A Food Blog, Are You Crazy?

Just a little crazy, but here are some reasons why I started this blog:

• It's winter here, and very, very cold. This is something fun to do inside.


• If I blog about food, then maybe I will eat less --and better.
  
• Selfishly, I want to encourage Tom to cook a lot after he retires. And he likes an audience; therefore, the blog.


• It's a way to channel my obsessive, need-to-do-something-new personality without doing something as ridiculous as I did last winter when I made the photo book/show without a clue.


• I miss my faraway family and friends-- so I thought I could rope them into doing this with me-- so we can stay connected.


• I have visions of being invited into other people's kitchen-- or them coming to mine-- to cook together -- like Julia & Jacques --and documenting it for fun ---like when Jeanne showed me her grandmother's Italian cooking methods.


• It will be an easy place for me to post recipes that people ask for.


• And then I can find the recipes easily in the blog index. I often forget how I do things or which book has what recipe and this will be a good way to capture them for future use.


• Our kids are starting to show some interest in cooking-- just a glimmer --and we want to encourage them.


• I can play with color photography! And practice using my little camera.


• It will help me learn my Lightroom 2 program, especially if I have to do it daily.


• I needed some relief. I saw Arianna Huffington interviewed about blogging and she said that the secret is to blog about something you are passionate about; hence, food! Up to this point, I have been blogging on my art blog, but it is way too serious sometimes.


• Anne, my art buddy, said 2009 is going to be a year of fun for her. And that clicked with me. This blog is purely for fun. (But indirectly I think it will fuel my other work.)


• Mary, a.k.a., mittensinthekitchen, gave me an article that says happy people are often in a zone called "flow." They're absorbed in a challenging, but not overwhelming, task.


• Blogging is really easy -- once you get the hang of it. And therapeutic. I highly recommend it.