Thank You

Blogging has been one interesting journey for me and I truly enjoyed this creative experience. It has been nearly 5 years since I started typing out my recipes along with some very talented guest bloggers--resulting in nearly 500 posts. As with many fun activities, there is an end and so for now, it's time for me to retire from blogging. I am glad that I took a chance and blindly leapt into this project with little information on blogging. I believe that sometimes what you read can deter you from doing some things. As with all things in my life I hope that I have improved since my initial post. The most important accomplishment is that I have achieved a few personal goals that I set for myself back in 2012:

1) To document for the first time recipes and ideas not only from my own imagination and memories of food that I ate but also some from my own family. Almost all of my family's recipes came from word of mouth...and as many of you have read often quite vague! I know of only one recipe that was written down. In the early 1980s, my mother's egg roll recipe was published in our community church cookbook.

2) To improve my writing skills...mainly to write in complete sentences. Writing is a huge struggle for me and it is still a work in progress. For 2 decades I barely wrote in complete sentences or in paragraphs. In nursing (as a Registered Nurse and as a Family Nurse Practitioner) one does not write a lengthy story. If you write too much on your patients no one will have the time or interest to read it. We prefer short, simple and to the point!

3) To improve my photography skills...which is also a work in progress. There is always room for improvement and every day I strive to gain new skills and be better. And as with food, I find that photography brings people closer together.

4) To involve some of my friends and family/relatives as guest writers/bloggers so they can share their delicious recipes, great ideas or stories. I want to thank my family and friends who have contributed to my blog: my grandparents, my parents, my father-in-law, aunts, cousins, and friends.

I also want to thank all of my blog members for your support. Thank you to those of you for stopping by my website to visit even if it was by accident! I am constantly in awe to see viewers from all over the world...even some countries I have not yet visited. I know for a fact that some of my members are not scared of my blog or are horrified by what I wrote/cooked/ate. I sincerely thank you for sticking around! I also want to thank my husband Paul for his endless support and constant encouragement, putting up with my hobbies, helping me do the dishes/cleaning the mess I made in the kitchen, eating everything I make without questioning and always appearing to enjoy every bite! So, what's next? At the moment I will try to keep this blog up passively. Instead of writing my own recipes I may continue to have guest bloggers in the future...of course if I can locate them! For any members who have any interest in sharing your recipes, ideas or food stories please let me know. I would love to have you be a part of my food journey!

--photo taken with my husband Paul on Maui, 2016--

Again thank you for following my blog and I hope you get to play with your ingredients often! May you stay happy, healthy, safe, surrounding yourself with good company and good food! Happy New Year from Thanh's Kitchen to yours!                   

Thanh Thai
thanhskitchen.com
thanhskitchen@gmail.com

--photo taken in NH in 2015--