Archetypal Stand Mixer in Turquoise

My love of baking probably stemmed from my immense love of baked goods. Or rather, I needed to bake in order to create a layer of cake-like substance from which to eat large quantities of frosting. I love frosting. Or icing. But not the gourmet type. I like the generic Dunkin Hines, Funfetti, and fudgy chocolate from plastic canisters. I'm sure many of you don't approve, but I'm just being honest.

Sometime around third grade, my mom taught me to use the oven myself (with supervision of course). I'd spend an entire Saturday baking and decorating sugar cookies. The recipe was actually from an old Sesame Street book, called Cookie Monster's Cookie Dough. They were delicious, and I can't believe it took me until just this minute to look for it on the internet. Oy!

My brother would help me decorate, we'd roll the dough out with our grubby hands, working the dough into worms, hat cookies (so I could decorate with flowers and rainbows of color), monsters, airplanes, alien starships...you name it, we made it. We'd take over the entire kitchen table and cover it with flour, would get dough smeared everywhere, and frosting in the remote places that the dough hadn't contaminated.

I don't know how that got all cleaned up. I'm sure we did a bit, but I'm sure my mom did a lot more than I remember. Another reason to love that woman...

I'm not a girl who needs a lot, kitchen appliance wise. I use my immersion blender (from Aunt Marty) for everything. So much that I got rid of my hand mixer, blender and a waffle iron for good measure. But the KitchenAid Stand Mixer. I lust after it. When I first started learning to cook, it stood out as an archetype for being a real baker or just knowing my way around the kitchen. Plus I saw one online with flames painted on the side, and you don't forget that too easily.



My mom bought a white one off of a friend, that she says I can have next time I go home to Florida with my car. I may just have to take her up on this! But I wanted to draw the turquoise one that is part of the Martha Stewart collection at Macy's because you know how I love pretty colors.

How about you guys? What's the one material thing that you thought would make you feel like a grown up, or that you want even though you may not need it? Uh, this and the Franklin Covey planner in 2002 are obviously mine!