My Niche

The other question on my mind recently is what makes me think this is going to work? What sets me apart from everyone else? How do I “brand” myself? I have come up with two things that I think sets me apart.

First – I love to bake, my enjoyment comes from the process of baking. Taking raw ingredients, mixing them together in a specific order and resulting in a product that is so much great then the sum of the parts. What this means, is that I make things from scratch. My things don’t come from the freezer or a box or anything that is premixed – with one exception. I bake the way your Mothers or Grandmothers baked. Buying a package of cookie dough and putting it in the oven is not baking and I can honestly say I do not recall ever buying a package of “store bought cookies.” I even make all of my frosting from scratch, nothing from a can. I know this is rare in this day and age, most people don’t make the time, or have the desire to really bake things. So I see this as something that sets me apart. Plus I make all those old favorites – éclair desert, congo bars, oatmeal scotchies, potato chip cookies…..

Second - Allergy sensitive baking. My nine year old nephew has a peanut allergy. When this was discovered, 7 or so years ago, my sister did a tremendous amount of research. It was very interesting to discover what companies and brand went to great measures to provide nut free products and which did not. At that time our family basically went nut free and that included my baking. With the exception of the things I bake with nuts, everything else I produce is completely nut free to the extent that the products I use are not even produced on the same equipment that produces nuts. In addition my kitchen is set up in a way that any nuts I have in the house are in a completely different cupboard then the rest of my baking supplies, and I use different measuring tools, pans, dish clothes, and pot holders when I bake with nuts. I also completely sanitized (i.e. bleach) my counters after using nuts. Now you may think this is anal, but this issue is extremely personal to me. My nephew knows that anything I make for him is safe and it will always be that way. I see this as a major strength – most people dealing with a peanut allergy completely bypass any baked item because it is just too risky – this is an allergy that causes death, and you can’t be too careful. So by understanding this issue and catering to it will set me apart.

Epiphany

Maybe epiphany is too strong of a word, but I like it, and this latest idea did hit me like a ton of bricks, so I am going to use it. I have been trying to figure out where to go? How to proceed? And of course the biggest question is this at all feasible? I think I have found an answer. This past weekend my sister’s neighborhood had community garage sale. Now before I proceed, let me explain to you that I hate garage sales, no I loath them. My first memory of a garage sale was a few days after my 5th birthday, I had received a new pink big wheel as a gift, and some scary old man tried to buy it out from under me. Through out my childhood, every year my mom participated in the neighborhood sale and I was always required to help out – in fact my Mom would make me stay home from school to run them (it was the only time I dreaded skipping school). They were always painful days when random strangers would try to barter over some 50 cent item.
Ugh… Anyway, my sister’s sale was this weekend and one night laying in bed it hit me, I could sell baked goods at her sale, unfortunately in her neighborhood they have a community bake sale at one of the garages to pay for their neighborhood picnic, so I could not do it then, but it got me thinking on a different path. My thoughts landed me at the Farmers Market. That is exactly what I have been looking for. A place to get my feet wet, experiment with quantities, packing, variety, etc. and start to build a client base. I am still looking to do special orders and fill those occasional needs, but I think this is a great way to start.
This all being said I would like to do a trial run at a garage sale. If any of you, or your friends or family members are planning a sale in a high traffic area, and would be willing to let me set up a table. Please let me know.

Nervous Energy

I am a hockey fan. I used to say I was a bit of a hockey fan or I enjoyed watching the Red Wings, but there is no denying it anymore I am a hockey fan. Well if I am being totally honest right now I would have to say I am a huge hockey fan. With the lack of anything else to do I find myself more and more engrossed in Hockey. We are currently in the playoff season and Sunday night it was the 6th game between the Calgary flames the Red Wings. The Wings were up 3 games to 2 and could put the series away and I was nervous – especially after the goonary tactics of game 5 Saturday by the flames, which I will not even dignify by discussing. Anyway by the time the game began I was a nervous wreak.

9:00 pm – Game starts, thankfully so does Desperate Housewives which is new and I can flip back and forth between, of course the game is always up on my computer.

1st period over – no score, I can watch the end of Desperate Housewives during the first intermission

10:00 pm – Brothers and Sisters is a repeat – turn the TV over to the game for the duration

2nd period – 3 min in Calgary score. Crap. Also 14 min later Detroit scores. YAH!!! Way to go Lang.

2nd intermission – catch a bit of the 11 news.

3rd period starts – this is way too close. I can’t sit here anymore. Start cleaning the kitchen. Load and unload the dishwasher, wash the remaining dishes. Probably too late to run the dishwasher. Period almost done, score still tied, it could be a long night. We are going to OVERTIME

1st overtime intermission – start making the shortbread for strawberry shortcake. Put it in the over for 30 minutes.

1st overtime – washing and stemming strawberries. OH NO – Holmstrom down. He was hit. Was it the forehead or the eye? Start smashing strawberries. He is being treated on the bench, good sign. Taking shortbread out of the over. He is going back to the locker room, not a good sign. Strawberry shortcake finished and so is the first overtime.

2nd overtime intermission – quick check the blogs for info on Homer’s condition. None. Move the TV and myself into my bedroom, start cleaning out drawers. Just reported that Homer is being taken to the hospital – Not a good sign at all, it is very bad, very very bad.

2nd overtime – 4 min in, Franzen scores!! The Mule comes through. THEY WON!!! Series over, on to the next round.

12:30 Game over.

As I am getting set to watch the next game, I am beginning to think this nervous energy is good for my house - maybe tonight I will start with the shoes.

Banana Bread

During my computer blackout I made Banana Bread a few times – has something to do with Meijer having bananas on sale two Saturdays in a row for .44 cent a pound. I am a big fan of Banana Bread, but usually I either get sick of it or forget about it before I finish a loaf – but these times, either due to being home all the time or the economic situation, I actually ate the whole loaf over the course of a week. :)

I have a couple other pictures, but when I went to edit them I realized the new computer does not, yet, have any photo editing software, so those will have to wait a bit. For now this one will have to due.

When it rains…. It pours

Over the past 10 days or so I have been computerless- my computer had been having some issues, but like so many other things I was just hoping it would make it until I got a new job. It didn’t. Initially, I thought the problems were with the power cord and when it finally went I begrudgingly ordered a new one. It was not too expensive, but these days, I am not spending money on anything but bills. After a few days the cord arrived and I excitedly plugged it in to nothing. I later found out it was not the cord, it was the connection into my laptop, which of course is attached to the motherboard – which cost a lot to replace – in fact I could purchase a new laptop for $60 more. So I decided to go that route and yesterday my new laptop arrived. (Thank heavens for tax returns) Then last night I was able to get most of my stuff off the old hard drive onto the new one, so I am pretty much back up and running. I did lose time on the job search, but in the absence of a computer I did do a lot of random cleaning – pantry, bookshelf, so that was good.

Habitat House

I am going up to the 2nd floor to help out for a bit - here 2 of the walls are up
These are the supports I built and some of the wood I sawed
We all spent some time on the shaking scaffolding - it was a really windy day
The house when we left.

Wednesday I spent the day working on a Habitat for Humanity House. I forgot to take any pictures when we first got there, so I do not have a before picture, but basically when we arrived, there was not a 2nd floor, and when we left there was one. I can take none of the credit for that – in our group from church, we had a couple professional builders who lead the crew up stairs (or up the ladders, since there are no stairs yet) and they surpassed the expectations for the day. I worked on some smaller projects, building some supports for the porch, lots of clean up and moving materials, sawing, putting in the backing for the kitchen cabinets, wrapping windowsills in water proofing paper – lots of fun stuff. It was a cold day – but thankfully no rain as was predicted. We are going back on May 19th – priming and painting – my specialty – so I am really looking forward to that.