One Year Blog Birthday!

It's finally the weekend! This has been a long week and as usual I'm afraid it's going to be a quick weekend. For today though, I'm going to celebrate the fact that I actually kept up with (and thoroughly enjoyed) writing this blog over the past year. When I sent out my first post a year ago today, I wasn't sure if people would read it, if I'd find enough to write about, or even if I'd be able to keep it up. Thanks to all of you who read this and give me positive feed back, I was encouraged to keep going. I really love when I hear that someone actually tried a recipe or project that I post on here and it has been so great to keep up with you all through this blog.

I try not to focus too much looking at my blog "stats", but it is fun to see how many people read the blog. Typically it's a pretty modest number, but last October that number really exploded when those Halloween wine bottles I made went crazy on Pinterest. Since then I've had many more views on the blog, but most of them are just for the wine bottles :)

You may have noticed that I post a lot of baked goods and sweets on here. That's because they're my favorite things to make AND eat! The problem is that I do eat them and I eat too much of them. I really wish I could share some of these things with you all, but logistically, it's kinda difficult. Instead I thought I would put a few of my favorite baking tools/utensils (new ones of course) together into a little prize for one of you. Consider it a birthday present from the blog :) Now I couldn't give you my absolute favorite kitchen tool which is my KitchenAid mixer, but maybe one day. The things that I do have to give away are:

- A Silpat baking mat - This will fit on a jellyroll size pan and is completely non-stick. It's great for cookies, breads and anything else you might bake, and it keeps you from having to waste parchment paper or grease the cookie sheet.
- A bench scraper - I use this to transfer chopped veggies from a cutting board to a pot, cut dough up into pieces, smooth the sides of cakes and who knows what else. It really is very useful.
- A pair of mini spatulas - I have a similar set to these and use them almost every day! They're great for scraping out small measuring cups that you can't fit a regular spatula in. They also scrape out jars and cans that aren't wide enough for other scrapers. And they're better than using spoons because they have nice flexible sides that make sure nothing is missed.
- Grease proof cupcake papers - These I really just wanted to throw in because they're fun. But the really great thing about them is that they are "grease proof" which means that they'll maintain their bright colors even after something is baked in them.

Well, that's all I have for you! haha. All you have to do is leave a comment below letting me know what you'd make first if you won this :) I'll leave this open for a few days so everyone who wants to has time to enter. The winner will be picked on Tuesday. This weekend before the Super Bowl I'm hoping to finally post about that special cake that I mentioned a couple posts back. I actually forgot to take pictures of it, but I'm making a similar cake for tomorrow, so I'll be sure to get pictures of that. Thank you again to every single one of you who actually reads this! You make it fun for me :) I hope you all have a great weekend, talk to you later!