I am 31. I have a husband and two gorgeous kids. My husband works for a coal mine and I am a stay-at-home mom for the first time in 11 years. I love to cook. I grew up working with my mom in the kitchen. We lived on a big ranch for several years and she used to cook for the branding and combining crews. I remember as young as three helping her with meals, dishes, canning and things like that. I have always loved cooking. I hope to teach the same thing to my kiddos. My mom did a great job instilling the love of cooking into not only me but my brother and dad too. They are both wonderful cooks as well. I love to bake pies & desserts, but mostly I enjoy cooking everyday meals. I like to be able to come home to the smell of a good meal on the stove or in the cooker. My family used to help out the neighbors when we were in high school. Every year everyone would get together and we would make homemade german sausage (YUMMY!). We no longer live in that area and so now I have to resort to having one of my best friends bring some down for me every now and then. My husband, myself and a good friend of ours have started a new tradition however. We put a garden in this year and I taught myself how to can. So the hubby, our buddy and I have started a ritual of canning sweet zucchini pickles, pickled beets, home-canned tomatoes etc. It is really quite fun and relaxing. Canning is not nearly as intimidating as I thought that it would be. I would have to say that my triumph would be first learning how to make pie crust. My mom refused to teach me to do three things - sewing, canning and making a pie crust. So, I took home economics one semester just to learn how to make a pie. It turned out so good that my dad banned my mother from making pie crusts (mine were better!). Mom really didn't teach me how to sew even though she was a wonderful seamstress. I simply bought a sewing machine and started making quilts. I don't do to bad. I did finally convince her to help me make a simple halter dress for my daughter this year and it turned out wonderful. Finally, my last triumph would be learning how to can. Mom never taught me how to do that - not sure why. Anyway, I taught myself and have started reaping the benefits of how wonderful home-canned food really is. My dad and brother would have to agree that the meat loaf that I made when I was pregnant with my son was absolutely horrific. That is the only time that dad actually let us go into to town simply for supper. It was HORRIBLE! I blame it on the pregnancy. I simply added corn and pork and beans to the meat loaf mixture along with crackers. Then I topped the meat loaf with more pork and beans and a can of tomatoes - then baked it. I don't event think the pigs ate that. It was really bad. I also had this wonderful dish that I made for a boyfriend of mine when I was in college. I still refer to it as the puke lasagna. I didn't know how to make lasagna. So, I called my mom and she said how easy it was and rattled off the ingredient list (which included cottage cheese). I quickly assembled everything and realized that I didn't have big lasagna noodles but small bite size ones. SO, I thought ok - I'll just make a layered dish of this and have it like a casserole! Mom forgot to te