My favorite mixing bowl.

This is a short one, mainly about my favorite mixing bowl but to also tell you real quick how by making a couple quick changes a boxed cake mix can taste like a cake from scratch.  Hence all of the other ingredients in this picture!

So I saw this online and tried it out, not actually sure if it made the cake taste better or not, I really would need to try them out in a taste test to know for sure but maybe one of you can tell me what you think.  So, following the instruction on the box, increase the eggs by at least 1.  Use milk instead of water and in place of the oil use melted butter and double the amount.   Bake as usual.

Now, onto that multicolored bowl in the picture.  Several years ago my mom was cleaning out her kitchen cabinets to get rid of items she wasn't using.  This bowl was on the chopping block.  I saw it and wanted it!  It had grimy layer on the outside from sitting in top cupboard for too long, but I didn't care!  Now the house my mom lived in had once belonged to my grandma and grandpa.  After my grandma suddenly died when I was in fifth grade, our family moved in so my mom could take care of my grandpa.  After he passed away a couple of months after that, we stayed in the house.  Since that time the house has never truly been completely cleaned out of all of the items owned by my grandma and grandpa.  Most of the big or important items were divided and such after their funerals, but things like random mixing bowls stayed and became forgotten.  When I saw that bowl it reminded me of my grandma, so I had to have it.
I don't know how many years I have been using this for baking, but it is my favorite bowl!  It is the perfect size for cake mixes, goes in the microwave with no problems, fits in my dishwasher and my fridge when I need it to.  For almost every recipe I make, this bowl usually gets used at least once, if not more.  It's not a perfect bowl, it doesn't have a lid, it doesn't have a nice handle to help me pour more easily, but I still love it.  I know my grandma enjoyed baking, though I don't have a lot of memories of her baking in the kitchen, I still like to think that this old bowl links me to her and I think of her whenever I use it.