Sunday Baking

Here's my confession, I LOVE TO BAKE.  If anyone knows anything about me, this is my passion.  Seriously.  On days when I'm looking for something to do, I just want to bake all day.  Nothing is more satisfying than a well baked good.  (Well, aside from my family and such).  I only however, dedicate one day to baking.  That day is Sunday's.  Don't we all wish we could bake everyday, and not gain any weight.  Where did my love for baking come from?  Well, here's the story...
Growing up, I often made crazy baking mistakes.  I made Apple pie, but put too much nutmeg in and everyone called it my nutmeg pie.  Numerous mistakes over the years followed.  When Bryan and I got married, I wanted to be the best cook ever.  But especially, the best baker ever.  We have a family chocolate chip cookie recipe that Bryan always raves about and I was determined to make it just as fantastic as our sister in law does.  I must have tried that recipe over a hundred times.  I never gave up, and was determined to get it right.  And that was the case with everything I tried.  I wasn't happy until it was perfect.  I work at Williams Sonoma part time to feed my kitchen addiction, and to afford it.  And one day my brother in law came in and was talking to my co-worker.  My co-worker said, "Isn't Emmy such a fantastic cook", and he replied, "yes, if it comes from this store and is in a jar".  That was the day that it all changed for me.  I was going to prove that I could make anything, and make it fantastic.
  This was actually only 3 years ago.  I can honestly say now that I feel pretty confident in my skills.  Not only has my baking improved, it's quite fantastic if I do say so myself.  I have become quite the perfectionist though.  I try a recipe and have to find the best of that recipe.  Vanilla cupcake's for example.  I believe I'm not the only one searching for that perfect recipe.  I want a dense, moist and just perfect vanilla cupcake.
  Someday I would love to open a bakeshop.  But for now, my main focus is my family.  Until that "someday", I will continue to bake for family and friends, and for the pure joy of just creating something amazingly yummy.  Like the 6 layer Salted Caramel Cake pictured above.  Yum!

Finally moving after 12 years!!!

Wow, really?  It's been waay too long since I've written.  I made a New Year's Resolution to blog more, so here I go.  Over the last 6 years we have endlessly looked, and looked, and looked at over a hundred homes.  We liked bits and pieces of many homes, but we only found 1 home that we absolutely loved. (But that home didn't work out.)  Are we too picky? (um, yes)  We mostly never understood the layout of homes.  I was mostly interested in having a larger kitchen than the one I currently have in my town home.  Oddly enough, some of the kitchens in homes were smaller than ours.  We made a few offers on some homes, and for one reason or another, they never seemed to work out.  We began to think that we were just supposed to stay in our town home forever.  Which we love our neighborhood.  We have amazing friends here, and our kids do as well.  But we really just wanted a backyard for our kids to play around in.  We made an offer on a home in Lehi back in September, and it was the first time we listed our home for sale.  With full faith that we would be able to sell in 3 weeks, it did not sell.  Once again we found ourselves with no new home.  But we decided to keep our home listed anyway.  We had only 2 people come through our home in the 2 months that we had it listed.  And feel very, very blessed that it sold for a full asking price.  We are also very proud of ourselves for taking such great care of our home, and having it pass inspection with absolutely no problems.  Except now, we had to find somewhere to move, and fast!  Over the years we have looked anywhere from Orem to Lehi.  But we had to sit and think about where we wanted our kids going to school.  We love the school they are currently attending.  And for the 2012-2013 school year, Madison will be starting Jr High (very, very scared about that).  We decided that we love Orem, and began searching only in Orem.  The home prices in Orem are quite a bit higher than the surrounding areas, and very few lots to build on.  We walked though a home in South Orem that we feel in love with.  The details were exactly what we had been wanting all of these years.  We found out the builder who built the home, and decided to build  on the west side of Orem, which is on a golf course called Sleepy Ridge.  Over the past year we felt very hesitant to build there. One, because it is so close to the lake and 2, for all the bugs that are associated with the lake.  But we spoke to quite a few people who love the area, and they helped put our reservations at ease.  So after 12 years, we are building a home and we are so excited.  We move out in one week, and we actually have nowhere to go while we build our home.  So for now, we feel stressed and crazy.  But though things feel up in the air, we know that the Lord is always aware of us, and hears our prayers.  Through this whole process over the last 6 years, we've been very aware that the Lord has been watching over us, and directing us in the right direction.  We certainly don't operate on our own timing, that's for sure.  He has a plan for all of us.
   We are very grateful for our blessings, and feel so blessed how everything has turned out.  We are so excited to move onto the next "phase" in life.  We haven't really had time to let the idea of building our own home set in yet.  Everyone keeps asking us if we are so excited, but we really haven't had time to actually be excited.  We just pray that things will go smoothly, and that it will all work out for the best.