Merry Christmas and Happy Valentine's Day!

I realize that this post is late, but we did not get one of our gifts until Saturday, so you can see why there might be a delay.

Holidays and birthdays and anniversaries around our house go a lot like this:

J:What do you want?
E: I don't know. I don't need anything.
J: Well, what do you want but not need?
E: Nothing.

Which, in reality is nice. With the exception of my wish for smaller thighs, I have all I want. So we decided this year that instead of exchanging needless things, we would buy ourselves something for the house. This is why people get married, I am thinking. So they don't have to buy this stuff themselves.

Whatever.

Anyway, we exchanged little gifts at Christmas and were debating between new pots and pans (Hey, have you heard that eating the nonstick surface of your pans isn't good for you? Crazy, right?) because ours were hand me downs or cheapies and needed to be introduced to the trash. Or we were considering a down-alternative comforter. Because, you know. That would be nice.

We chose the pots and pans because there was a fantastic set at Cost-co and we couldn't pass it up. Seriously, awesome set. Stainless steel, copper bottom and along the sides, wonderful.

This picture was taken right after Christmas which explains all the munchies and treats on the counter. Sort of.

My dad said they were nice, my brother called me a lucky bitch, and my mom said they were too nice for my stove.

Thanks, y'all.

For anyone interested, it was the Cost-co brand (Kirkland?) and it's a huge set with lids and a steamer and everything. They all cook things evenly and once they get heated up, shit stays HOT.

Then we decided on Valentine's Day that the same thing applied. We wanted nothing. We needed a new toaster oven, as the one I had got in college had seen better days and only worked on the top side, not the bottom. So you had to flip everything you put in there. Plus, we don't own a microwave, so a toaster oven is truly our go-to counter top appliance.

So here is the old one:

 It's the Toastmaster deluxe. From the year 2000. It didn't even come clean anymore. It actually had to be tossed and could not be donated. Jeremiah suggested that I open and close the door one more time, for memories. I did.

We replaced it with this:

There are positive and negative reviews for this, but there were positive and negative reviews for all the ones we looked at. KitchenAid is the brand, and I knew once I saw it, I wanted it. Mainly because it is three pronged on the outlet, and most toaster ovens ARE NOT. Which is crazy, because think of the power they got floating through there. So the three prong means that I most likely won't get electrocuted. Yay. Also, the wire trays hook in the back so they don't slide all the way out and you find your food on the floor. Plus, this beast can cook a whole bird, people. It came with two wire racks, a broiler pan, and something that hooks up a bird.  So far we've used it to do a mess of potatoes and some toast...AT THE SAME TIME! Everything cooked up superbly and evenly.

So there you go. Two wonderful purchases and two wonderful reasons why you should get married and register for gifts.