Meet my husband, Mr. Donnie Mills!

    So, I haven't blogged in a while.  It seems that I start every blog this way.  I always have the best of intentions but then life seems to get in the way.  Over the last year, my mom and dad have had some serious health issues.  And I met the man who would become my husband.  Needless to say, it has been a busy year!
     I met my husband in the summer of 2012.  We started dating in December of 2012.  We got married in August of 2013. 
     So who is this guy who swept me off of my feet?  He is a farmer from Jones County.  He loves his cows, and he loves to fish.  My husband is sweet and quiet.  He definitely does not like to be the center of attention.  He thinks that Jones County, NC, is God's country.
     He also loves surprises.  And so do I... both receiving them and giving them.  My wedding was just that to many people.  When we decided to get married, we both knew that we wanted something simple.  Both my husband and I work constantly and didn't feel like we could take time off from work.  And we wanted a house more than we wanted a big wedding.
     We spent the summer remodeling a house that my husband bought over the summer.  When the house was ready, we chose a Saturday and went and got married.  We were both back at work on Monday morning.  Our small wedding isn't for everyone.  But it was perfect for us!
     So if you have seen a handsome fella' around The Tipsy Bee and noticed a change in my name, you now know a little about the guy who stole my heart!

Change

Good evening, everyone!  It seems that every time that I think that I am going to commit to blogging regularly, I fizzle out.  Life catches up with me, and before I know it, I haven't blogged in 3 months. 

Then I find myself in a reflective mood as I begin blogging again.  I am thinking about the things that were going on in my life 3 months ago and how much things have changed since then.  The key word here is CHANGE.  Change can be a wonderful thing.  For me though, while it is somewhat thrilling, it is a scary, terrifying experience in other ways. 

For whatever reason, I have just never handled change very well.  Even though it may be exciting, it seems to frighten me on some level and in a way that I can just never explain. 

So for instance, I am super excited about the changes happening at The Tipsy Bee.  I have made sacrifice upon sacrifice to make The Tipsy Bee work.  When Isay sacrifice, I mean both the time kind and the monetary kind.  I have turned down offers to do fun things and not spent money on things that I really wanted, even felt I needed, to help The Tipsy Bee make it as a business.

And now on the eve of planting my grapes and pouring concrete for my new building, I am filled with pride, excitement, but still some dread.  With every major transition of my life, I go through these exact emotions.  You can imagine how trying my childhood was for my parents...lol... yes I wanted to go to kindergarten, but then I was terrified of leaving preschool.  The story replayed itself with every transition... elementary school to middle school... high school to college.  And though I survived each transition and found that the new experiences that came with the transition were awesome, change is still that thing that thrills me and scares me all at once. 

And with that, I leave you to ponder how change makes you feel... and promise to be less reflective in my future blogging :-0)

xoxo The Tipsy Bee

Happy New Year

Happy New Year!

I am so excited about the new year. 2010 held so many surprises. One of the greatest gifts of all arrived in the form of The Tipsy Bee. I always liked baking and thought in the back of my mind that a baking business would be so neat. Until I took a cake decorating class for fun over the summer, though, and someone asked if I would bake a few desserts for her, I never really thought that it could be a business. Though the business is small and just getting off of the ground a little, it is still the most rewarding thing that I have ever done. I have met neat and interesting people, learned a few things about starting and running a business, and had the chance to work with my family. I have had to work outside of my comfort zone some and occasionally bite off more than I thought that I could chew as the saying goes. Yet, this little business of mine is the thing that consumes me. I am always thinking about it and hoping to figure out ways to improve it and make it bigger and better. There is still a long ways to go in making it so that it can support itself but then the roller coaster that starting a new business is about is part of the fun! So as I said goodbye to 2010 and the many gifts it gave me, I thought about how much I am looking forward to 2011 and the challenges and rewards that it will hopefully present.

And as we begin the early days of 2011, I thought that it would be a good time to tell you about the things that I love and that inspire me and my baking... to help you get to know me. So as the song goes from The Sound of Music (a favorite movie... I love the classics), here are a few of my favorite things: cake, pie, chocolate, fresh whipped cream, eggs from a local farmer, raw honey (raw is key here), butter that I make myself from fresh cream, cookies, my family, pecans from my family's farm, fresh cut flowers, the colors red and black, NC State, Hallmark movies, books, and my truck. You might notice that many of the items on my list are food items. I love food, and I love to cook, bake, and eat. Food is social in that it brings people together and has always brought me together with my family and friends, and it is nourishing when it is produced with minimal interference from humans. To me there is something wonderful about fresh ingredients that lack all of the added junk that so much food contains these days. Local and/or natural ingredients make me feel all tingly inside... lol. Freshly made butter and eggs from a local farmer are fresh and pure. I really love the feeling of things that are wholesome and natural and the ability to name the person who produced them.

I also like things that are simple... playing with my dogs after a long day of work. Driving a truck that doesn't have lots of gadgets and gimmicks. NC State that doesn't always have the best ball team but certainly has the most loyal fans... and one of the few campuses where you are as likely to see a tractor instead of a truck in the middle of campus. And red and black, not just because they are NC State colors, but because they are passionate colors. Hanging out with my grandmother who is 93 and sharper than most 33 year-olds. The new gadget on the market is the Nook, but I prefer an old-fashioned book and the feel and smell of its pages. And though it may not be an Oscar performance with lots of suspense, I love the movies on Hallmark where in the end the guy gets the girl. So here is to a few of my favorite things and an exciting 2011! Best, Christian