While I was pregnant with my daughter (born July 09) I ended up stuck home on short term disability for several months before she was born. I ended up watching a LOT of food network, which inspired me to want to learn how to cook. So I found some recipes and just started cooking! I started off decent, and following months I branched out and started trying new recipes and new styles of cooking. I'm currently unable to eat a lot of dairy thanks to a dairy intolerance in my daughter, so my biggest challenge right now is finding delicious recipes with little to no dairy in them. I looooove to make cookies and muffins and breads. Mostly, I think, because I like to eat the dough as I'm making them! Hah! My family doesn't really cook. One of the reasons I started cooking so much was that I got tired of eating boxed dinners every night. I (very successfully) made a replica of my favorite (and now retired) rosemary potato chicken pizza from California Pizza Kitchen. A few years ago I got it in my head to make manicotti (I LOVE manicotti) but I didn't know how to cook much beyond burgers and tacos. I didn't chop my herbs finely enough (not thinking that it would matter) out of sheer laziness... and what resulted was the most awful pasta I have ever eaten in my life. Even my husband, who will eat almost anything I put in front of him as long as it isn't a vegetable, wouldn't eat it. I still don't have enough courage to try making manicotti again.