I cook simply for the love of it as well as seeing the looks on my loved ones faces when they take a bite of something I've made and the first thing you hear is the "mmmmmmmm..." and then you see a smile. It gives you a good feeling knowing that they love to eat what you cook. I like to try different things with all types of meat and seafood and I absolutely love baking! My mother swears I should have been a pastry chef. I think the 3 main holidays (Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas) are my favorite to cook for. Each year my mother, sisters and I try to have at least one "new" recipe ready to put on the table with all the traditional trimmings. I call myself the worlds worst cooker of bacon! Even in the microwave! I finally cooked my first batch of bacon with out burning it about a year ago. I had a new puppy while I still lived at home with my parents. I was going to a 4th of July picnic and decided to make cakes that looked like watermelons. I mistakenly left the cakes too close to the edge of the table and also left the chair out. My puppy jumped up, ate almost 1/2 of one of the cakes and proceded to trot into the living room - he looked so cute with the green and pink icing all over his face that it was so hard to be mad at him. Needless to say I only took one "slice of watermelon" with me to the picnic, but I also had a funny story to tell as well.