I'm a single mom of a two year old boy. Life really doesn't get much more hectic than that. I started cooking (literally the first time I ever tried it) while I was on maternity leave with my son. I did a tour in Japan and have taken a lot of their foods back with me and I love it whenever I can get asian cuisine on my dinner table. I love cooking pizza. I think I have like 6 or 7 recipes. For my son's first birthday I decided to do a pizza party. It's nice when it's homemade becasue then you don't feel so guilty. Plus a lost of my recipes I can assemble up to the night before and then just throw them in the oven. The main tradition in my family is that my dad cooks and my mom bakes. My dad puts everything in butter and sweets are never good for you. But other than that I would ahve to say my father's zimmels on Christmas morning and my mom's pumkin roll throughout the holiday season. Well, it's not exactly with cooking, but one day I had the bright idea to plan my recipes out in advance. I had already started a family recipe book and if an ingredient cam up more than four times I would buy it in bulk. Then at the begining of each week I would pick 4 or 5 recipes and then write down the ingrediants I needed fromt he store and then put it in order by when I would come across it at the store. The first time I did this it took forever (it was a solution to grocery shopping with a 1 year old), but now It happens in minutes. I can't wait to get to the day where I can do it in my head at the grocery store. There are a million. Quickly, Apple and Avacado Curried Bowtie salad comes to mind. And just two days ago I put too much sour cream in the beef stroganoff. A Lot of my worst mistakes were for thinking I could subsitute things in recipes if I couldn't find it. The first time I made risotto I thought I could subsitute regular rice and close to an hour and half later I thought my arm was going to fall off. But thank god, my kid is really easy to please and will eat anything you put in front of him.