I am so excited that I joined Baking GALS and recently signed up to be a team leader! I just got word that our team has been matched up with a Marine from Missouri. Here are some details about him.


His name is J (won't post actual name here), he's 21, from Missouri and has been a marine for almost 3 years. Last November he married his high school sweetheart, C (again, no real names) and they are expecting their first baby any day now. I do know it's going to be a boy. J was deployed before C had the baby and he's expected to return home sometime next summer. I should also mention that J's brother AND brother in-law are in the military as well.

During his spare time he enjoys spending time with his wife, camping, and the outdoors. He doesn't have any food allergies and isn't picky on food or candy.

We are all looking forward to baking for J, and helping to make his holiday better while away from his loved ones. Especially his little baby boy.

Running off to preheat the oven!

A Great Conversation Piece

I had to share this because we've had a ton of people coming and going in our house (due to renovations) and everyone asks us why we have this on our fridge.

Well, when we got married last year we did the traditional dollar dance. The tradition goes that you should write words of wisdom for the married couple, tie the bill into a knot and put it in the "Money Bag". The day after the wedding, or whenever you get to it, would be spent tackling your first task as husband and wife - untying all the bills from the night before.

We spent hours trying to untie all the bills. Some were dipped in candle wax, while other were covered in tape. Needless to say, people got really creative with their bills. Hence the "Make Babies" bill.

We use the cash we received from the dance on our honeymoon when eating out, but this was one bill we couldn't let go of because it was too funny.

We found one particular restaurant we ate at a few times because they had a ton of TV's and got all the sports games. The first time we ate there we apologized to the bartender for paying with wrinkled, candle wax stained, one dollar bills. He laughed and said it was fine.

The next day we returned for lunch and he had them still piled next to the cash registered. He greeted us when we came in and said he was glad to see us again and handed us the bills from the day before. He told us we should keep these because people wrote really nice things on them and he felt bad for taking them from us. We insisted he keep them as payment and we all laughed about it.