Recipes

About a year and half ago I decided to work on my recipes.  The tops and sides of my recipe cards were getting frayed and hard to read.  I have many recipes in different books that I use and could spend far too long looking for a certain recipe.  I decided it was time to make my own book.  First I went through all my cards and typed them up on my computer.  I tried to put them in catagories that made since to me and arrange them in alphabetical order.  I now have a new appreciation for all those cookbooks the different churches have made through the years.  I skipped past recipes I didn't use and updated the rest to the way I actually make it.

Then I went through all my cookbooks and typed in the recipes that I use.  It took me well over a year to finish.  I did a quick edit and sent it to the printers.  There are around 300 recipes.   I planned on giving all the kids a copy.  David suggested I surprise them and give it to them at Christmas, which inspired me to get them done.  I put the pages in page protectors and had page dividers to separate the sections.  

The kids knew I had been working on it for myself, so I finished mine and began using it.  This was very good because it gave me a chance to find several errors.  (Once again another moment of appreciation to all the women who made church cookbooks).  I found that half my recipes for casseroles disappeared.  I must have not saved it that day or something so I had to type out the missed recipes and add them in.  Then I found recipes here and there that I had forgotten so I typed them up and added them at the end of their section, totally out of order.  I found that I couldn't remember where I had put certain recipes, so I added an index at the end of the book.  

After breakfast Christmas morning, I realized I never saw anyone open their recipe books.  I forgot I had hid them in a separate room.  This project has definitely been a  trying one.  Later that day when we were all together again I finally gave them their presents.  I had to add a disclaimer to all the spelling errors and encouraged them to let me know of mistakes so we can pass the word around.  It was fun, the kids were happy and so was I.  I am very happy with my book and use it almost every day.  It is so nice to have all my recipes in one book, and it was fun to get done.  

The finished book

Inside

The index