In my quest to become the ultimate baker, I have a acquired a new tool:

Isn't it just the prettiest thing you've ever seen? I love it so much, I am going to make stuff with it right away, to compensate for six months of using an old tiny mixer that has started to make loud grunting noises at me whenever I try to mix anything with more substance than cake batter. Seriously. I made muffins yesterday, and it was whining even before I put in the flour (yes, I'm lazy and I mix the wet ingredients in muffins with a mixer...I know that's not the preferred method, but my muffins come out just fine, so deal). My good mixer has long been gone to a better home and the one I received as a gift (that was supposed to be an upgrade but broke immediately after I gave my good mixer away and turned the new one on) has been sitting on a shelf in my garage, unable to be fixed.

So I've been using an old hand-me-down to fill in the gap while I tried to find a way to afford one of these bad boys (I got a great deal on it at Costco, in the warehouse, but it still hurt). I have a lot of trouble making large purchases, due to my indecisiveness and inability to decide if it's really worth that many hours of work. Plus, the old one really is just fine. It's quite small and makes for a lot of extra cleanup because it leaks gear oil and you have to constantly bang the pin that holds the top part on back into place and it gets stuck on the base so I have to leave the dirty bowl on there for my husband to remove with a strap wrench when he gets home. Other than that, it works okay. It's just that since I use it about five times per week, it gets a little tedious having to deal with all of those issues plus having to do everything in smaller batches because the bowl is close to half the size of the bowl I'm used to working with. Yes, I am whining. I realize I could mix this stuff by hand, but then we'd be eating Chips Ahoy instead of homemade cookies, now, wouldn't we?

This totally is worth it, though. I've been agonizing for three weeks or so, waiting to buy it until I felt like it was the right time. When we saw it on that shelf at Costco yesterday, all shiny and $70 cheaper than it had been online, we knew it was time.

This is the best week ever. EVER. Maybe that means my priorities are skewed, or maybe it's just the happy spilling over from all of the good things that have been happening lately, or it could even be that my birthday (which is coming up on Saturday, for those of you who are interested...I accept checks, money orders or gifts from amazon.com) is making me in a better mood than usual. Whatever.

I'm off to mix stuff. Gourmet, fancy stuff (or cake).