Today was the big day. Whiskers In Wonderland. It's our 3rd year participating in this event and we look forward to it every year. This year, our dear friend, Char, accompanied us. She was a huge help and ran the Bodacious Baked Goods bake sale table for most of the 3 hours. She had a great time and is excited to help us out next year too.
The past 2 years, we had 1 table. This year we had 2 tables. It took us almost 3 days to prepare for our Bodacious Biscuit Love table. Yesterday I baked all of the goods for the bake sale table. Obviously, this isn't something I can do days in advance. It has to be done the day before. All of it.
I started baking at 7 in the morning. I made the cookies first. Chocolate chip. Reverse chocolate chip. Cranberry white chip. Chunky Monkey. I whipped up a batch of cookie cups. When the cookies were done, I made a bunch of zucchini and pumpkin quick bread loaves. The whoopie pie cakes baked after that.
I finally took a break for dinner. We ordered takeout. The baked goods took up most of the counter and table space.
By the time we finished eating, the kitchen was cool enough to make the Christmas Munch. While that was cooling, I made the 2 flavors of filling for the whoopie pies. Peanut butter. Cheesecake.
I was still working on the whoopie pies and filling the cookie cups when Lisa and the kids went to bed. It was about 9:30 when I tucked them in.
You'd think I would feel relief and a sense of accomplishment when all of the baking was done and the whoopie pies and cookie cups were filled. For a few seconds, I did, but then there was another lengthy task at hand.
Packaging all of the baked goods. That's no easy feat.
It was close to 2 a.m. when all of the baked goods were packaged, the little signs were made to let people know what was what and the list of ingredients.
I was extremely sore and tired, but I managed to get the kitchen cleaned and I made sure we had everything organized for today.
Before settling down to relax and get some sleep, I leaned up against the far counter in the kitchen. I was truly amazed at what we had accomplished especially the bake sale items. They looked scrumptious.
I remembered something that had happened at our fall Bodacious Yard & Bake Sale back in 2015. The morning of the event, I got up really early and made homemade pumpkin donuts. While Lisa took the yard sale items outside, I was in the kitchen frying the donuts.
Best. Donuts. Ever.
After the donuts cooled, I bagged them up. The donuts were medium sized. I put 6 in a bag and charged $3.
Within the first hour of the yard & bake sale, an older guy was looking at the items on the bake sale table. He picked up a bag of donuts and said he'd give me $1 for them. I told him no. The donuts were $3 a bag.
"You're charging too much. I can go down the street and get donuts for 50 cents."
I'm not sure what place down the street he was talking about. There are several places to get donuts, but they're not 50 cents.
I didn't budge.
"Sir, the donuts are $3 a bag."
With haste, he dropped the bag of donuts back into the basket and stormed off.
I'm not sure why that incident popped into my head. Maybe it's because this is the first year having a bake sale table at Whiskers In Wonderland. I wasn't sure what baked goods would sell, what wouldn't, or if people would complain about the prices.
I consider my prices reasonable. Everything is homemade. Quality ingredients. No shortcuts. Generous portions. And, I always offer a special like $3 each or 2 for $5.
At the end of the day, our table, which had been completely covered with baked goods, was almost bare. We sold out of most everything. The only thing we had left were a few of the zucchini and pumpkin quick breads.
No one complained about the prices.
We'll definitely be doing a bake sale table next year.
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