I missed Baking and Math’s 2nd birthday because I had a new human baby at the time. But for the blog’s 1st birthday I googled “birthday celebration women” and got this fantastic picture:
And then I googled it again just now, two years later. Same card appeared, but so did this remarkably ugly design:
17th bday present comes in t-shirt, tank top, tote, or thong: http://www.cafepress.com/mf/25934971/17th-birthday-math_tank-top?productId=235581471
As a birthday present, here are some stats about this modest little blog:
Most visitors in a month: October 2014 (that’s when Ian was born!) 3,578
Highest average visitors per day: November 2015 (that’s right now!) 127
Most visitors in one day: May 1, 2014 (for this post which was tweeted and facebooked by MoMath) 754
Most popular day to visit: Tuesdays (19%) and most popular hour: 3 p.m. (7%)
Most popular post (this doesn’t count people who just go to the home page): my mom’s thit kho with 14,993 views
And a few of my favorite things from each category:
Math:
I love these cute pictures in posts about serious math: Apollonian circle packings from a lecture by Hee Oh, and Kissing Numbers from a talk by Federica Fanoni
I also like the open problems series: geometric group theory, combinatorics, and group theory.
I’ve received compliments/been told that the curve complex series ( I, II, III, IV) and the fundamental theorem of geometric group theory series (I, II) were also helpful for current/beginning graduate students. I’d love to do more series, so if you have any ideas/requests let me know! My last series was suggested to me by the postdoc whose work I showcased, so that’s awesome if you want that too.
Unrelatedly: I noticed I have a slight bias toward writing about the work of female mathematicians. I don’t see this as a bad thing and it might even be a good thing if I do it consciously instead of unconsciously biasing myself toward tribalism. And obviously I’ve written about male contributions to math as well. Just a random observation.
Life:
I still stand by my breastfeeding post (in case you were wondering, I did end up breastfeeding for several months and loving it, and stopping was bittersweet, but I still don’t advocate relentlessly pushing it on women even if I understand that is a method for societal change). Writing this list just reminds me that I’m really rather proud of all the math and life posts. The podcast list has been useful for friends. Everything about being a woman in math is my life and who I am, and there are often pictures of cute animals or my baby.
Baking:
Pavlova is still one of my favorite things.
I also love that easy lime pie.
Savory: we’ve been into eggplant lasagna lately, and when I was pregnant I ate so many delicious burgers. Also all the Vietnamese food.
Semi-homemade: those super easy cinnamon rolls, the rum cake, the Hull banana pudding, and the oreo balls are all hits every time
Things that are more work but so tasty: Moosewood ricotta cake, olive oil cake, and chia pudding with coconut milk and mango
Anyways, this has been a great ride and I really love having my little corner of the internet where y’all come visit me. Feel free to drop me a line (email is in the About page), comment, tweet (@yenergy), facebook (Baking and Math); I’d love to hear from you. Also, happily, this week I got my 100th WordPress.com follower, so thanks to Stuart Perkins for that and to all the people who follow me. Happy Thanksgiving, also! I’m so thankful that I’ve had this incredible three years: moved to Chicago alone to start a Ph.D. program, traveled all over the world with that program, moved to Austin a few years later with a husband and child in tow for the end of said program, all piecemeal documented on this blog. Thank you to you, and I hope you stick with me for whatever’s coming next.
Baking and Math 
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