T.M. Kayode

I had a pretty eventful week. Between Wednesday and Friday, I experienced so many firsts, and I would like to share them with you.

THURSDAY

On Thursday, my 4-year-old, Dabbie, asked me if we could bake a cake together. She was so persistent that, in a moment of weakness to her incessant requests, I said yes. Unknown to me that morning, the day would prove to be very busy and tiring, and baking a cake was the furthest thing from my mind.

She kept asking, of course—every hour like clockwork, “Mom, are we baking the cake now?” “Mom, are you ready to bake the cake?” Not wanting to be considered a liar, I got up from my work, and we started to bake the cake.

Backstory: Dabbie and I have baked cakes a couple of times. They never really turned out as perfect as I knew they could be. She never really cared how they turned out; she would eat them however they were. But I always wanted fluffy, airy cakes, but they never turned out like that.

So, this day, I was not really expecting the cake to turn out well because I was baking with the most lackadaisical attitude you can think of.

To my great surprise, it came out perfect—and I didn’t even have eggs at home.

Let me tell you how we made it.

First, I pulled a random recipe online. It had 5-star reviews on Google. Good enough, right? Here is the link: The Best Chocolate Cake Recipe Ever. I modified it a little bit because of the lack of exact ingredients at home.

For instance, instead of the 2 cups of plain white sugar, I used 1 cup of brown sugar and 1 cup of icing sugar. I had run out of eggs at home, but after a quick Google search, I found out that you can use white wine vinegar in place of eggs. I used about 2 tablespoons of lemon juice. At the point of adding the lemon juice, I was convinced that the final cake would be on the Mount Rushmore of terrible cakes I had baked in the past.

Close to the end of baking, I realized that I had almost made another mistake. The recipe calls for it to be baked at 350°c for 30 minutes. I actually read 45 minutes, so my kitchen timer was set for that.

However, Dabbie kept asking me if the cake was ready. By the 30th minute, I went over to show her that it wasn’t ready, but again to my great surprise, it was.

Now that I have this chocolate cake win under my belt, we are going to make chocolate ganache and make a couple of tiers of cake together.

WEDNESDAY/FRIDAY

On Friday at 1 pm, I had my follow-up appointment for my first dental cleaning ever. Before you feel all grossed out, I come from a place where people almost only see the dentist when they have serious dental issues that cannot be solved by taking just aspirin.

Dabbie is at the age where her pediatrician has been reminding us to book her dental appointment. Interestingly, the first dental check for a child in the US is at 18 months old. So my husband and I just thought we should be examples to our children and get ours checked and cleaned as well.

Deciding to clean was the easy part; finding a dental practice that could accommodate us time-wise was another thing entirely.

I called three other dental practices, and they all couldn’t take new patients until September, October, or January of next year. Those were too far out because my goal was to have Dabbie checked before she resumes Pre-K in mid-August. Plus, by any time in October, we would not have taken advantage of our dental insurance for the year.

Thankfully, when I called The Dental Center South Bend on Monday this week, they had an opening for my husband and me on Wednesday, and then we had the dental cleaning on Friday.

Let me tell you exactly what happened.

Going into the appointment, I was a bit nervous because I didn’t know what the outcome would be. From the dental videos I had seen on the internet before, it always seemed like going to the dentist would reveal problems you didn’t know you had.

The staff at the dental office were nice and professional.

I was ushered into a room that had several monitors and intimidating-looking equipment.

First, the dental technician or nurse (not sure of the term) inserted a device into my mouth that had a camera on its end and took different pictures of my mouth from different angles. A few angles were uncomfortable, but it was all right for the most part. The nurse moved very quickly and efficiently, so I was not in much discomfort.

After that, she took me to another room where the internal imaging of the bone structure of my teeth was taken. So basically, you have to stand inside a device, bite on another camera thingy, and then another part of the device swivels around your head in a circular motion. After this, she did a manual check to see if there were signs of oral cancer that the device might not have picked up.

Then the doctor was called in for the consult.

After checking out my scans and X-rays, I was deemed to have perfect dental health, to my surprise. I didn’t have any holes in my teeth that needed filling, no decaying bits, and my wisdom teeth didn’t need to be pulled out.

I literally just needed the cleaning, and I had a bit of gingivitis too.

So cool and surprising.

For that, I was able to get another appointment for Friday.

The cleaning itself took a little over an hour.

She applied a local anesthetic to my gums, but I could still feel some movement. On a pain scale, I would give it a 1.5.

She used a device to remove some plaque before going in and cleaning tooth by tooth. Then she polished with another device, flossed, and then finished off with the laser treatment on my gums.

I loved every bit of my first experience. My teeth and mouth feel different, and my gums look pinker too, less swollen.

Anyway, I am making visiting the dentist when due a family staple.

Lastly, after my dental appointment, I had a hair appointment. My hair has needed TLC for the longest time. Since moving to the US, it has been a bit difficult to get my hair properly done. I have thick 4C hair that is perhaps one of the densest you have ever seen.

It has always been difficult for me to wash it and even comb it properly. Just recently, the University of Notre Dame brought in a stylist specializing in black hair on campus, and I decided I was going to her when I was out of my braids.

She did such an amazing job; my hair feels alive. I had a wash and then deep-conditioned my hair. Then it was combed out on medium heat, and then trimmed (I had almost 4 inches of split ends that needed to be chopped off). Then she put my hair in flexi rods, and I had to stay under the dryer for more than an hour because my hair refused to dry.

Nonetheless, my hair is on its healing journey. I’m sure it will be able to grow longer now.

So that was my eventful week. This Saturday, I plan to get at least one chapter of my book project done, and on Sunday, we have a family mid-year photoshoot after church.

I need strength!

See ya!