My husband and I have been married for 7 years, and just had our first baby. We love having friends over for dinner and game nights - and I love cooking new things. Good ol' standbys include lasagna, spaghetti, pork roasts with all the fixin's, and italian breaded chicken. I love learning more about ethnic cuisine - I'm just starting to dip my hand in Thai and Indian cooking. I am an avid baker, but don't do a lot with breads. I'd love to learn more about bread making. My mom owned a catering company while I grew up- so I was immersed in that for the majority of my life. She taught me how to be sporadic in the kitchen, and to try new things (although I still like to go by the book with baking). Making dinner was always a big event in my house- especially for company. I am a messy cook- just like my mom, but I have an amazing husband who does my dishes. :0) The main food tradition that my husband and I started is around Christmas time, we have our friends over for an ornament exchange, and we have mass amounts of appetizers and desserts for everyone to enjoy (along with hot chocolate and spiced cider of couse). I'm looking forward to creating new traditions for our family someday. I started learning how to decorate cakes a few years ago, and I'm pretty proud of the cake I made for a friend's birthday- nothing special inside, but decorated as an "old school" Nintendo game paddle. It was fabulous- and I'm still so proud. Other than that I can make a mean dessert tray. I've had a few. One very sad one was when I made chicken and dumplings. I cooked the broth all day long- and it was looking fabulous. I turned up the heat when I added the dumplings, and completely burned the soup. I tried to salvage it, but it was nasty. That's the last time I'll ever use a cheap, thin pan again.