do you know the muffin man?

This week my Moms' Bible study was having our social week, which basically means that instead of doing a bible study we eat tons of food and visit with each other!  We all love doing our study, but every once in a while it's wonderful just to chat and get caught up on what's going on for everyone.  The kiddos play, we eat - it's a win win.
 
The hardest part for me in coming to a pot luck is deciding what to bring!  I love to bake, but rarely do since Drew and I do NOT need tons of yummy baked goods laying around the house.  Events like this are the perfect excuse for me to pull out my mixer and go to town!

{Although I must say, it's an even bigger challenge than normal in this group since one of our members is an honest-to-goodness pastry chef.  Most times folks are impressed if you make frosting from scratch.  At the last social she brought homemade croissants.  Good grief.  Love you Abby.  :o)}

So while deciding what to make I remembered that I received this little beauty for Christmas.

Yum, muffins!!

This book is full of great muffin ideas.  All of the recipes are pretty simple and I wanted to try several.  Asher and I looked and looked through it and decided on 3 muffins to make:  cranberry-orange

sour cherry with coconut streusel

and classic blueberry {lost my will to photograph by the time these finished, sorry}

Do you know how hard it is to find cranberries in March?  Didn't think that one through.  3 stores later we had all the ingredients and were ready to bake!

Asher was, of course, my helper in the process.

While I mixed, filled, and baked he unloaded every drawer and flat surface in my kitchen.

How did I ever bake without him?

As a funny side note, at one point I told him to "smile!" and he did, but while still looking in the drawer.  You can see the side of his smiley face.  Too cute!  ha!

Unfortunately, as they say, all good things must come to an end. 

Asher, we're done baking!  Time to go play in the living room!

I know, I know.  I'm sad too.

 No, it's not time for a taste test yet.  That's later.

The muffins turned out really well, but there are things I will change in the recipes for next time.  I hate trying new recipes on friends {I want them to be perfect!} but when else can I make 3 dozen muffins? 

Next time Asher can bake while I destroy the kitchen and we'll see how they taste!

How could they be anything but sweet {or cheesy}?