrot cake which we all love and is my brother Sergie's favorite cake. Liz shared that they called it the "Lottie" cake because my grandmother had written her sister, Lottie's name on the top of the recipe with V.G. for very good. We love this cake and Liz was so sweet as she talked about how special it was to bake while reading my grandmother's handing writing. It was very neat for my children and my nephew and nieces to also see their great grandmother's writing on the recipe. Liz's tip is to double the delicious cream cheese frosting!

Judge Holly moved around the Zoom boxes calling on family members. My mom made her classic and family favorite Crazy Cake. We love this chocolate cake and it is so heavy!




​Missy made a beautiful daisy cake which my brother-in-law John had never had! Missy even decorated the cake with fresh flowers and they coordinated their outfits with the cake. 

My niece, Molly made a scrumptious lemon blueberry cake and you can find this incredible recipe in Together too! Molly clearly won for presentation when her boyfriend, Matt made a surprise guest appearance on our Zoom call and showed off the impressive lemon blueberry cake!

My niece, Eleanora had a show stopper three-layer rainbow cake with delightful sprinkles covering the cake! We all loved seeing the swirling rainbow colors in her cake! So creative! 

We can always count on my nephew, Alex to crack us up and he sure did not disappoint. Alex showed off two pancakes for his cake submission! His girlfriend, Erin is a good sport! 

On our Zoom calls we have often talked about things we are looking forward to doing when it is safe and things open back up. My sweet twins, Stella and Sophia always talk about how they cannot wait to go my mom and dad's lake house with all of our family. What they are the most excited about is having everyone bring their dogs to the lake. We've gone from two dogs in the family to suddenly having six dogs in the family which is big fun. The girls and I decided to make a cake that would have Nana and Papa's lake and beach on it. We ready their Barbie toys and found dogs to represent all the dogs in the family and put them on the cake. It was so funny and awesome! Stella loved explaining our cake!

This coming Sunday we will found out the cake winners! If you are looking for your next theme for your Zoom gathering with family and friends you should do a cake theme! It will be a piece of cake! And, you'll create some special memories with your family and friends!

We loved all our cakes and spending time together as a family. We're sharing all the cake recipes in the Recipes blog tab. Check them out and get baking! Order Holly's awesome Together cookbook too!

Stay safe and stay connected with your family and friends. Thanks for reading! 
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The NFL Draft was a few days after I posted about making my 200th mask. The NFL had an awesome opening about hope and I decided that I should sew Chicago Bears masks will watching the NFL Draft. It was a fun way for me to cheer on our beloved Chicago Bears and I decided to tweet a picture of me sewing and the draft.

I kept sewing and a few minutes later my fabulous friend Jayme texted me that the Chicago Bears had retweeted my tweet! I was so excited, it was so cool! 

Today I made my 200th mask. I'm part of a group of sewers in our neighborhood and together we've made more than 2,700 masks for doctors, nurses, policemen, firefighters, nursing homes, hospice, EMS, and so many others. It is still surreal that I am making masks for people on the front lines of the coronavirus. When Tony and I moved a year and half ago we discussed if I should move my sewing machine. I've had it for years but hadn't touched it in a very long time. I remember telling Tony that I wanted to keep it because I might want to sew again in our new house. Little did I know how much that sewing machine and those grade school sewing lessons would help.

My mom, Bev Murer and my mother-in-law, Lois Tortorello set me up with my initial fabric and sewing materials and away I went. Sophia and Stella have helped me trace the mask patterns and I've set up my sewing shop at our kitchen table. My twins love Build-A-Bears and one of my favorite parts about the BAB process is when the girls kiss the hearts and put them inside the bear with their love. As I sew I keep thinking about that moment and how I am putting love and wishes for bravery and safety into each mask

While making masks I've been inspired by all the helpers in my small group as well as around the globe. An incredible woman in our neighborhood, Lois Nelson is leading our sewing tribe and you can read more about our masks and awesome team in this recent Patch article. This amazing couple, Heather and Tom Krusinski will pick up masks from my front porch and drop them off at Lois's house. Tom and Lois even brought puppy treats to Rocky and they have a fantastic dog care business. We have others who are donating fabric and elastic like the awesome Cheryl and Katrina. Shout out to my fantastic high school Dairy Queen friend Jean Pilon Chudy and the fabulous Tanya Rand for helping me with elastic! And, others are delivering the finished masks all around our community. It is such a great team effort and I'm in awe of the my fellow sewers, they are so talented! We've been able to see some pictures of people wearing our masks and it makes me catch my breath. It is surreal to be sewing at my kitchen table and see a nurse wearing a mask I made hours later. I wish I could do more.

I also need to give a huge shout out to JOANN! JOANN has a fantastic web page dedicated to helping people make masks for people on the front lines of coronavirus. They share patterns, tips, and how-to information. JOANN has so many great fabrics and it was so easy to order on line and ship the fabric and thread to my house. Huge thanks to my mom and messy mommy Holly for sending me fabric too from JOANN!

As I scroll through social media and watch the news, I'm in awe of the incredible ways so many people are being helpers during the coronavirus pandemic. From ordering meals from local restaurants for people working at the hospitals and on the front lines, to supporting food banks, to helping with e-learning, to chalk drawings in the neighborhoods, to making videos to make people laugh, we are seeing the best in people. No matter how you are helping, every act is making a difference. Thank you for helping. Stay home. Stay safe. 
​xoxo, Meg

During this time of "shelter-in-place," we are trying to make the best of our days! Matt has set up his office in our dining room and Eleanora does her school work at the kitchen counter and I have all of a sudden become the lunch lady (minus the hairnet)! We are keeping up on the latest news of the coronavirus but have also tried to find other news stories to inspire and humor us. I ran across this story sharing some of the funny things people are encountering while working from home! https://www.fastcompany.com/90478967/farts-cats-naked-bodies-people-are-failing-hilariously-at-working-from-home.  So it seems no one wants to get caught naked on a video conference, however, we think you may want to eat a Naked Cake!

Eleanora is home for eLearning for the next several weeks and is doing a great job with this new school experience.  On a couple of occasions, she has found herself finishing school work early and looking for other things to do to keep busy. Her most recent distraction is scouring Pinterest for ideas to celebrate her upcoming 13th birthday! She started pinning beautiful cakes called Naked Cakes and asked if I would try making one. Well, I take my job as lunch lady seriously so got right to work. While I didn't have items on hand to decorate the cake as some shown on Pinterest, I did have the ingredients to mix up this delicious three layer cake. If you make it and decorate it, please share your pictures - we would love to see them!

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and sprinkle it with dew???  Hey readers, we think it's Terese McDonald of Candyality! Join us in helping Candyality get recognized by the Byline Banks small business marketing contest. Candyality has the opportunity to win one of 3 prizes up to $10,000. I know we are all working on social distancing and can not make our way out to local businesses during this unprecedented time during the Covid-19 pandemic, but so many local businesses (along with all of us!) are being impacted by this pandemic. Your vote for Candyality could make a world of difference in making sure everyone's sweet tooth is satisfied. 

Place your vote daily starting today until the end of contest, April 3rd. Visit Paystobanklocal.com. Scroll down to @candyality, vote, then hit "submit" at the bottom of page. You can do this everyday until the end of the contest! Be sweet and be well!

Checkout our post from December to learn about Candyality's Candy Charcuterie!
https://www.weebly.com/editor/main.php#/

We are early into the #StoptheSpread #FlattentheCurve #coronavirus staying at home phase. This weekend we discovered the amazing Jordan Matter YouTube videos and binged many videos of incredible dancers, contortionists, and gymnasts. Jordan often asks his performers to "do something interesting" and they do such cool poses. After watching another Jordan Matter video, I said to Stella and Sophia "do something interesting" and this picture is what they came up with all on their own! I was so impressed. The creativity and talent of kids is amazing!

Late night this weekend I was also scrolling through Instagram and saw an awesome post by the highly talented and inspiring Jennifer Garner. See below!

I love this! Like Jennifer, we know so many kids, parents, and friends that have been working on huge goals. From Eleanora's dance competition to Lilia's swim meets to Stella and Sophia's soccer games, kids across the country are having to be resilient and find different ways to show off their talents. After Stella and Sophia did their "do something interesting" picture we called their cousin, Eleanora and asked her to do a dance picture which is below. While Eleanora's dance competition was cancelled, her love of dance cannot be cancelled! We love this picture of Eleanora and her sweet dog, Ginger.

Thanks, Jennifer for encouraging everyone and for wanting to see the amazing talent of all ages. The show must go on! You sure helped the show go on! Search the hashtag #heyjenlookatme and you will immediately smile at the beautiful art work, amazing solos, Irish dancing, family talent gatherings, songs and dances from Footloose, Chicago, Matilda, Hairspray and so many more musicals, sporting shots, and other incredible feats. With so much anxiety in the world, this simple hashtag is showcasing that the sun will come out tomorrow.

We hope you will share your talents and do something interesting. Help spread some joy and share the incredible talents of your family and friends with the heartwarming, incredibly talented Jennifer Garner by using the hashtag #heyjenlookatme ​We'll be looking for your posts! Stay home and wash your hands.

​Day 4 of Christmas fun is brought to you by a great group of moms (and dads) working to organize the 2019 Advent Market at Saint Clement School on Sunday, December 8th from 9am to 12:30pm! The Saint Clement School and Parish are a wonderful community hosting this event to bring family and friends together to celebrate the Christmas season. Come and join the fun - all are welcome! Not only is this an opportunity to meet Saint Clement parishioners and families, several local artists and retailers will be at the market on Sunday selling great items that may be the perfect gift for someone on your Christmas list! You can even take care of your holiday decorating needs and buy Christmas greenery and flowers (even your tree!). Kids will have a great time jumping in the bouncy houses, making crafts, and visiting Santa for a photo. And so you don’t get hangry while having all this fun, there will be light breakfast items for sale and a bake sale.  Hope to see you on Sunday!

The Dock at Inwood restaurant and bar will celebrate their one-year anniversary this Christmas time on December 20th which is fitting for owners and brothers, Rick and Mike Trafton and their wives, Julie and Melissa. Opening The Dock at Inwood was all about coming home. Their story could be a Christmas Hallmark Channel movie! Tony and I moved back home to Joliet last year with our twins because we wanted to be closer to our parents, friends, and this amazing community. Rick had a restaurant in New Lenox, the Charleston back in 2007 and learned the restaurant and bar business during tough economic times. He then had The Dock Rotz in Minooka and gained more experience about what makes a restaurant and bar special. When the space became available at Inwood last year, Rick knew it was time to come home, just like a Hallmark movie. 

Rick and Mike wanted to create a warm atmosphere where family, friends, sports teams, community partners, and colleagues could gather. I asked Rick about they unique location with the skating rink and he shared that the hockey families are awesome and are all in! The park district team has become like family. They opened up walls and enhanced the interior. In the spring, I would run on the treadmill at Inwood and watched The Dock patio transform and expand. This summer it was so great to see the patio packed with softball players and locals enjoying great food, great camaraderie, and great sunsets. I loved seeing the vibrant art added to the patio walls. I learned that not only was Nicki Schultz a fantastic manager for The Dock, she was a gifted artist and did all the patio designs and artwork by hand. She also decorated the restaurant windows for the holidays! So highly talented!

I asked Rick why they came home and picked this location. He talked about how Mike and he were retired Joliet cops and how this community is so important to them. They knew the could create a restaurant that provided a great product with outstanding service and have an opportunity to help the many non-profit organizations in the area. Rick and Mike knew first-hand how hard the non-profit organizations work in Joliet and Will County to help so many people in need. Rick talked about how with The Dock they had an opportunity to provide a way for groups to fundraiser in a different way. He knew that often the same people are donating and supporting the many causes that serve our community and that it would be nice to have another opportunity to make an impact.

 I had already seen on Facebook the great Shop for a Cop event last week that raised $2,060! Rick shared that Big Brothers Big Sisters were at The Dock Tuesday night for a fundraiser and had Big Brothers Big Sisters celebrity bartenders! So heartwarming how The Dock team is helping so many organizations raise money that will help so many people during the holiday season and beyond. What great heart and great impact! Check out The Dock Facebook page for upcoming charity events and activities!

It was clear to me that Rick and Mike care deeply about our community but what about the food and drinks? I had been to The Dock a few times and was impressed with the menu. I told Rick I wanted to order the guilt-less goad pizza because it was so good and showed a great healthy option. He shared that they tried to have something for every age and range of healthy to indulgent. I asked a ton of questions about the menu and learned that they enhanced and reorganized the menu about six months ago. Everything is made from scratch except for the iconic Milano bread, of course. The salmon salad was the most ordered salad! I think the BBQ is the best in the area and I even got to go in the kitchen to check out the smoker and meet the fantastic kitchen team! The dry rub on the pork the night before delivers incredible results. We all like a great deal and the weekday $5.00 lunch menu is great! The chicken tenders are the top seller and be sure to get the special mango habanero sauce! While I loved my pizza, Rick new best and had ordered the BB! pulled pork grilled cheese - whoa! This sandwich was amazing and you must order next time you are at The Dock!

The Messy Mommies love a good cocktail and in this case four! Rick told me about the epic Flight Deck margaritas and shared the punch card with me. Talk about festive - so many flavors and so cute! Rick, Mike and the amazing Dock team knew they needed a way to count the number of flights order. The result is a massive scoreboard that is hilarious and so fun! They have sold 6,171 flights since January! We can't wait to come back with our Messy Mommies tribe and try out the different flights! Come out to try the fantastic flights this holiday season and add to the scoreboard!

Back to why The Dock is like a Hallmark Christmas movie. As I chatted with Rick, he constantly was jumping up to cheerfully greet customers and it was straight out of a holiday movie. Shaking hands with current cops, chatting with a businessman who had ordered lunch for his co-workers, visiting with a group of women out celebrating the holidays, and joking with staff from the Park District. Mike was in constant motion and his holiday hustle was impressive! Nicki and and Angie were filled with holiday cheer as we talked about the restaurant, the warm community, and Mike learning to never touch the elf in the chandelier. The kitchen team swiftly worked their magic and was cheery as I was in awe of their talents. We even had a messy movie-like mishap as I spilled my Diet Coke all over the table and my laptop while trying to take pictures. Rick saved the day with my spill and continue our interview with good cheer. Throughout it all, he talked about how great it was for their families to bring this restaurant home to Joliet and how grateful they were to have an opportunity to help our community organizations in such a fun way. I'm sure I heard Christmas bells ringing in the background. Please support local, come visit Rick and Julie and Mike and Melissa and the fantastic team at The Dock and come out for the community events. The Messy Mommies will see you there! On Monday, Dec. 9 come to The Doc for Christmas cocktails and Milano cookie decorating! Merry Christmas!

The Dock at Inwood is located at 3000 West Jefferson Street, Joliet, IL. Remember The Dock for your holiday catering. Pick up a $50.00 gift certificate and receive a free $10.00 gift certificate! 

Messy Mommies are excited to bring you day three of holiday inspiration! Candyality https://candyality.com is a must go to this holiday season and another great female owned business in our area! Terese McDonald, also known as the candy lady of Chicago and owner of Candyality, has some great gifts and stocking stuffers for your favorite people this holiday season!

I am so thrilled to highlight this local candy store again on our blog. Candyality is a very special place that has been open in Chicago since 2007! There are three great locations, and each store has its own personality:)! You can visit Chicago's candy store Candyality in the Southport Corridor, in Andersonville or on Michigan Avenue in Water Tower Place. Each store is amazing!

To get a sneak peek of the latest candy craze, Candy Charcuterie, tune in to catch Terese McDonald, our local candy celebrity, share some fun candy inspiration on Thursday, December 5th on Chicago's Very Own WGN9 @11:30am..

Next up, Terese will share her sweet ideas on Friday, December 6th on FOX @9:45am.

Just last week I ordered this latest craze of Candy Charcuterie! I stopped in one of my favorite Candyality locations, 3737 N Southport Avenue, where one of the wonderful gals who works in this shop greeted me with the most amazing candy board. I ordered this sweet treat to take to my daughter's teachers to snack on in between their parent-teacher conferences. Clarissa presented me with a festive creation of holiday sweetness! It was a big hit with all the middle school teachers - they loved the variety of treats! I highly recommend candy charcuterie for either a gift or to serve at your next gathering - so many candy options are available!!

Visit Candyality's website to find additional delicious and fun gift ideas for all the people on your gift giving list at https://candyality.com/product-category/gift-sets.