Happy Day

I started this challenge called "100 Happy Days". The requirements are to photograph something that made you happy each day and send it to the people at 100happydays.com or tag them in your post via hashtag. It is supposed to help you recognize and be thankful for the things that make us happy on a daily basis. Acknowledging the causes of our happiness should in turn make us happier. I thought that I would use the daily challenge as inspiration for my blog, in order to expand on the photo postings. 

My first happy photo:

My boyfriend Christopher may have a cookbook obsession. I have just recently limited him to one cookbook per month. We don't spend a lot of money, but the majority of the money we do spend is on food, followed closely by cookbooks. I get on Christopher's case about the cookbooks very often. One day he will seek all of the cookbooks to buy me a diamond ring. Yeah Right. But I have to say that I am also a book lover. I have always been a reader and I have had shelves upon shelves filled with books since I was a child. More recently though, with the influence of culinary school and two years with my boyfriend, I am totally into cookbooks. We have a six shelf bookcase in our apartment which is solely for cookbooks. If you have any other books not related to cooking then you need to find room for them elsewhere. As I mentioned I give Chris a lot of grief for having so many cookbooks, but I am actually really proud of our combined collection. I say our collection because when I met Chris he had maybe 25 cookbooks and I probably had 20, and now we have over 200 cookbooks give or take a few. Our bookshelf is completely full, so every time a new book makes it way home we either have to take a less important book and move it to the small shelf that is not located in the living room or display it in a different manner. 

Chris is persistent on buying or making a new bookshelf, but I know that if I allow him to do that, then he will have a growing need to fill it right away. We recently moved, and let me tell you books are heavy! At least half of our boxes were filled with books and it took two people to carry each box. People think that having children forces them to settle down, well I think having too many books can really weigh you down. It's difficult and expensive to move with books! If we picked up and moved to Italy, we would have to store our cookbooks- how could we pick just one box to bring with us? How could we ensure that the books that are in storage will be safe/not deteriorate? What about the slip covers!? They might get damaged!  If you knew Chris, you would understand that I am completely making fun of him right now, but in all honesty I am thankful that I have a partner who shares a similar passion to me. We both enjoy food and reading, so there you go. I may find a new cookbook with a receipt hidden under his bed, but at least it's not a pack of cigarettes. We really do have quite the collection and it makes me really happy to be able to peruse through hundreds of cookbooks. I have only tried a few recipes out of the collection but what we really do is use them for inspiration. And we have to keep feeding that. My name is Tricia and I am addicted to cookbooks.  

I would say this is probably one of our best finds- Used Book Section of Barnes & Noble, signed, totaling $1.94