Category: Inspirations

Baking for Hope: Exceeding Goals and Raising Expectations

One month ago I set off with a mission to bake through a cookbook, raise some money for a good cause, and make some essential workers happy in our community. Though I was very motivated, I willfully kept my expectations low. I blame Covid for my lack of confidence, as I’ve learned that holding plans loosely is the best way to go in a pandemic. One has a hard time aspiring for greatness when there are about a hundred ways a deadly disease and can throw a hinge in our best laid plans.

But despite my scarce optimism, not only have I been able to meet my goals, but exceeded them somehow. I’m 7 recipes ahead of schedule toward my baking goal (12 completed out of 47 recipes in Pie In the Sky). And though my scale may be scolding me for all the taste testing, I have zero regrets for all the delicious cakes, pies, breads, muffins and cookies that are flying out of my kitchen (and my carb-obsessed family of six is not complaining either).

But hitting baking goals was not the only part that has surprised me. To be honest, I wasn’t sure if people would get involved with my crazy bake sale experiment. But despite my doubt, in just two short weeks 17 people donated and I was able to raise $525 for Be the Bridge. And to think my original goal had been to raise $100- oh me of little faith.

But probably the most amazing outcome from my bake sale project was the surprising meaningful connections I have been making with people through baking. Either I was safely re-connecting with friends (masked, socially distanced, no contact delivery), making new friends (the fundraiser was public through Facebook), or I was able to bring a little bright, sweet moment of generosity to essential workers in my sphere.

It’s not a huge thing- to drop off a few slices of cake in a cute little box. But in this heavy moment in our lives, small gestures can really have a larger impact than we anticipate.

For instance, I received this note after dropping off some biscotti to a co-worker at Raphael House: “Your timing was everything I needed.  Your sweet treat literally made my day and continued to bring a smile to my face every time I made eye contact with it at home.”

My first delivery to my fellow Domestic Violence Advocates- Double Chocolate Walnut Biscotti

But friends, what I love about this project is that it’s not just me making these moments happen- I get to give others the opportunity to share in the joy of giving. Creating this little bubbling of hope in people is addicting and absolutely should not be limited to myself.

Because of my years of work with people who have experienced heart-breaking trauma, homelessness and violence, I have personally witnessed how giving to others is vital for our own healing. To walk a hard road and yet be able to eventually encourage someone else is life-giving and helps give purpose behind some of the pain we have experienced.

For this reason, you can understand why I was so thrilled to see the people donating weren’t necessarily people who were financially well-off and had shiny, perfect lives (which don’t exist anyway, of course). They were people who have struggled themselves, but were still able and willing to give despite their personal challenges.

One past resident of My Father’s House, Susie (name and picture used with permission), reached out to me and asked if she could order 3 pumpkin pies. As she graciously understood that I wasn’t able to do big orders, I felt I had enough energy to make 1 extra full-sized pie. We arranged to connect and I was excited to see her again, since it had been several years since I had been her case manager at MFH.

As we caught up while trying to avoid the sprinkle of cold rain on my small porch, she told me how excited she was to be able to do something good in the community and she wanted to be able to do more. Covid had forced her to be home more as well, and she was hoping to be able to dust off her deep fryer and pick back up her egg roll hobby and would be thrilled to donate orders of egg rolls to my bake sales in the future.

As she was talking, I literally got warm chills (it’s also what I call a God-goosebumps). To be standing on my porch giving someone a pie…who is then giving me money to give to a great cause…who then wants to use their gifts and resources to help others in a bigger way…and can inspire others with their story because they have overcome homelessness…and we get to eat egg rolls…?!!!!!

I mean, I can’t really think of much in life that could be cooler than that right now. Seriously.

Eat that, low expectations.

Susie picking up her Custard Pumpkin Pie

So as we are already into February, I’m looking forward to introducing everyone to our next Bake Sale for Hope next week. This month we will be featuring Wild Aid, a cause that is near and dear to my 12-year-old daughter, Penny. From a very young age, Penny has had a passion for shark preservation (read more about her young activist beginnings here– it’s half-way through the post) and she has saved $100 of her own money to contribute to the cause. We will be hearing more from her as I bake up Daredevil Food’s Cake with Mocha Buttercream and Lemon-Poppy Seed Loaf cakes (and egg rolls from Susie) to save the sharks!

Friendly reminder of how the giving and receiving works for the Bake Sale:

Each person who donates to the charity gets two options: either they can connect with me and get a baked good, or they can donate their treat to an essential worker. To help with managing my time and capacity, it doesn’t matter if someone donates $10 or $100- everyone receives a similar sized portion (i.e. 2-3 servings of cookies, 2 slices of cake, etc.).

Unfortunately, I simply don’t have time or energy to make full-sized recipes for everyone who gives. I’m a full-time working mom, with 3 kids at home…so yeah, I hope you can see how running a full-fledge bakery on top of normal life might be a tad INSANE. For now, I am using Facebook for the fundraising, but I can take cash or Venmo donations as well.

Moving forward, I won’t be so reserved in my expectations or set limits on what we may be able to accomplish. This is going to be amazing. I hope you’ll join me!

One of the recipes I was happy to both share and taste test: Mocha Chiffon Cake with Champagne Sayabon Sauce

I selected my first charity, Be the Bridge, because of the incredible impact this organization has had in my own life. Over the past year (as so many have), I have watched, listened, and learned so much about the reality of systemic racism in our country. My heart has grieved as I have grappled with my ignorance and lack of action in the past, and Be the Bridge created a place (through Latasha Morrison’s book and online community) where I could really learn and begin to process what I was seeing and experiencing.

Learning and lamenting about the injustices of racial inequity are certainly important steps for personal growth, but without action, we can’t really affect change. So helping support organizations who are already doing good work is one small step we can take. Choosing this charity is not a one-time token action to make it look like I have done something to address hatred and racism. It has to be ongoing work- personally, outwardly with action and with a commitment to carefully listen to the BIPOC community for how we can effectively begin to heal the divide.

Missed the bake sale last month? It’s never too late to give- find a charity that is working toward racial justice you love and give generously!

An act of kindness, giving it forward, can be more powerful than a sword in a needed revolution. –Ann Voskamp, The Broken Way

Art and Sharks Party

So what do you do when you have two kids who have birthdays 5 days apart and yet want different themes for the party this year?  First, you have a moment of insanity, and think, “oh yes, two parties wouldn’t be that hard to pull off.  Let’s do that.”  But then you look at your life and how you hardly have time to feed yourself or clean the toilet and wisely re-think this decision.  So a mishmash of 6 and 9-year old interests results in:

Before I move on, I must put a huge shout out to my creative kindred spirit, Mikah Neff, for designing these awesome invites.  I had no idea how to communicate the theme of Art and Sharks and without any guidance whatsoever, Mikah came up with that incredible design.  I have cool friends 🙂

When asked what she would like to be when she grows up, Ramona will inform you that she is going to be an artist.  She will also tell you that this means she doesn’t have to learn how to read because she will just be making beautiful art.  Let’s see how that goes for her in the long-run…*Mom and Dad grimace*

Penny has carried on her fight for the well-being of our sharp-toothed friends and their right to a life out of the shark-fin soup pot.  She has also decided she would like to be a marine biologist.  And thus Art and Sharks became the theme!

So what do you do at an Art and Sharks party?  Pictures really explain it the best…

Kids exploring our backyard and visiting our chickens

Balance beam game in shark infested waters

Arts and crafts free-for-all table!  Ramona prefers projects without structure, and so do apparently most kids…

Pin the fin- just can’t get away from this classic party game, no matter what the theme

No elaborate cake this year (I know…clutch the pearls!)- but I did carve a pretty nifty watermelon shark.  It’s actually way easier than carving a pumpkin and way more yummy

Ok, so I know there was no epic cake, but that doesn’t mean that I wasn’t up to my elbows in cake prep this week.  To go with the arts theme, I thought I would make a mini cake for each child and they could decorate their own cake however they liked.  The kids just couldn’t wait to get their hands on the buttercream and fondant- it was definitely the highlight of the party.

After a brief instruction about how to roll out fondant, the kids were off and running with their delicious creations…

Did you know you can paint fondant with food coloring?  Ramona was finding her muse in no time…

 

Sorry Amelia- you slipped away without a pic of your beautiful cake!  But I know it came out so cute!

Two amazing girls making birthday wishes

Some of you may be familiar with Penny’s last fundraiser and how she likes to raise the neighborhood awareness of shark cruelty.  The party was just another platform to further her cause.  We collected over $20 in spare change from her birthday guests to donate to the the Wildaid shark fund.  Such a giving heart and smart too- Penny, you’ve got this marine biology dream in the bag.

After 4 major family birthdays in the past month, I’m ready to retire the party supplies and go on vacation.  But I love the creativity of these amazing little people, how unique they are growing up to be, and how I get to be their mom.  It will be interesting if we get another crazy mishmashed theme again next year…unicorns and spelunking?  Superheros and roller derby?  Only time will tell what these spunky girls will come up with next.

*This post is dedicated to my Dad (Grandbear).  He would have loved to have been there and tell the kids he was the troll in the basement.  He would have sang the short version of the birthday song (This is your birthday song, it isn’t very long, hey!), tell me about 10 times how proud he was of me, and watched with joy as they opened gifts, never taking a single moment for granted.  You are so missed, Dad!  

Penny’s Cupcake Win

Today, I watched my little girl win a prize.  This was not just any prize, my friends.  She won 1st prize in a baking competition.  Talk about living out your dreams through your children.

It all started yesterday….

After trudging through a particularly rainy and unseasonably chilly June afternoon, the girls and I huddled in our cozy kitchen around gingerbread tea and cookies to revive ourselves and discuss the summer break ahead.  Looking out of the back kitchen door and watching the rain pouring in sheets, I thought, rather begrudgingly, about the school picnic scheduled for the next day.  Trying to cheer us up, I said, “You know, Penny, they are going to have a cupcake cake competition at the picnic.”

A little twinkle came into her eye and in a matter of a few minutes, our aprons were on and Penny was brainstorming her ideas in her notebook (something she has seen me do many a time).

Here was the initial sketch:

The inspiration for Pink Lemonade Cupcakes came from this interesting find at Trader Joe’s:

It was a totally random impulse buy- I was intrigued by the idea of pink lemons and they looked fun, but I had no real intent or purpose for them. It’s how you could really describe most of my grocery cart when I shop at TJ’s (true confessions here).

Penny loved the idea of using them in her cupcakes and so Pink Lemonade Cupcakes became the plan.  She used my vanilla cupcake recipe, dyed it pink and we whipped up a quick batch before flying out the door for dance lessons and the library.

The frosting and decorating we saved for the next day.  After looking at a few recipes, we decided to just try our own attempt at lemonade buttercream.  All of them involved frozen lemonade concentrate…something we didn’t have time to run to the store for.  So she grated some pink lemon zest, guessed at the right ratios for lemon juice, and added it to my standard buttercream recipe.  It turned out perfect- the pink lemons have a little more depth of flavor than regular lemons and this frosting was perfectly tart and delicious. I have never thought to describe buttercream as “juicy” but that’s the word that comes to mind.

And below was the delightful result of Penny’s creativity and awesome piping skills:

I’m not sure how other parents prep the kids for possible disappointment, but I tend to be the voice of reality (I might be a touch of a negative Nancy). I don’t want to see them set their expectations too high, only to be crushed when they lose.  This is from experience with Penny in the past…I seem to remember a pumpkin carving contest fraught with terrible despair after she didn’t win. It practically ruined Halloween (though the candy made quick remedy of that affair).

So as we arrived and I saw at least 30 other entries (who looked incredibly delicious), I reminded her that we should have a good attitude, no matter the outcome.  She nodded in agreement, but I could tell she really wanted to win.  While her friends played on the park equipment, she hovered around the cupcake booth, stalked the judges while they did their tasting, and checked every few minutes to see if they had the the results.

Honestly, I was bracing myself for a ride home with a disappointed almost 9-year-old.  But as the points were added up, I realized that she might have really impressed judges and had a chance to place.

The anticipation was killing her:

And then it really happened.  They called Penny Scout Wiese, tying for 1st place!

She won 4 tickets for the G6 air park, a free carwash, and a smile that didn’t leave her all night.  I’m taking the win as a compliment to my own recipes, but Penny gets 100% of the credit for her creativity and determination.  Watch out world, this girl is just getting started.

Want to try out our winning Pink Lemonade Buttercream?  So simple and fun- just use with vanilla or lemon cupcakes:

Penny’s Pink Lemonade Buttercream

2 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temp

2 1/2 cups powdered sugar, sifted

3 TB *Fresh pink lemon juice

1 TB (scant) *Pink lemon zest

Pinch of salt

(*Regular lemons could be substituted)

Cream butter with an electric mixer until smooth.  Add sifted powdered sugar slowly until completely absorbed.  Beat on med-high until light and fluffy.  Add lemon zest and lemon juice, scraping down bowl as needed.  Beat until completely combined.

We added 10 drops of yellow food coloring to make it look more “lemony.”  You could alternatively use pink if desired.

“There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.” -Paulo Coelho