Pancakes and Prego-tinis

Out of all the friends I have who have had children (at least 21 kids? holy crap I never counted before), I have never been asked to host a baby shower, and when I've offered, others beat me to the punch. Last weekend I was super excited and honored to host a "pancakes and pajamas" brunch for a tiny crew of 6 lovely guests, almost all of which would not be drinking alcohol. YAY! Something fun to fuss about!

In preparation, I researched brunch mocktails and was frankly disappointed. They all seemed overly complicated with 8 ingredients and stupid names like Pregnant Punch. Apparently "prego-tinis/preggatinis" are a thing now. What happened to "mocktails?" Why must we always infantilize pregnant women? Ugh. Anyway. I needed something to pair with pancakes - which the guest of honor specifically requested - and yet it seemed insufficient to just do juice and coffee. Life got in the way as it is wont to do and planning time was drastically cut back. I had to improvise with orange-mango juice (Tropicana, available most supermarkets) and mango LaCroix sparkling water. Turns out, it was a passable virgin mimosa, and the crowd was pleased. Didn't even bother measuring anything in haste, just dumped a 1.5 L juice bottle and 4 (12oz.) cans of sparkling water in a pitcher and called it good. Three cheers for winging it!