New Year, New Possibilities

Well, it’s been 3 weeks since I’ve posted something. I didn’t mean for it to be so long between postings, but with traveling for the holidays, and entertaining family I’ve spent the majority of the last two weeks trying catch up on cleaning, laundry and chasing after a 22 month old boy who has gotten into the habit of picking up toys & other household items and hiding them in strange places. This week I found a sippy cup in the laundry hamper, Mr. Potato head parts in the refrigerator, and his little broom in my tub. I’m still looking for an oven glove & whisk that seem to have vanished.

Also, this is the first year that I noticed a little seasonal depression set in right after January 1^st. I’ve always heard of people having it, but never understood it until now. I usually leave my decorations up through January to help extend the season a little. But this year I’m actually ready to take the decorations down. I’m ready to get on with the year and start fresh. Our tree in our living room was really dried out and dead, I couldn’t bear to look at it anymore, so yesterday I literally yanked it through the front door & drug it down the sidewalk and put it out of its misery. It was a good tree, and lasted almost 8 weeks. But it was a constant reminder that the season was over.

With a new year brings a fresh start and with that comes a whole new list of projects I want to complete. The ideas bouncing around in my head are overwhelming. I’ve got crafts I want to do, sweets I want to bake, things I want to sew, rooms I want to paint, furniture I want to rearrange, and the list goes on and on and on…… Today I decided to start with baking. I thought a nice chocolate cupcake would be the perfect start to the weekend, so I got out my new Martha Stewart’s Cupcake book and decided to try the one bowl chocolate cupcakes. When I opened the oven I found this:

I overfilled the cups and the batter rose over the edge and turned into one big cupcake mess. So, we won’t be having chocolate cake this weekend. If I learned anything from this mistake, it's that I may need to add a baking class onto my list of things to do for the year.

Happy New Year everyone! Hope your new year is off to a great start!