Dave and I were making dinner the other night, and while we were prepping everything, we stepped out of the kitchen for something. I don’t really remember. Anyway, I see Franklin run past me with something large in his mouth and I realize it’s an avocado half??!!!Well, chaos ensues as I scream to Dave “he’s got the avocado, he’s got the avocado!!!”. Dave has NO idea what I’m talking about, but Lily, Casper, Dave and I take off running up the stairs after Franklin and his avocado.

Franklin is under the bed with the avocado half in his mouth, the dog is going wild, Casper is running around under the bed and Frankie somehow averts us all and runs back downstairs.

Oh, it’s a scene. Finally, he goes back in the kitchen where he drops the slimy, now dusty and hairy avocado half and Lily proceeds to pick it up. Now we’ve got to get it out of her mouth.By the time we retrieve the poor avocado it’s only good for the trash.

But it was funny, and it made us laugh.

He’s such a whippersnapper!

I was planning on recounting our week filled with a string of anything that can go wrong will go wrong situations, but I’ll keep it short. It was a week where just when you thought you were as low as you could go, or you made the biggest mistake you could make, you get more bad news and you make a costly error. You know like you’re getting kicked while you’re down. Over and over again.

First, if we don’t get some business either in the cookie sales or the bake shoppe, there very well may not BE a business to blog about. Instead you’ll be reading about us living in the streets wearing nothing but potato sacks, begging for change.

Second, it’s extremely rewarding running your own business, working for yourself (in actuality you’re working for your customers) making your own schedule and your own rules. But as good as it can be, it can be equally as bad and stressful. When you need to order supplies, the bills keep piling in, no one seems to like your product (at least not enough to BUY it), and more super giant SCARY bills keep piling on top of the already heaping mound of other bills. You wonder when you will ever get to go on a real honest to goodness vacation. You know the kind that you actually go to the airport, get on a plane and go somewhere really fun? You also wonder how many more nights you can eat spaghetti, when you might be able to get some new underwear, when you can have satellite t.v. again, when you might have time to sit and read a book (in the sun). Oh I could go on, but I know there are people out there who have it worse and I seem like a big baby because I need new undies.

Just so you don’t think I’m a hypocrite, talking about woe is me, we have no extra $$. Then we go away for the weekend, see a show and go out to eat. Let me just say that this trip was planned 3 months ago when cash flow was decent. (not great, but DECENT). The show was paid for then and we’ve been saving and had a very tight, and tiny budget for one night out on the town.

My BIL threw a surprise 40th birthday party for Dave’s sister and we helped out with the save the dates, invitations, menu cards, party favors, dessert and cake.

I decided that we would build our own cupcake stand. I used floral foam, wrapping paper and ribbon. While constructing my fancy stand, I ran out of foam and broke the hot glue gun. Dave went to get more of the foam blocks and the store was out, so he improvised.

He used liquid nails to glue the foam together after I killed the hot glue gun.

The color scheme on the invites and everything else was pink, green, and purple.

Now that the stand it built, all I have to do is change out the paper and ribbon for different displays.

I made a triple layer, 6 inch square cake for the tippy top, with some daisy cookies on sticks coming out of the top.

The cake is a little warped, but it’s kind of Suessical, I think.

The cake suffered a bit on the 4 hour trip and I lost a few melted cupcakes as well.

I made the mistake of frosting them and NOT chilling them in the freezer before the journey.

My wacky cake. All the pictures at the party came out blurry, AND I had to use flash, which I hate.

I brought 3 dozen peonies from Frost Hill Farm.

The car smelled heavenly with all the peonies.  If you’re ever in the area when they’re open, you should stop by, it’s a beautiful place.

I arranged them in mason jars tied with pink, green and purple ribbons.

The room all set up.

Each place setting got a menu card and a cookie favor.

The party was a success and the Birthday Girl was surprised.

The party was Saturday night, Sunday we drove to M’s house and hung out for a while, then headed into the city to check out a new cupcake shop, Sweet.

Next, we went to Newbury Comic’s so Dave could return some things and use up a gift card. We stopped at Tapeo on Newbury Street for $5 tapas and sangria at the bar. Everything we ordered was great. As you can see by the plates that we licked clean. I don’t know why this place gets such mixed reviews. M and I loved the sangria and all three of us loved the food and atmosphere. And at $5 each for the the tapas, it was a fabulous bargain for our meager budget.

One last stop before the show, Dillon’s on Boylston St. where B joined us for a quick casual dinner. Our meals here were very satisfactory, and I suspect they make a great burger, but after the big meaty meal we had at the birthday party, Dave and I weren’t in the mood for more meat so we got falafel sandwiches. Certainly not as good as falafel at Rami’s in Coolidge Corner, but good enough for us to eat every bit of the food on our plates.

The evening was wrapped up with a performance by Madeleine Peyroux at the Berklee Performance Center.

The show was great, she was amazing.

By Monday morning we were feeling positive, refreshed and ready to get back to work. Then on the way home a rock hit the wind shield and put a nice hole in it. I’m sure our insurance won’t cover it as our deductible is high, so pile that right on top of the stack of bills…………….

****And I’ve conceded to the friggin’ “OPEN” flag, only to find out it’s going to cost us $80 (not just the flag, but you do need a flag pole and some hardware which costs $5o). Who knew an ugly flag could be so expensive?****

We had a custom order for some inscribe dinosaur cookies. Dave came up with the shape and design, which I tweaked just a little.

Sorry for the poor photo, but after wandering through the camera department while Dave was buying my new computer, I now think I need a new camera.

The T-Rex is iced in three shades of green and has a sugared belly. I’m not loving his teeth, maybe next time I’ll do something different.

We also took in a special order for 24 cupcakes with flip flop and flower cookie charms. I’m not placing the cookies directly in the frosting anymore, because the start to get really soggy. And that’s no good.

The Birthday Girl wanted brightly colored frosting, I think they came out nice without being garish.

See, the color is weird.

Must have new camera.

This one might be my favorite.

Or maybe this one.

All together. Pretty!

We tried out some breakfasty items over the weekend. It didn’t really go over very well. Especially since we didn’t promote an early opening or breakfast pastries.

The crumb cake is delicious though, and I ate more than my fair share. It’s got a very thick layer of crumb, which is the best part.

We’ve got another custom order for cookies and a coordinating cake to get started on and Amy from Flamingo’s and Flip Flops is stopping by with her little girl. So it should be a fun day. Let’s hope maybe we can have both a successful cookie AND cupcake day today!!

It was just getting too difficult to maintain the blog and get everything else done between two people and one very ancient Mac desktop computer. (which is located in the bakery, so no bed time blogging).

We sucked it up and pooled our resources, (what few we have), and took a drive over to NH and bought a new MacBook. It’s not the Air, or a pink one, but it’ll do!

It’s not a great picture, but I’m in bed, you can even see me in the mirror there.

Casper’s in bed too, so you get a gratuitous Casper shot. (Dave thinks I post way too many pictures of Cassie, I think he’s jealous).

Ok, two gratuitous Casper shots.

And one “artsy” close up of the cutest (and cleanest) pink paw ever.

So that’s it for tonight. Tomorrow I’ll have some more new cookies, a super cute T-Rex, an adorable special order of cupcakes with cookie charms and some other baked goods.

Oh and in case you were wondering why there haven’t been any food posts it’s because we’ve been eating horribly. Nothing but pasta and heavy (cheap and quick) fattening foods. As a matter of fact, several of my pants don’t fit anymore. No more pasta, and NO MORE CUPCAKES!!

It’s hello Tae Bo, stationary bike and Slim Fast.

I miss my laptop, I miss all the blogs out there, I miss free time.

It’s been a busy week with one assistant leaving for the Summer and a new one in training. It seems like we can never keep ahead of the cookies, and while the Bake Shoppe is super fun, it’s EXHAUSTING. And by the time we finish all the morning production for the shoppe, it’s time to start icing cookies.

Did I mention that it’s all exhausting and I really miss reading blogs??

It looks like we won’t be getting a new laptop until next weekend when we’re in Boston, so I’ll be on the fringes of the blogoshpere until then.

Now that I’ve gotten all my “waahh I’m so tired because I decided to open a bake shoppe” out of the way. Here are some pictures from last week.

I tweaked our chocolate cupcake recipe and we are happy with the results. A much taller and darker chocolate cake. Hmm, tall, dark and delicious.

Our new Bensdorp dutch process cocoa is AWESOME!!

The always popular red velvet with cream cheese frosting.

Which was made from the extra batter of a special order red velvet layer cake with raspberry cream filling.

Another special order for a dozen Margarita cupcakes (the second special order for this flavor in 2 weeks).

The counter one day last week.

Our “gluten free” treats. Vanilla meringue kisses and chocolate dipped coconut macaroons.

Yellow cupcake with raspberry filling and mocha buttercream.

Inside the raspberry filled mocha frosted cupcake.

Pink velvet cupcake with fresh strawberry buttercream. A friend brought us some beautiful fresh strawberries and I thought they HAD to go into a special cupcake.

We sold out of these, even without samples!!

So pretty!!

A custom Birthday collection including Snoopy and Woodstock.

This is the new design for for our vanilla birthday collection.

Another special treat we are offering this weekend in chocolate whoopie pies. I had to use one of my nifty new cake stands to give some height to my display.

If ever there was a day that required cupcakes, I think this looks like THE ONE.

And this photo was not digitally enhanced or photoshopped at  all.

You can see the difference in the weather. To the South, dark and stormy and to the North sunny and bright.

This was not the day that the laptop was zapped, just another beautiful day in MoHo.

So that’s what’s going on in my neck of the woods, lots of rain, lots of baking and icing, not much blogging or use of the “innernets”.

I CAN say that my two Jen stalkers can duke it out by continually sending me surprise packages. Then I can let you know who is the stalkiest of them all.

Seriously, ladies no need for more surprises!!

Now don’t get all fresh, I’m talking about the amazing package that Jen H. sent to me last week.

Here’s the back story, J asked me if I wanted some heart ramekins like the ones I bought for my SWAP partner in the last SWAP that I participated in. She just happened to have some lying around (?? that’s some good stuff to have just lying around). So of course I said hell yeah, I won’t say no to some new heart shaped ramekins.

Well, this mammoth box arrives and I’m thinking “boy did she go overboard packing up 8 little bowls”.

So, I open it up and find all these amazing treasures.

The cutest pair of red and green cake stands, which I can’t wait to use in the shop over the Holidays. I had a margarita cupcake model on the small stand.

A super cool mold for shot glassed made of ice. Mine disintegrated a bit by the time I set up the picture (and whipped up a batch of frozen watermelon margaritas).

Here’s what they are suppose to look like. And mine did before the tequila melted it.

And when you’ve finished your shot, you can just throw the glass on the ground and Lily will eat it right up!

The red heart ramekins.

Which we filled with peanut dipping sauce for our flank steak and asparagus.

Not one,

but two pink glass cake stands, which I immediately used in the shop.

And  a box of Cafe du Monde beignet mix. I’m waiting for a very special occasion to make these and thinking of the evening Dave and I actually sat at Cafe du Monde eating beignet and drinking chicory coffee.

Thinking that we really need a vacation.

But will need to spend any extra $$$ on a new laptop.

And finally, a pack of wafer sheets. I’m not sure what I’ll do with these, but I’ll post it when I do.

I’ve been working on some other sweets to sell in the shoppe and so far everything has been a hit.

Last weekend I tried out some raspberry filled sandwich cookies, chocolate dipped coconut macaroons (gluten free) and some vanilla meringue kisses.

Today I tried out a recipe for cream puffs and it didn’t work out exactly how I expected, so tomorrow I’m digging up my recipe from culinary school and will try again. Hopefully, I’ll get it right because I have a container of chocolate pastry cream that needs to be eaten.

And NOT by me!!!

Nope it sure doesn’t.

Thanks to a crazy thunderstorm yesterday, I no longer have a laptop.

It’s a long story. We first knew something was wrong when Dave got a big jolt of electricity as lightning struck nearby and killed the laptop. (not Dave though, phew!). After that we ran around unplugging everything, fridge, freezer, ovens, mixers, lights, etc.

The storm blew in and lasted longer than normal, our power went out for a second, then came right back. After that, every time lightning struck, our outlets sparked, popped and flashes of light were shooting out of them. Thankfully, all of our appliances are fine (except dearly departed Mac Book). The only outlet that actually blew out was the one I was trying to pull a plug out of as it sparked and tried to kill me.

So that’s my story. For today.

As I alluded to in a previous post, Dave and I volunteered at the annual Mt. Holly School fundraiser. We were the designated “tattoo artists”.
Cool, every time I tattooed a 6 year old I couldn’t help but say to myself “Scoresman got a tattoo!”. (if you don’t know what that means, sorry. But I’m sure Jen will know!!).

It was a fun night and most of the kids were adorable and polite.

The other anecdote I wanted to share was my HORRIBLE experience with a particular Etsy seller. But the story was long and exhausting, so I won’t bog you down with my whining about a print (printed on a PRINTER) that took over 2 weeks to arrive in VT from NJ. (this should take no more than 3 days.)

Now that all that’s out of the way, here are some fun pics of a couple of custom jobs this week:

Elmo cookies for a little boys 2nd Birthday. I think these came out super cute. The actual order is inscribed with the Birthday Boy’s name.

Custom golf bags for a big Birthday!

Festive ice cream cones for an end of the school year treat.

Believe it or not, this was a corporate custom order. The client was hosting a “field trip” to the New England Aquarium and gave each attendee a pack of 2 cookies: a big whale with a small logo.

This is my GIANT mystery box that arrived last week. I’ll try to get the contents up asap, but my temporary computer is taking a bit of getting used to and everything I do takes 10 times longer than normal.

Last weekend I made some lovely (and super delicious) Boston Cream Pie cupcakes. I used my tasty yellow cupcake recipe, filled it with home made vanilla bean pastry cream, topped it with a schmear of vanilla buttercream, then dipped the tops in ganache, and finished with a bit of edible gold leaf.

Marvy huh?? They were awesome (if I do say so myself) and we sold out of them 2 days in a row!!

Another flavor from last weekend: Banana’s Foster.

Butter, brown sugar and bananas caramelized and doused with dark, spiced rum, mixed into the cupcake batter. YUMMM. Topped with spiced rum caramel buttercream, and finished with a drizzle of rum caramel. (which I still have in the fridge and think it would be fantastic on some home made vanilla ice cream)

Just your basic vanilla/vanilla, chocolate/vanilla, and maple/maple. This was an “emergency” cupcake order that we filled at the last minute last week. I’m finally finding a good use for all those pearl dragees, sprinkles and edible gold stuff I have sitting around.

Ooops! Where’d that come from??? Most definitely not the kind of “cupcakes” you’ll find in my Bake Shoppe!!

Seriously, I found these through a site that had linked to mine the other night, and good lord do they make the damnedest things with Hello Kitty on them.

Our basic chocolate chocolate cupcake. Dave’s going to use this photo on the Bake Shoppe page.

Another basic cupcake, or CC if you’re working in the shoppe! Yellow cake with chocolate buttercream.

We’ve just started a changeover to a new supplier and I’m thrilled. I’m finally going to be able to use the chocolate that I’ve been trying to get my hands on for months, and lots of our supplies are cheaper from our new vendor. AND, it seems that this new vendor actually knows about baking. It’s a MIRACLE!!!

Today I’ll be working on some Father’s Day cookies and Elmo!! I’ll post them as soon as I’m done!

Stay tuned to see the GIANT mystery box that arrived the other day. I’m working on getting pics of the whole shebang.

Have a great Sunday.

But I’m not biased or anything.

Yesterday was a prosperous day for us here at A Dozen Eggs.

No, we didn’t sell out of cookies or cupcakes. Two packages arrived, today I’ll show you what was in the first package.

Not the cat!

The bag!The bag that I ordered from LL Bean last month has finally arrived. And Casper LOVES it.

Let’s all take a few moments to admire her.  And the bag of course.

So tomorrow I’ll show you all the fantastic loot in the other package!!

We made some cute new cookies last weekend, some were for Father’s Day and some were just part of our Summer collection.

La Tour Eiffel, one of my most favorite landmarks in the whole world.

Gone Fishing.

I think we’ll have these all Summer long, but we’ve rolled them out for Father’s Day. It was Dave’s idea and the designs are based on images he conjured up.

Hamburger and hot dogs for the Summer Barbecue collection.

Up close with the cheeseburgers so you can see what a pain they are to make. But so cute in the end!!

Newly edited Ship’s Ahoy collection.

Since I grew up on Cape Cod, this is one of my favorite collections to make. I’ve updated the design on the life preserver and switched out my fish for a whale.

I’ve made some super yummy cupcake flavors over the past few days so check back tomorrow to see!!