San Diego Food Blogger Bake Sale 2012 - Video Recap

The bake sale as a complete success! Watch my video to see just some of the yummy items that were available. Thank you to all of you who made it out to the bake sale and I hope you come back next year!

All Grown Up: San Diego Food Bloggers Bake Sale 2012

In the early days of my blog, I wasn't sure where I wanted to draw my focus. Obviously I wanted to talk about baking and occassionally to revamp or try recipes that were diabetic friendly. In my search for self discovery, I stumbled upon a blog called Meandering Eats and Marie was promoting the San Diego Food Blogger Bake Sale. I went to the sale held at Great News Cookware and Cooking School in Pacific Beach and got to meet a few local bloggers and try a few of their treats. After the sale, I blogged about the experience "When I Grow Up" and hoped that one day I would get to join this great group of bloggers and help raise money for a wonderful cause.

Less than one year later, I'm part of the San Diego Food Bloggers group and I have the opportunity to participate in this year's bake sale! I hope you can join us on Saturday, April 28 at Great News (1788 Garnett Avenue San Diego, CA 92109). Other than having the chance to try both sweet and savory treats from 40 local bloggers and bakers and doing a little shopping inside Great News (I can get lost in there for quite awhile), every purchase will be a contribution towards Share Our Strength's (Strength.org) fight against childhood hunger in America. I gave a few statistics about childhood hunger in my original blog last year and in researching for this year's bake sale, I came across a trailer for Hunger Hits Home: Our Problem, Our Children, Our Solution (See the documentary trailer here) that will be featured on the Food Network tonight. Unfortunately, it will already be playing on the east coast by the time I get this post up but luckily, the Food Network will be replaying it throughout the weekend and hopefully during the week.

Can't make it to the event? Visit San Diego Bloggers' Bake Sale page to make a donation, bid on one of the online auctions, or discover a new San Diego food blog. Not a San Diego local? Not to worry! Visit Bloggers Without Borders website which lists food blogger bake sales throughout the US. Last year,national food blogger bake sales raised $25,000. This year's goal is $50,000!

So what will I be baking for this fantastic event? Ideas have been rattling inside my brain for the past month on what I want to make and the problem is, I want to make it all! Of course I can't make it all but I did decide on making my Lemon Snow Cake...in a jar! Other items I'm considering are some kind of cookie and/or a mini pie. All of the items that I will be making for the sale (whatever they end up being) will be diabetic friendly whether they be made with Splenda, reduced sugar, or no sugar added. Other bloggers will also have vegan and gluten free items. I hope to see everyone there and a special thanks in advance if you can make it!

Year One - Giving Thanks

I thought about writing a long post about everything I have learned in my first year of blogging, the bumps I've come across, and what I plan on achieving in the upcoming year. I know I have so much more to learn, the bumps will only help me become a better and more creative blogger, and my goals are endless at this point. Instead, I just want to use this little sunny corner of the web I call my own to thank all the people that have supported me this year:

My family - For inspiring creativity and passing on a lot of their knowledge of cooking and baking. Also for helping the Lil Ms. Sueshine fund to get my laptop when I first started blogging!

My friends - For being my guinea pigs when I have to test out a new recipe or I need someone to eat my treats before I eat them and go into a sugar coma.

Ms. Ashley Barnett - For creating my awesome logo and being a partner in foodie crime during local food events.

The San Diego Food Bloggers - For inviting me into this wonderful group and sharing their experiences as bloggers. I'm proud to be part of this community and I can only hope to be half as good as many of them.

My puppy, Eponine - For being so ever dutifully by keeping watch over the kitchen as I bake. No crumb will go uneaten :)

My Husband, Scott - For being my biggest supporter and being patient while I raged at failed recipes in the kitchen. He always knows when to give me space by walking away and when to come back so he can steal a cakepop. When I've hit those bumps this past year, he always said it best by quoting the oh so wise Yoda: "Do or do not....there is no try." He pushed me to just keep on turning on my oven and tapping away at my keyboard.  

And....

My Readers - For being so supportive and coming back time and time again just to see what this lil SoCal girl is up to in her lil red kitchen. Endless thanks to you!

Sueshine Note: Read my first post here! The cakepop pictured above is a representation of my original logo when I started blogging which was a little piece of clipart.

San Diego Food Bloggers Unite!! A Fund for Jennie

On August 12^th, seemed like the whole food blogging world was making a peanut butter pie in support of fellow blogger Jennie Perillo and her two young daughters who had lost their husband/father suddenly. As if it wasn't hard enough to deal with the loss of your partner, Jennie is having to deal with the other realities of life such as health insurance, the mortgage, and just day to day life trying to raise her girls.

So again the food bloggers unite to help Jennie out. Bloggers Without Borders is a non-profit organization that was created to raise awareness for certain issues in our communities and to spread the word via the food blogging community. Read more about Bloggers Without Borders

BWoB’s latest project: A Fund for Jennie 

Food bloggers throughout the country have organized auctions for their readers to bid on. Items include anything from baked goods to stacks of cookbooks to the blogger actually coming to your home to teach you how to cook or host a dinner party.




 

What I'm doing about it

I got an email from Marie of Meandering Eats a few days ago asking fellow San Diego Food Bloggers to help put together a basket to auction. Yup....I'm in!!

What you can do

1) Bid on our super awesome San Diego themed basket! Visit Marie's blog, Meandering Eats to check out what's up for auction. If you are interested in bidding, please leave a comment at the bottom of the post (Marie's post, not mine...you won't get anything for bidding on my page silly!) Be sure to include your email address so we can contact you if your bid wins. The auction ends on September 2 at 12:59pm, PST.  

Btw, I contributed San Diego's own Sam the Cooking Guy's newest cookbook, Just Grill This!....which I want one for myself now. The only way to pry this cookbook away from my hands is to bid. So what are you waiting for?!

2) Visit the auction page on the Bloggers Without Borders website. They are updating the site with blogs that are holding auctions. There are so many great items but a lot of the auctions will be ending soon so hurry!

3) If you are like me and the millions of people who cannot afford to bid but you would like to still contribute something, please follow the link Donate: A Fund for Jennie to make a donation for any denomination. All funds being donated at this time will be going towards A Fund for Jennie.

A huge thank you to all of you who donate or bid on the SD Food Bloggers basket! Have a great weekend!

Lil Ms. Sueshine