So after I came to my senses and realized how many families were enjoying my baked goods, I decided to do my own personal fundraising. Instead of baking and giving all my holiday cookies away, which I usually do every year at Christmas time, I was going to sell them instead. Perfect timing since it was for the holiday season, but at the same time hoping to get support for our fundraising efforts. Included on my flyer was also peanut or cashew brittle as well as fudge. I put together 9-inch containers (great for personal consumption or gift giving) then I offered 12-inch and 16-inch platters as well. I also offered sugar cookie kits complete with homemade buttercream frosting and embellishments. Who knew that I was going to start something that kept me baking the entire holiday season?
I made almost $2400 in cookie platters from Thanksgiving to Christmas. All those monies went directly to Kenedee and Kyle's account. Of course there were costs involved to make the products, but I always look at the big picture. It was all a learning curve for me. I was told by everyone that I could have charged a much higher price for everything but once my prices were posted I didn't feel I could go back and make changes. Friends were responding to me email/flyer within 5 minutes of posting it. WOW!
Anyways, I hope Ryan will allow me to do it again this year because people are already asking. I've already decided on what I would do differently and what cookies took too long to make so I won't repeat those one. Yes, this personal fundraiser was hard on the family life I will admit. My family never saw me as I stayed down stairs as much as I could to keep the mess from my upstairs. (Sure would have been nice to have had a TV installed in my daycare kitchen while all this baking took place!)
The family helped me out as much as they could, they were awesome. Ryan chauffeured the kids everywhere when I couldn't. He also would do Costco or Sam's club trips for me when I would run out of ingredients in the middle of a batch of something. He also helped keep the house picked up and did the laundry for me. I had Kenedee and Kyle weighing, measuring and packaging embellishments for the sugar and gingerbread kits, which BTW is very time consuming. All things said and done, we survived the holiday's and yet look forward to doing it again.
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