…I have a fairly quiet weekend work load, the orders start coming in waves. About two weeks ago, all I had planned for Saturday was a wedding cake. Then I got an anniversary cake order, a wedding shower cake, 4 dozen minicupcakes for a graduation celebration and an order for 20 cupcakes for a baby shower. Whew!

The minicupcakes turned out great, though. I think they will become very popular. I might start selling them in my booth at the Wednesday Market in downtown Salem. I’m thinking 50 cents each, since they are only a bite each.

 And I was pretty pleased with how the wedding cake turned out, too. The delivery was at Willamette Mission State Park. One funny thing is that I noticed every time I’ve done a delivery there, the wedding was in one part of the park, and the reception was in “Area B” in another part of the park. I found out yesterday when setting up the cake that this is because there is a path from the wedding area to Area B. I was thinking people would have to drive from one part to the other, but nope!

 And finally, the cupcakes for the jungle-themed baby shower were really fun to make. Medallions with lions, zebras, giraffes and crocodiles decorated the top of each grassy cupcake.

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A mom called me last week and wanted a custom graduation cake for her Sprague graduate. She told me a little bit about her sons interests, and I created a sketch for her. I didn’t expect her to love every part of the sketch, but it gave us a place to start.

We did a little tweaking, and by Sunday, her son Matt’s masterpiece was ready. I am including what the sketch looked like as well as the finished product, so you can see the transition.

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Well, I didn’t open a cake shop … yet. But I did start a lease on a fully outfitted commercial kitchen, which is very exciting and scary. It was pretty filthy, having been used two years ago by other bakers and then abandoned. After weeks of cleaning, painting, finagling a dishwasher and other fun tasks, I finally baked my first wedding cake there today.

Here I am in the kitchen after we epoxied the floor. It's purely coincidental that my top matches the floor!

I am loving the convection ovens but still getting the hang of it. I swear I baked a 3-tier wedding cake in 7 minutes today! At this rate, I’m going to be able to take a lot more orders.

But for now it’s like when you move into a new home. You don’t know where anything is, and you’re living out of boxes… But I’m very excited.

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