ThisBabeBakes

My days as a caregiver for my mother were a blur of stumbling through hard times as a caregiver and amateur cancer researcher by day, and then baking all kinds of treats ranging from my family’s favorite Christmas cookies to mini Mascarpone cheesecakes or broiled cinnamon rolls by night. I’d tuck Mama in by 8-8:30pm, and then I’d bake. Sometimes, I would keep going until 5am and crawl into my bed exhausted as well as lightly dusted in powdered sugar. I grew more and more fascinated by different buttercream frosting recipes and what the heck a “sponge” meant within the food realm. Baking took my mind off things, like how much my heart was breaking to see my mama laying on the couch all day, and it kept me from crying all night, which was a bad habit I’d fallen prey to for coping. Plus, as a bonus it was an outlet for all my built-up workaholic, artistic energy. I began taking on new challenges to push myself in learning ambitious skills and to also allow baking to creep into my limited daytime hours. Our home care nurse, who was a nun, kept coming back for more of my intricately decorated angel sugar cookies to bring to her sisters. She called them works of art. Our family church asked women of the congregation to donate a couple pies to the annual men’s dinner, so I delivered a variety of ten, (I also choked back my inner-New Yorker who cursed about how super sexist the ways of suburbia are… men’s dinner, really?) For a neighbor’s Hanukah celebration I ventured into blue & white cupcake decorating, a jewelry fundraiser hosted for pancreatic cancer research prompted me to craft 50 purple ribbons out of fondant, and there was ALWAYS a reason for CAKE. Baking is what saved me from losing my mind. Unfortunately, man-nor-beast (chemotherapy) could save my best friend -- my mama Susan Maynard Doan -- and she died of pancreatic cancer on April 28, 2015. This store began as a way to raise money to fight the disease that killed her. And, we will not rest until it's beat.