Weddings, and Jobs, and Gifts, OH MY!

If you read my posts solely for inspiration, well here you go.

KBye. Have a nice day!

If you want MORE.... then I suppose I can try to throw a few more sentences together.

I have a few exciting things to announce today!

Exciting Thing #1:
I found out last week that I DO indeed have a couple classes I can take over the summer, one being Wedding Cake Decorating. This class is an elective but I am of COURSE going to chose it as one of mine because, well, I'm really into that kind of thing. The thought of wedding cakes takes me to a whole new level of stress.

I know these photos might look pretty much the same, but I think everyone knows that a wedding cake is just a wee bit more important than a birthday cake. ( No offense, little one!)

That being said, I would love some additional training. It is not something I want to jump into or assume I know how to do properly. Many people may not know, but when you have large layered cakes like that, there is actually a construction process to it! It isn't a simple two hour process.

I am also super duper excited that my first wedding cake will be for my good friend Andrea!

We've known each other since we were little girls in dance, but here is a classic prom picture. hehe

Andrea & Conor are tying the knot this coming September and I am pumped to work with her in the time leading up to the big day to get exactly what she wants.

...oh, and I'm a bridesmaid in said wedding so it will be a busy month :)

Exciting Thing #2:
I mentioned at the end of my post last week that I would hopefully have some exciting news this week...and I do! I had a job interview last Friday and I'm stoked to announce I will be joining the team at Betty and Bobo's Better Breads in the Newbo City Market in the Heart of New Bohemia District of Cedar Rapids. In case you aren't aware, Cedar Rapids (in my opinion) has an excess of chain stores and a lack of local businesses. When I moved here, I tried to find a job that would get me experience with baking. That was pretty much non-existent. My only options seemed to be for a chain restaurant or the nearby Walmart or Hyvee which also, in my opinion, isn't really baking if it consists of me just dropping items I grabbed from the freezer and popped them into the oven. If you are from Cedar Rapids or are ever in the area, I HIGHLY recommend you check out the Newbo City Market .

The Market just opened in October of 2012 after a 6 million dollar renovation of the pre-existing building to make it what it is today, and what it is today is...completely AWESOME. It was part of the initiative to revitalize the area after those pesky floods of '08.

If you want to read more about what the Market offers, including a pretty awesome take on environmentalism, click here.

The market it pretty much like a Farmer's Market inside a hip, new building. One half of the building features anchor merchants who have built-in store fronts (which is what I will be working at) and the other half is filled with non-permanent merchants who set up booths when the market is open.

Here is a picture of the empty anchor merchants side of the building. I will be working wayyyy in that back left corner! :)

These pictures are from their Facebook page which you should probably go ahead and check out and "Like."

Sooooo...I'll probably be including my experiences I have in that position as well! I start this week and I'm super excited to see how it goes.

Exciting Thing #3:
Valentine's Day fun! I know, I know...you've all probably seen your fair share of lovely flower bouquets and chocolates and teddy bears and rings and cards and perfect boyfriends/fiances/husbands etc. over the last couple of days. But what about the guys? How did you ladies "show" your love?  I've said it before and I'll say it again. I'm a firm believer love should be expressed every day of the year and superficial holidays are kind of silly. (Haters gon' hate, amiright?) BUT. I love crafts, showing I care via gifts, making people feel loved/special, and being creative. So, if I'm given a reason to do all of those things, IMA UP N' DO IT.

When you've reached poor girl status, creativity is of utmost importance. I chose thoughtful and practical items to use for my gift and although it wasn't anything extravagant, I think it sent a nice message. You gotta know what they like, right? Well...Alex isn't a huge fan of sweets. (I know that should kind of be a deal breaker if he's dating me, but sometimes you just gotta make exceptions.) He DOES, however, have a little thing for brownies so you know I of course exploited that as best I could.

Are those the prettiest brownies in the world? No, no they are not. But I tried experimenting with melted white chocolate morsels which I colored and it just really didn't work out. haha But of course we're talking about gifts for men here so I assure you (like I assured myself) he probably didn't really care what they looked like.

I saved money by mostly making my own gift and using stuff I already had. I also figured I would use a container he could actually use again. As much as I wanted to get that cutesy heart shaped, G.L.I.T.T.E.R.T.A.S.T.I.C. bowl from the "suck-you-in-and-take-all-your-money" Holiday aisle at Target, I opted for the practical route. We kind of developed a thing for coffee so I tried to incorporate that as well and and all in all I think it went over well. If you are ever trying to think of creative gifts, don't forget about baked goods. If you know the person well, you are bound to have an idea of their favorite foods and even if you keep the baked item simple and standard, there are always cool packaging techniques to use and little things like a cute coffee mug and a nice letter that won't break the bank! Show the LOVE! :)

In other news....the rest of my week days up until Spring break will consist of being at school at 7am which is a record for this girl (I don't think 7AM classes for normal majors etc. are a THING) so I'll be getting my butt up nice and early to get there on time.  The good thing is, we'll be baking almost everyday so I should have some swanky pics for you next time!

**NOW TAKING APPLICATIONS FOR DAILY MORNING WAKE UP CALLS**

It's officially official. I really do need a cat.

Have a beautiful weekend, all!

-BB

A Plateful of Passion Fruit...Hold the Fruit.

I'm going to start this post off with a thought that struck me in the middle of class today.

 Because....

Yes, I usually have about 1,346 other thoughts floating around up there at any given time. I'll go into more detail on that later.

BACK TO THE TOPIC. In the middle of class today, I had an epiphany about a metaphor for my inner passions.

Enter Scene: June 2010, Katerini, Greece
After my sophomore year of college, I jumped on the AMAZING opportunity to study abroad for 3.5 weeks for my Capstone course at UNI. One of our last stops was the beautiful Katerini, Greece. This is a seaside paradise and our hotel was within a stone's throw of the beach. As you can imagine, traveling for so long with the same large group of people can take it's toll on a person. At this point of the trip I was feeling slightly homesick and just needed a little chunk of alone time. I decided to wake up super early and head out to watch the sunrise over the ocean. (Sounds like a dream, right? It was.)

So, nobody tell my mom because she will probably get really upset with me, but I ventured out ALONE in the darkness to the dock to sit and wait. As I sat, I took in my surroundings and waited what seemed like a long time for any sign of light.

(Yes, I used self-timer, don't judge me too hard..I was waiting for quite a while.)

Finally, a little light started to break on the horizon.

Now, I had never really been a big morning person. I have only seen a couple sunrises at most in my lifetime and they were in the Midwest, so I didn't know if they were, like, different. I say this because I thought this following picture was the sun fully risen. (Mainly, because I'm super impatient so I thought it had run its course because it took a while.)

I thought I could see it (the sun), it was just hidden behind the clouds/fog/mist! It kind of hoovered like this for a little while. Eventually, I started getting up to leave, thinking the show was over. I walked around and took a few more pictures:

Still gorgeous, right?

And then. IT HAPPENED.

Light pierced through that haze. It was strong, bright, and BEAUTIFUL. That morning was easily one of the most beautiful experiences I've ever had in my entire life. 

After that, it rose and grew brighter in the blink of an eye.

I stood alone on that dock amazed at what had just happened before me. Obviously, I still carry that feeling with me today.

So, you may be wondering why I'm talking about this? Well, here it is.

Enter Scene: Bakery Lab, Kelsey's Brain (Lala-land)
I think we all have passion for many things. Some passion is faint, some is strong, and some is still undiscovered. Now, when I mentioned the metephor for my passions, this is what I meant.

I went to UNI for four years, and worked incredibly hard towards a degree in Interior Design. It was super time consuming, draining, and sometimes felt like the work would never end. It wasn't like other majors; you couldn't just wing a test or paper and get by. If you didn't finish a project, it was clearly evident you didn't finish it...there were no multiple choice answers you could just guess on. Because of this, I still firmly believe my 19 classmates and I couldn't have finished that degree without one thing. PASSION.  

I STILL have passion for design, it hasn't gone away. That is why I relate that passion for design toward the first photo that I thought was the 'real, full sunrise.' It's still beautiful, right? That photo still inspires me and is pleasing to the eye.

Sometimes it takes time to realize what we are passionate about. I will never lose that passion for design and I don't regret one minute of earning that degree! But my passion for Baking/Pastry Arts is like the second photo of the full-blown sunset. It's piercing, overwhelming, and I just can't deny it.

And you know what? I bet there are even more things I will become passionate about in my lifetime. I just hope everyone takes the opportunity at some point in their life to really chase that passion that sets their soul on fire. It's an incredible feeling that I just can't explain any further.

And, just to link this back to my other posts, this trip was a growing experience for me. It was that same summer I decided to take my first cake decorating class that I also decided to sign up for this trip. Alone. Traveling across the world not knowing anyone. But guess what? After signing up, I realized this girl that was in my major that I didn't know at all (we had just started our major-related classes so none of us knew each other yet) just so happened to be going on the same trip. We kind of got to know each other that next Spring semester in class but really bonded on this study abroad trip.

I now consider Nicole one of my life-long friends and I'm so glad I went on that trip and got to really know her. In that time, we also figured out we've lived 10 minutes from each other our whole lives! :) Kinda cool! 

Take chances, people. I can't say it enough!

Oh, you want to hear about classes?

Re-Enter Scene: Hospitality Arts Bakery Lab
 
Well...we started baking this week! My Bakery Essentials class is only 50 minutes so Chef has dedicated this week to learning the 12 steps of baking bread. Mind you, I've never baked actual bread in my life so I was kind of geeking out. So, each day we would work on a fresh batch of dough; the first day we scaled ingredients.

The second day we mixed and let it rise.

Then we practiced folding and let it rise more.

Isn't it pretty?! Kind of my little baby. We then practiced rolling it out into baguettes and twisting into Sicilian 'S' rolls before baking it.

 Yummy! Goes great with soup and for breakfast!

 This was merely an exercise to walk through the different steps of the baking process, but listening to him talk about all of the things we will be making in future classes this semester has me SO excited; I can't wait to share with you all.

My sanitation class is a lot of memorization and I managed a 100% on our first quiz! Afterward, I realized if I would've skipped the studying the night before I probably would've bombed it. The material is pretty common sense, but when it comes to specifics on food borne illnesses, you really have to have it down. I have to say, technology is a great thing. Since I didn't decide to start studying until 12:30 a.m. and I had no one to quiz me on my note cards, I asked Alex if I could type them out to him on Skype to help me study. I would type out the keyword and then have to fill in with my associations and then I would send it to him. I knew he wasn't reading them (Or at least I hope he wasn't because they should make NO sense to anyone outside of my brain) but it really helped me get it down just by tricking myself into thinking I was explaining it to someone else, even though I know he eventually went to sleep! Sometimes you just have to be creative with the resources you have and know what works for you!

My mathematics class has been beneficial so far! My professor is probably 87 years old and referred to his hearing aids as mechanical ears today, but he is so knowledgeable about so many things that I can't help but listen to every word he says. What's that you say, Kelsey? You pay attention through 90 minute math classes?! Yes, yes I do.

I'm sure If I wouldn't have had an epiphany about PASSION today, I would've written a lot more about my classes but like I said, I have a short attention span and I think that's enough for now.

Until next time; Have a splendid Friday-Sunday. I will be spending mine getting a new license, trying to replace everything I lost when I lost my wallet, and working. Never be too distracted that you forget your wallet in the seat of your cart in the middle of a rain-drenched Walmart parking lot on a Wednesday night in early February. That's a hypothetical situation, because obviously I wouldn't ever be so careless as to leave my WHOLE LIFE in the seat of a Walmart shopping cart. NOT ME!

-BB

P.S. By my next post, I MAY or may NOT have some exciting news to share..we shall see soon, hopefully!