My mad chili making skills

My ward had a fall festival party on Friday the 30th & part of the festivities was a chili cook off. I am pretty confident in my skills as a cook but I am not so confident that I would KNOWINGLY sign up for a cook off of ANY type! However, I did sign up for this (I originally thought I was just signing up to bring chili for a potluck, I didn't realize until AFTER I had signed my name in pen that it was actually a cook off!). Well, I decided to really go all out. Even though it has been FOREVER since I made chili with the beans made from scratch I decided to do that this time. I soaked my beans overnight on Thursday & when I got up on Friday they had done what dry beans do and that is they absorbed the water and tripled in size! My ENTIRE crock pot was full! Thankfully I mentioned this to my friend Kym & she graciously said she would take some of them off my hands. After getting those beans (Literally HALF of them!) I started my beans cooking. I diced up some onion & minced some fresh garlic and put them on low with LOTS of water! When they were nice & tender I started browning and seasoning the ground beef (all 2.25 lbs of it!). I added my diced tomatoes & tomato sauce & some seasoning. I have recently discovered how much I enjoy the flavor of cumin but I went INCREDIBLY overboard while seasoning my chili with it. It was ALL I could taste! I called my mom & sister for some advice on what to do to make my chili taste like something OTHER than cumin & the "helpful" advice I got was to add a ton more garlic & chili powder. Well, I did, and wouldn't you know it? It worked! I gone THIRD prize out of around 20 different chilis! I was SO shocked & excited. I didn't get to have a whole bowl of my award winning chili but I still have a little leftover & I have had one request so far to make it when the family is all together for Thanksgiving this year. Anyway, here is a photo of me with my "trophy" and a close up of the trophy.