National Food Bloggers Bake Sale: The Recap

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Yeah, he made all of that. Plus pumpkin bread. I love that man.

Oh, hi there.

It's been far too long since my last post.

There is a lot to write about, but I'm going to start with the bake sale. All I can say is wow. Just wow.

When I contacted Gaby of What's Gaby Cooking about hosting the San Diego branch of the bake sale, I envisioned something small and casual. I thought I'd twist the arms of Amanda, Leanne, Mary, Jenny, Darlene, and we might be able to scrounge up a few more people to join us.

The lady who owns the arm is Leanne of Three Dog Kitchen, cashier extraordinaire.

What we had on May 14 was 32 bakers, a stint on the morning news, a bevy of gorgeous treats, a lot of customers, and a happy chaos that resulted in us raising $1615 for Share Our Strength. Add another $135 in donations to our team website and that's a total of $1750 raised!

Gorgeous cake pops and other gluten-free treats from Heather and Alyssa of Bake My Day! In the foreground, treats from Amanda of The Cilantropist, Kirbie of Kirbie's Cravings, and Michelle of Berrylish.

I'm verklempt.

Many, many thanks to our bakers, who showed up with armfuls of goodies, supplies, and infectious enthusiasm. They put up with my long, overly-detailed emails and made the sale an absolute success. From the raffle, to the flyer/poster design, to the advertising, their touch can be seen in every part of the sale. They are supportive, kind, thoughtful, and funny as hell. I felt like I made a bunch of new friends and I hope we have many more fun times together.

Lovely treats from Kim of Liv Life Too and Kelly of Sass and Veracity.

I can't thank Erika and the wonderful crew of Great News enough. Their support, kindness, energy, and (of course) the location made the sale possible. We couldn't have done it without them.

Great News made several beautiful signs for the sale! Photo from Michelle of Berrylish.

Lots of thanks and love to the spouses, family, friends, and fellow bloggers that supported us along the way. During the sale and the few days preceding it, I met Liv and Mr. Liv Life Too, Mama Bakerita, Mr. Sass and Veracity, Mr. My Burning Kitchen, and many other friends and family.

Cupcake alley: from Jenny of Foray Into Food and Amy of Do You Know the Muffin Pan?

And last, but by no means least, there's Mr. Meandering Eats.

Somehow, he might have been more involved in the bake sale than I was. He certainly baked more for it than I did. Flashback to Friday, May 13. Morning. The mister's shuffling through our pile of looseleaf pages of recipes.

Me: What are you doing?
Him: Looking for the gingersnap recipe. I think I'm going to make another type of cookie for the sale.

Meandering Eats' offerings: pumpkin bread and three types of cookies from Dan; ginger-stout cupcakes, s'mores kits, and
marshmallows from me; and chocolate chip banana bread from Garrett. Next door: Nutella brownies from Averie of Love Veggies
and Yoga. Photo from Mary of foodies: a southern california food blog.

He was already making two types of cookie (chocolate chip and oatmeal butterscotch) and pumpkin bread. Then, he started talking about cardstock for labels. I blinked at him.

Me: I thought you wanted to print out labels on the sheets of sticky mailing tags.
Him: Yeah, but that was before I saw Amanda's packaging. Clearly, the bar's set high.

Caramel corn from Lauren and Chrissy of From the Little Yellow Kitchen.

He baked up a storm, made a ton of labels, and did a ton of work at the sale itself. To top it all off, a couple of hours into the sale, I actually heard him selling. This from a man who quietly prefers to let me be the chatty and obnoxious one.

Well, after years of referring to him as D., I suppose I should probably introduce my better half. Interweb, meet Dan.

Did I make anything? Yes, I did, and I'm really glad it was captured by the lovely Jenny and Indigo of Indigo's Sugar Spectrum.

Banana bread from Rachel of Bakerita.

I can quite honestly say that I couldn't have envisioned a better bake sale. It exceeded every expectation I had and I can't thank everyone enough. It couldn't have happened without you!

I can't wait until next year's sale.

Cheers to our bakers and supporters! Check out this page for links and take a look at our Flickr page for snaps of the sale.

Go to Meandering Eats' bake sale page for links to all of the blogs.

If you would like to support Share Our Strength, our team page is still accepting donations and all proceeds go directly to Share Our Strength. Thank you!