Journeys in the Kitchen

I feel conflicted. I must be of dual personality. Not to be confused with bipolar, mind you, but wanting two different things at the same time.

I love being a mom. I love to nurture and care for my little girl and I miss her when I'm away from her for even just the hour I go to the gym to work out. I love to help facilitate her growth and to watch her reach milestones. I would hate to be away from her for the majority of the day and miss those precious moments. I feel like being a mom/parent takes a lot out of me emotionally and physically on occasion. Some days, Janen is the perfect "Angel" baby and I can predict every mood and need and it's an easy day. Then there are some days where I have to try and figure out what new thing she is requesting through her frustrated grunts and complaints. But I always find satisfaction in being able to meet her needs eventually and watch her smile and squeal in delight or sleep peacefully in her crib with her bunny wrapped in her arms. (She loves her bunny)

The other part of me wants so badly to go to school and return to work. I know I can do this later in life when my kids are grown up and in school at least, but I would really like to do this now. However, I do not have the luxury of family to watch Janen for me while I go out gallivanting and pursuing my "dreams". At this point, I do not trust having strangers watch my child nor do I want to pay anyone to. (This kind of defeats the purpose of going to work to earn money on a part time salary. More than half, if not most of it, would go to pay for child care anyway). I have always had a hard time narrowing down what I want to go to school and do. I have waaaay too many interests to the point that it paralyzes me in my decision making. I have thought about going to school online so that I could stay home with Janen, but WHOA BABY, is that stuff expensive! And it kind of defeats another purpose of being able to get out of the house. And most everything that the online schools offer is something that I know I would be good at, but not necessarily passionate about. It always comes back to the arts for me and that's not something that you can do online.

This leads me into my next segue. I have always loved cooking and baking. I like to satisfy tummies with something that I made and to hear someone ask me for the recipe. What great pleasure it would give me to satisfy many people's tummies with my very own recipes. James and I have talked a lot about owning our own business some day. It wouldn't be our main source of income, but something that I could do to keep me busy and to have fun with. I have mentioned many times to him that I would love to take cooking classes or even go to culinary arts school. But I honestly don't want the daily pressure of running a restaurant. So while I was perusing around in different culinary arts degrees I came across Catering. I thought, that would be perfect for me. I wouldn't work ALL the time so I won't be neglecting my duties as a mother. I think owning my own catering company would be a lot of fun and very satisfying. I know that I don't necessarily need to go to school for that, but I would want to because I would like to avoid a lot of trial and error and school will hopefully help me avoid a lot of pitfalls. But I was reading the other day that Rachel Ray, that's right the cook with her own talk show, actually never formally took classes. She just had a passion for it and made it happen. That definitely inspires me to someday pursue one of the many dreams of mine to become a professional caterer. I feel comfortable in the kitchen and I think that will help me a lot with having my own catering business.

With that said, I decided that every week I would make a new recipe. I'll find inspiration from cook books or recipes online and tweak and experiment and make something I can call my own or my own version of it. Hey maybe I'll even make my own cook book someday. I'm excited for this new adventure, even though it's a small step towards achieving a big goal.

We are moving this weekend to a new place so a new recipe won't be happening this week, but watch out next week for an entry about my journeys in the kitchen. I'm excited! And if you ever happen to try any of my recipes, I hope that you will tell me what you think so I can weed out the good from the bad.