A cook I will be, yes, a cook I will be!!!

I had such HIGH hopes 9 1/2 years ago after I got married... I pictured myself this wonderful gourmet chef :) Or really, just a wonderful wife making some kick ass food for my husband!

Over the years, I have bought over 24 cookbooks!!! I mean WHO needs that many! And to find out I had TWO sushi books... what is wrong with me :)

I guess I'd be telling a different story had I actually opened them!! Oh, I take that back... I do like to open them! I love to see the beautiful pictures of all the fabulous food I would make if only I had the time.... But of course between working, being w/Tati, trying out all the most delicious restaurants San Diego had to offer and having a husband who like to cook us gourmet meals ... The whole cooking thing never took off for me! Excuses, excuses :)

Well, 4 months ago, I was just sooooo excited to take on the cooking world! Not having to work outside of the home and having no friends in this new town, gave me TONS of time on my hands!

Such high, high hopes I had... BUT, unfortunately it just hasn't worked out as I had envisioned :( I didn't know that you should NOT put chicken in the crock pot for 8 hours... or that 30 minutes in the oven for the smallest pork chops will dry them out into leather... and really, how do I ruin instant potatoes??? The list could really go on and on and on...

So my poor, poor husband has been living off the picture on the bottom instead of the one on the top...

BUT NO MORE! New Year, New Beginnings...
I'm dusting off the dust of those beautiful books today!

Start of a journey...

Is the grass greener… hmmm… Had you asked me that question 4-6 months ago… YEP without a doubt!! I was one of the jealous mom’s that has always worked and would have given my left hand to be able to stay home and care every day for my little girl!!!!!

It’s funny how life works out and it’s funny about how you always think “if this happens or what about that or if only”…

Given, a lot has changed since I thought that way and now I realize, I really NEED MY LEFT HAND!!!!!

Let me take you back a bit if I may… I loved my job about 90% of the time~ I had been doing it for a little over 13 years… I mean, I should really love it, right????

I enjoyed seeing my patients, really getting to know them and was always super excited to see their beautiful smiles at the end of treatment!!!! What better job than to have someone cry and tell you that you “changed their life” I mean…WOW!!!!

I always dreamed about the day I could quit my job and stay home w/my baby! I thought about singing, dancing, cooking (all the things I really am no good at) but I thought that it would all change once I was a mom! Like a pill you take while leaving the hospital…

POOF… “You are now qualified to be the most amazing mom ever and be the envy of all that you encounter, with the most beautiful little daughter in the whole world”

Yep, felt like it for a minute or two, but reallllly, I’m not that crazy!

I remember moving to San Diego 6 years ago…

Jason had never been there but being such a wonderful husband that he was, I convinced him after I had spent an amazing weekend with my 3 sisters, celebrating by sister Ginny's Birthday that this is where we need to be and because it was going to be a new adventure for us! What an adventure it turned out to be!!!!!!

I HATED my 1^st job! Seriously, it was wretched! The horrible doctor threw dental instruments when he was mad (which was ALL the time) Jason, thank god worked at a golf course just within walking distance and we would meet for lunch and cry about how crappy our jobs were… The sweetest, most awesome husband that he is, would leave me cards on my car to find… Encouraging me to make it through another day at a place he knew I hated… I love him more than I can express for those cards…

Anyways, I/we NEVER, EVER, EVER thought we would EVER move to California! Jason spent his Freshman year at Whittier College in East L.A. and just HATED IT! So, never in a million, billion years would I ever think that we would end up in California and “LOVE” it for 6 years!

Grass greener?? Well.... I mean San Diego is mostly BROWN!!!!

But it just wasn’t the time for us to be in Oregon and I am sooooo happy we followed our hearts and jumped in completely blind to find such an amazing family of friends in San Diego and a truly wonderful adventure :)