Cake Therapy
Cake Therapy is a heartwarming and uplifting podcast that celebrates the transformative power of baking therapy. Hosted by Dr. Altreisha Foster, the passionate baker, entrepreneur and advocate behind Cake Therapy, this podcast is a delightful blend of inspiring stories, expert insights and practical baking tips. Each episode takes listeners on a journey of self-discovery, emotional healing and connection through the therapeutic art of baking.
Cake Therapy
From Classroom to Cookie Artistry with Karen Lightfield
Join us as we unravel the heartwarming and inspiring story of an individual who has found joy in baking and teaching. In our latest episode of the Cake Therapy Podcast, we sit down with Mrs. Karen Lightfield, the talented owner of Custom Cookies by Karen and a TikTok influencer. Karen takes us on her journey into the world of cookie decorating, shares strategies for mental wellness during the slower months, and she discusses the dynamic of baking with her daughter.
We then shift our focus to the educational realm with a dedicated educator who spent 33 years shaping young minds. She shares the importance of community, continuous learning, and how the therapeutic aspects of both baking and teaching can create impactful connections. Her transition from the classroom to the kitchen illustrates the profound parallels between these two worlds and offers a unique perspective on the importance of accessibility and support in every aspect of life.
Lastly, we share the story of a seasoned kindergarten teacher who, facing the increasing academic demands on young children, found solace in baking. Listen as she recounts her decision to retire from teaching and embrace a full-time cookie business, a decision influenced by the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic. Learn about the innovative Eddie, an edible ink printer, and how it has revolutionized custom cookie orders. This episode promises a blend of inspiration, creativity, and the therapeutic power of baking and teaching, celebrating the transformative impact these passions have on our lives.
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Welcome to the Cake Therapy Podcast, a slice of joy and healing with your host, Dr Altricia Foster.
Speaker 2:Hi everyone, welcome back to the Cake Therapy Podcast, your slice of joy and healing. And, as usual, we always have great slices of conversations and great artists in the space talking about their journey through their art and their experiences. Today, we're lucky to have Mrs Karen Lightfield. Of Mrs Karen Lightfield, she's the owner of Custom Cookies by Karen. And listen, this lady is an influencer. Okay, she has over 90,000 followers on TikTok where she showcases her amazing sugar cookies, demonstrating to her audience the process of making these cookies. We are happy to have Karen on the show today, so thank you for joining us.
Speaker 3:Oh, my goodness, thank you so much for having me. This idea of sharing journeys to help each other is absolutely amazing, so I appreciate the opportunity.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for coming. You know, karen sprinkles sweetness one cookie at a time right, I try, she's sprinkling. She's her mom, that's her mother. She's sprinkling sweetness, one cookie at a time. But how are you, how are you feeling right now? Tell us about you know your mental health, your challenges right now.
Speaker 3:Absolutely so you know January can be hard. You know, for a lot of people, january can be one of those months where there's lots of darkness and snow and you know, maybe for cookiers or bakers or cakers.
Speaker 3:We aren't getting the maybe orders that we're used to getting. I've seen a lot of that come by, orders that we're used to getting. I've seen a lot of that come by. And really I think this time of year is just a time to regroup, maybe focus on the things that we can focus on, focus on what we're going to do in the new year, how we're going to have our businesses grow, and it's okay to have some of that downtime in terms of orders or maybe that those orders coming in because, guess what, this is how life is, so you need to kind of plan accordingly, right? And so I'm doing a lot of content now. I'm doing a lot of thinking, processing, kind of putting some ideas out there. I just on TikTok last night was doing Easter cookies, but again I teach virtual classes, so I have to be it's like being in retail I have to be ahead of the game. So I'm doing a lot of that in January. My daughter is in Arizona. She's moving home the end of the month, so I am in.
Speaker 3:Maryland so that's been quite a challenge. They've been there for about a year and a half, so I'm super excited to have her home. She's my baker, so I'm loving that she might be coming back to help me with some of the baking. That's not my favorite part. Love the decorating.
Speaker 2:I know Good that's. You know, for me, I don't really enjoy the baking part either. I am really a decorator and art. I don't call myself an artist, you know, because it takes a lot of practice and experience and I I would prefer someone to call me an artist as opposed to me. Oh, yes, I'm sure this, I'm already this right.
Speaker 3:So, um, I hear you, absolutely Matter of fact, um, I do that on TikTok often. I don't try to, you know I I want to bring value to myself, but you, you don't want to be, you know, braggadocious and I will have people say, karen, stop, you're an artist and it feels good, right, but I'm with you. It's kind of like I don't want to brag, yeah, or put myself out there when I know there's other people that have been doing this a lot longer than myself or have been trained differently.
Speaker 2:Yeah, excuse me, and I absolutely agree. It's better Let them tell us as opposed to us telling ourselves. And I hear you have the confidence that we take into the space to be able to create the work or create our art, but like, oh I'm artist, this I'm chef, this from sugar spoon desserts. Now we just wait on those.
Speaker 3:Well, your, your quiet demeanor and your, your vibe, I think, allows people to see that in you. You don't have to share it. I've seen that in your podcasts, in just your work. It's amazing.
Speaker 2:So I'm going to call you an artist.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, karen, and I'll call you an artist too. So you mentioned my vibe and everything. So we've met in several classes. So let's talk vibe and everything. So we've met. We've met in several classes, so let's talk about that experience. You know, karen and I met in a conference. She taught some of the sessions there and she's an amazing instructor, and as we go along in the conversation, you'll understand why she's so good at these instructions, right? So I'm a Marylander myself who's moved to Minnesota. Yeah, interestingly, tell me your thoughts on Minnesota when you come here.
Speaker 3:Listen, my first exposure to Minnesota was through friends we adopted from Bogota, Columbia, and we met friends that were adopting. We met in Columbia and they happened to live in Minnesota. So we had been there. We'd been there since 1999. I guess every five years or so we would go back and visit. So my heart is in Minnesota because our lovely friends are there.
Speaker 3:My first time doing a cookie kind of workshop in Minnesota was last January and this was through Primera with their Eddie the edible ink printer, and they had me come to Minnesota in January. You can imagine. So that is quite a challenge because guess what, it snows a lot in January in Minnesota. Luckily for me, that first experience with Primera in Minnesota last January it was a beautiful week so we had no issues with the weather. And of course they picked that time because, guess what, January tends to be a slower time for cookiers, cakers, bakers. So they picked that time so that we could kind of come together and not be worried about orders so much. So I appreciated that, Glad to have missed the weather. So Minnesota you get a lot more snow than we do now. I will tell you, in Maryland right now we have about seven inches. We got some snow this hearing.
Speaker 3:We have gotten a little bit of snow. I think schools were in session for one day this past week. So, yeah, I think Minnesota is fantastic and here's what's interesting we haven't had major snow.
Speaker 2:We've been like warm. I would say right, we were like below zero for a couple of days last week, but I think today we're going to be in like the twenties and the thirties and hear us talking about twenties and thirties being warm.
Speaker 3:Well, that's Minnesota for you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we have to take it where we can get it. So that's really, really interesting. So I know you're a teacher right by profession and from your website I'm going to quote you right, you said you began decorating sugar cookies with my brothers, sisters, cousins, as a young child. Your grandmother, who you refer to as Nanny, would gather her grandchildren together to bake and decorate Christmas cookies and it was one of the holiday traditions that we never skipped. That pains to me such a heartwarming memory, because I did that with my own grandfather, you know, when I was growing up, Not as much, but he was the baker in the family a family. So take me back, or take our listeners back, to the beginning and talk about that very early spark that you know of your love for pastry.
Speaker 3:And I, you, you really hit the nail on the head because it really does come back to me, to family, to a feeling, to gathering around a table and just laughing and sharing and my grandma, who we did call Nanny Nanny, would make. She actually worked in a cafeteria in an elementary school, so she had those big pans she would bring home every Christmas and she would make each of us rolled out cookies and back in the day excuse me, they we did those cutters that have the little, um, little rims in them almost like a fondant cutter now.
Speaker 3:So she would literally, and there were probably, let's see there's. There were five kids in my family back in the day. We now had six, um, and then plus my cousin, so we're probably 10 of us gathered around her tables with these big pizza trays full of cookies that she would roll, cut out, put on a tray for all of us. And we didn't use royal icing back then. We used, I think it was like an egg wash with gel food color or with liquid food color, and we would paint the cookies before they baked. Do you remember doing any of that as a young child?
Speaker 2:No, I remember.
Speaker 3:What I remember with the egg wash was putting it over like pastry or something but no, I keep trying to find the recipe and I need to ask my mom again, because it's either like condensed milk or a little bit of egg wash, with gel, with water, with food coloring, and then we bake them. So they would, we would paint and then they would bake, and they would be these gorgeous, almost like stained glass.
Speaker 3:That's what it kind of reminded me of. And then, of course, we would add sugars sanding sugars to them, of different colors. So those, those are my first memories of baking cookies. Colors, so those, those are my first memories of baking cookies. So when my daughter was in high school and her boyfriend went off to college, she needed something to kind of keep her brain active. So we started decorating cookies, more so outside of that Christmas holiday time. So it was an Easter and we were starting to decorate cookies, trying to keep her from thinking about the boyfriend being away.
Speaker 3:And I posted on Facebook these pictures of these cookies and one of my girlfriends from way back when said oh, karen, do you have a cookie business? And I did not at the time I was still teaching kindergarten. And she said well, can you make these cookies for my son's engagement party? And I said sure, you know, no charge, I'll just make them for you. So I made some cookies for her, posted those pictures on Facebook and, voila, I was like I guess I do make cookies. So that's really how my business started in terms of being able to start thinking of it as a way to contribute money to my family and a way to maybe transition, when I'm finished with teaching, into the cookie world. So it was really really cool that my daughter was there with me, kind of like figuring things out as we go, and she's an amazing baker. So I really liked being able to kind of help her keep her mind focused and also help me with that creativity and thinking about how I can grow as a.
Speaker 2:At the time I was 52 years old, so yeah, you know what I absolutely love about being in the kitchen with family members, and especially our daughters. This is what I encourage in our foundation that baking can really help to to build communication between a parent and a child. It can help to build communication between relatives. So that's why I really promoted this aspect of cake therapy or baking therapy, because that's what happened to me and my mother in the kitchen as I was learning to make cookies and cakes back in a couple of years ago. So I like that you brought up this interesting point here, that you did this with your daughter.
Speaker 3:It's kind of like as a parent, when you're driving in the car. It's a really good time to talk because they're behind you and there's no eye contact. Right, it's the same type of idea. You're focused on something else decorating cookies and that conversation really does start to flow, maybe a little bit more than it would if you were sitting down and saying let's talk about that boyfriend going off to college. I know it feels very good, right, it? Just it. Just, you're right. It opens that line of communication without being threatening at all.
Speaker 2:Yes, absolutely, absolutely. Was you talk about your, your nanny, and learning that from her? Was she able to you know? Was she alive to see the cookie business, the entrepreneur that you became? She?
Speaker 3:was not. Unfortunately she had passed many years ago, but it still is. What it's bringing up for my family is memories that we all remember from that cookie experience or just being together at the holidays or doing something kind of to benefit everybody. So it definitely has trickled down into the generations, even if Nanny wasn't here to actually see it, and we know she's watching and very, very approving of what we're doing smelling yes, exactly, she's probably being a little critical over my dough, or?
Speaker 3:yeah, the fancy tools that we have, that they do, I know I know advancements.
Speaker 2:Man, it's crazy, it you? Know, it is. Yeah, um, you know you. You mentioned asking your mom about the pop condensed milk recipe, right? If you do find it, send it to me and we add it to the. You know the intro.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. I will certainly do that, because it's one of those things where we we remember mixing it up. We remember what it looked like, but what was in it I'm not exactly sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely so, if you ever, if you find this, I I interviewed, uh, a previously incarcerated um baker um the other day and she learned to bake in prison and she was telling us about a concoction where she used the color from the m&m to color the cream from the oreo cookies.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Wow, the things we have to do sometimes, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 3:She didn't have access to gel food color. She has to figure out what to do. Yeah, yeah she absolutely did.
Speaker 2:Yep, you, you are retired. Yes, yeah, you're a retired kindergarten teacher. What led you to teaching?
Speaker 3:Oh, my goodness, I remember in fourth grade, for some reason wanting at that time I think it was obviously my elementary years experience just wanting and thinking that that could be me up there, and throughout the years I had teachers that and I would share that with them and they all agreed that they thought that this would be a really, really good career for me. Obviously, I'd like to talk, so that helps and I don't know. I'm a nurturer by nature and I think being able to communicate and teach and be a mentor for others to me has always been something really important. And I didn't know. I wanted to teach kindergarten until I was in college and I got to experience some amazing educators at that level. Back in the day, when I was much younger, I thought five-year-olds, what are they going to learn? I thought it was going to be a lot more like babysitting. And they're not. They're amazing. They are just little sponges and they absolutely adore you, no matter what.
Speaker 3:I do not have a great singing voice and all of my children over the years kept telling me how beautiful my voice was, so but, I, think wanting to kind of spread and and help people feel like they can learn and they can grow and that they are good enough Um and then we all kind of have a different path and a different journey.
Speaker 3:It's not a race to get to that reading level or to that math level, uh. So I really think, really think, that was what it was for me. Yeah, how long did you teach for? I actually taught 33 years, so a very, very long career. And every year was in kindergarten, except for when I was, when Lainey was three, my daughter was three and four. I wanted to be her teacher, so I opened a little preschool in my house and we for two years we had children come in and we did morning and afternoon preschool and then when she went off to kindergarten, I was able to get a kindergarten position at a current or where she went to elementary school.
Speaker 3:So that was really fun to be able to have that experience together at the same school. I, um my master's is in special education, so that first year back at um, the, the new County where we live, um, I taught special ed and that was quite an experience. And then the following year I was able to get back into kindergarten. So of my 33 years, 30 were in the kindergarten classroom and then three were at the preschool level.
Speaker 2:Yeah, why did you tell me about wanting to teach special education? Why did you go into that?
Speaker 3:specialty? That's a great question. For me what it came down to was being in the classroom and I started my career as a teacher in 89. So back in 89, we would have a lot of students come into the general ed classroom that were coming in with some needs at that five-year-old level. Oftentimes in kindergarten we are the first exposure to maybe what typical development is.
Speaker 3:So parents often didn't know coming into kindergarten that their child maybe was not exhibiting completely typical behaviors and I just did not have the knowledge as a general educator to kind of know what I was looking for. So I looked to my special educator teacher friends and I really thought, wow, they have that experience, they have that knowledge base that I think as a general educator I really need so that I can kind of be that first look for a lot of these parents. So I went to Johns Hopkins here in Maryland and got my master's in special ed and I always wanted to teach the general ed classroom but I wanted to have children with disabilities included in my room. So in Maryland we call that the inclusion classroom and throughout my career I really did. I was the general educator and I worked with special educators, but I had that knowledge base, to be able to feel confident in my abilities to meet their needs.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know what I love about people who um love about people who have the ability to recognize when there are gaps or loopholes in their education and chase after it, because I admire that more, as opposed to just sitting back and saying, okay, I didn't get trained here, I don't have that, and just pass it off to someone else. So kudos to you for recognizing that, thank you.
Speaker 3:And I think, kind of what you're doing too, it's almost like you're not saying I have all the answers. Right, you're saying how can I learn more? By offering this podcast to a community where it's really about the community and not about competition or about who's better or who has the fancy tools. So I think that in a way, you're educating like that too, but you're also saying, hey, I don't have all the answers, let's learn from others.
Speaker 2:Exactly, and let's see how others use this tool. Right, and I'm also saying that it doesn't have to be this tool, but there are the forms of artistry that you can use to help transform your life.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, that's exactly what very eye opening and I think, if I think, a lot of us, as bakers, cakers, cookiers, we, you have to have an open mind, right you? Have to be able to learn and grow and realize that you don't have it all. So I think opportunities like this to hear each other share their stories and to share their fears and maybe the things that they can offer is super important, Really, really important Absolutely, and the thing about it is like this bake world, this cake world, this cookie world.
Speaker 2:It can be so intimidating, right, because there are girls and guys who are looking in and they come and they see, oh, 17,000 followers, they see over 100,000 followers, and they're like thinking this person is unreachable. We, we cannot, we don't have access to this person when in fact you do, right, when in fact you do so. I'm really trying to create some accessibility for people to really hear why all of us are doing this. We're not necessarily. We didn't all come into it just to make money. We did come into it for healing, absolutely.
Speaker 3:And if you do come into this business for the money, it's kind of like being a teacher, right? It's not really what it's about. Not really what it's about. You can certainly make a living and you can certainly work it out so that you can be a contributor to your family or to maybe vacation fund or things like that.
Speaker 3:However, having accessibility to each other at any level again kind of goes back to the classroom, right. It is really, really important. Even at 90 some thousand followers on TikTok, I think one of the things I hear a lot is oh my gosh, you responded Well. Yes, if you have a question, I don't.
Speaker 1:I'm just Karen here in Maryland.
Speaker 3:I'm going to answer you, but I think people may look at that and go, oh, that's somebody else. And we're just people, you know, we're just regular old people that are trying to do what you're doing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. And the thing about it is, I think, when people say, oh, you responded. I think bakers and cookers are somewhat introverted people. That's why they choose this lonely profession or this lonely hobby where they can sit still. So sometimes they themselves are in fear of responding and not feeling like they. Oh, you're asking me, I don't know, I'm just here baking.
Speaker 3:No, that's a really good point, though, because why, unless you own a storefront and you have people and you're interacting and you're you're right most bakers and cakers and cookiers are kind of that one man show and you've got your head down and you're doing what you've got to do to kind of get to that next order. So I think being able to be visible and accessible is probably maybe something that really is needed more than we even think.
Speaker 2:Or, you know, the people who follow us and people our customers really realize that what plucks us from obscurity are the things that we're making, because we would rather sit behind our DMs, not showing our faces until something goes viral, and then it plucks you out of obscurity like your hiding space.
Speaker 3:Whether you want it or not.
Speaker 2:Exactly Now. You have the responsibility to show up.
Speaker 3:But you know what? That's a really good word because I think responsibility is part of it. If you're going to put yourself out there.
Speaker 3:We do have a bit of a responsibility to our followers or to our customers to kind of offer what we are our best foot forward right, yeah, absolutely One of the days when I'm not having my best foot forward, I just don't go live on TikTok, right, or that's when I kind of close down and I do my thing and I put on my music and I kind of get that energy back in me so that I can come back and it's not even a performance. Really, to me, it's more about being able to give back, right. If you're not, if you're not feeling it, don't try to give because it's not going to be authentic, it's not going to be genuine.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because you know what I am. I'm baking through a lot right now and I have a friend who recently lost a son and I wasn't going through anything prior to her losing a son. So I was there. I was there, but then I had to put my mom into a nursing home because of her stage three dementia. And she said to me and I was apologizing to her at the top of the year, saying I'm so sorry I haven't been there and she said to me something that was really profound. She said you cannot pour from an empty cup, so please do not expect this to show up if our cups are empty too, because this is our space to regroup and reconnect with ourselves and kind of know when that is which is going to be regroup, and you know reconnect with ourselves and kind of and kind of know when that is, which is going to be different for you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it'd be different for me, going to be different from another, another baker. Um, yeah, but I like what you said in terms of you're baking through things, because that is really what we do, right? Yeah, you're, you are really using that what you're doing. You're mixing and you're, and you're baking and you're, you are really using that what you're doing. You're mixing and you're, and you're baking and you're rolling as therapy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, and it really has been. Um, what we? I'm going to share a copy of my book cake therapy how baking changed my life. If you haven't bought it yet, we I'll have the my producer send send one over to you and you will see the things that I've actually baked through Wow.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, I'm eager, eager to read that. Yeah, it's very interesting.
Speaker 2:So we were talking about. Before we digress, I would say we were talking about your years of being a kindergarten teacher, right? When did you decide to A not be a kindergarten teacher anymore and start? Custom Cakes by Karen.
Speaker 3:You know, it's one of those periods in your life where you don't you can't look at it and go oh wow, I think this is the plan. It just happened very organically. I had been teaching for about 28 years and kindergarten has changed a lot, and I think there's a lot of rigor expected on five-year-olds. So I was having a bit of a hard time settling into the fact that what we're expecting of children has changed, even though child development has not changed. So I just started thinking about what am I going to do? You know, am I going to continue to stay kindergarten teacher?
Speaker 3:And I loved my families, loved the children, loved my staff. So those relationships were super, super important to me. However, I wasn't really liking what kindergarten was necessarily looking like anymore in the public school system. So when my daughter and I started baking cookies again year round, it just started to take off. And so for the last three years of my teaching career, I would teach all day and I would come home at four, quickly, put some dinner on, and then I would decorate cookies in the evening. And I would come home at four, quickly, put some dinner on and then I would decorate cookies in the evening and I would stay up until midnight sometimes and have to get up again at six and do that.
Speaker 3:So I did that for several years. And then, of course, this was right before COVID. During COVID if you're a parent out there you remember the period of time where everybody was doing virtual learning, which was hard enough. Right, that was tough, but at least everybody was doing virtual learning. But when we came back into the public school system, there was a period of time where we did something called concurrent teaching. Concurrent teaching and that meant that I was in the classroom teaching maybe 10 children in my classroom who had Chromebooks in front of them, so I had to teach them through the Chromebook. And then I had maybe 15 more children who did not come back to the classroom yet, for whatever reason they were teaching, they were working from their Chromebooks at home. So imagine being in a kindergarten classroom with Chromebooks for the 10 that are there, 15 at home with a Chromebook, and you're trying to teach five-year-olds and you know five-year-olds don't learn best through sitting down through a laptop.
Speaker 3:That was when I came home and I said to my husband if I ever have to live through concurrent teaching again and I would never quit, but that was my topic. I said, if I ever have to do this again, my fear is that I'm just I'm not going to be able to. And he said why don't you think about retiring? And I said, well, we're not there yet. And he was and he, being Mr CPA that he is said you know, we can make this work, let's just throw some numbers out. So we kind of sat down and looked at it and, with my cookie business taking off and I was work again, I was working pretty much two full-time jobs. He was like you've got a pension, let's see if we can make this work. So that's when I decided that it was a good year to go ahead and put my retirement in and then just focus on the cookie business.
Speaker 2:You know what People have made a lot of life decisions, life changing decisions, during the pandemic and right after we were emerging, you know, out of returning to work or returning to school, whatever. You know one of my, I loved having my kids home during the pandemic. But let me tell you one of the things that I've noticed my kids don't write well.
Speaker 3:Yes, Listen, I remember trying to show the little ones you know how to hold their pencil through the Chromebook. You know, make sure you're grabbing it and holding it down. You can't. And I think writing handwriting per se really took a turn during COVID and we're still seeing it. Those occupational therapists are having to work with more children now because they didn't have that fine motor development that they would normally get in the young early childhood classroom.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I've, I've, I've seen that my kid's penmanship is just horrible, Um, so yeah, I needed to mention that like that, that COVID took a toll on those handwriting.
Speaker 3:Well, I bet your listeners are all going yes, that writing is horrible.
Speaker 2:now I have to be constantly in the rooms because they both have that desk in their rooms and stuff. I'm checking homework. I'm like you can't turn that in. You have to redo this. What were you thinking? It's all over the place. It's running into each other. There's no space between the words.
Speaker 3:Yep, yep, and I think that was probably one of the hardest parts for teachers and parents and children all around to be able to go. Golly, I really. You really do need hands-on, right. You really do need that hand-over-hand time to develop that skill or the practice with somebody that's not mom, because, guess what, the mom-kid teaching for most of us does not go well. Yeah, they don't want to hear it from mom how to hold the pencil, right? I know, like you're not my teacher.
Speaker 2:No, and you don't know. No, they think you don't know. Oh, of course. They think you don't know. Oh, of course. So you know, like retiring, leaving the classroom and starting the cookie business. How does it translate to the cookie world? Like your teaching skills, and I'll talk about how. Outside of it being you know, I would say added income when you teach. Tell me about you know, how has the transition been? And tell me about what is urging you to teach in the cooking world.
Speaker 3:Fantastic, great, you really have a great way with questions. No wonder you're so good at this. I think for me it really was kind of what you said earlier in terms of this being a one person show, right. It was lonely when I first retired and I was focused more on kind of getting those orders out and making sure that I was bringing in that income. And when I started doing TikTok more regularly, people kept saying why don't you teach classes? Why don't you teach classes? And when I go live on TikTok, generally speaking, it really is a class because I'm kind of demonstrating and talking people through it, I'm being able to look at questions and I was like, oh, you're right, we could do classes.
Speaker 3:And that is really how I found my joy in doing the cookie business, because before it was about just getting all those cookies out right, making sure that the customer was happy and being able to kind of get a vibe for somebody that maybe they're having a bad day, or being able to understand that maybe somebody else needs me to explain something a little bit differently.
Speaker 3:The teaching comes back to me so naturally that it's been a really nice, nice transition. So I offer in-person classes, which are really fun and that's where I bring everything to everybody and we decorate together. But I also offer virtual classes, which is really just eye-opening, because I give everybody the tools that they need to make their own cookies and to make their own icing, and then we gather together in a virtual setting and we decorate on a given day. So I think that transition for me has been really easy, just because of my teaching background. It's not an easy task to kind of explain your job to someone unless you are comfortable, kind of either in front of a camera or in front of an audience. It can be quite the challenge.
Speaker 2:So you did mention that joy. I heard that word joy in describing your transition. Are you a teacher or are you a baker, cookier, cake artist? What brings you joy? What aspect of it?
Speaker 3:Yep, and again, I think this is going to be different for everybody, depending on your personality, depending on what your strengths are. For me, the joy comes from the teaching.
Speaker 3:So the joy comes from kind of sharing what I know and helping others grow, whether it's business or skills or maybe just going through something tough. So, again, I think that's just something that's always been ingrained in me, to be that nurturer. So I find the joy in the teaching and, matter of fact, my husband who, again Mr CPA, his idea of a business is probably very different than mine because I need to do what is going to make me happy and make me feel fulfilled, Because as a teacher I got a lot of my uh fulfillment from being able to have those light bulbs go off with the little ones, and it's transitioned into that with the cookie world, because people will email me and say, Karen, I had no idea just that changing and that icing consistency was going to make me feel so much more confident. Or being able to roll out that dough and have it not spread. Thank you so much for the recipe. So that's what really does bring me the joy. Without that I don't know that I would be as successful.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, yep, yep, um. You talk about baking and enjoying it and I tell people all the time for me it's you have to feed your soul. When you're doing this, it's not just something you're just doing. You have to definitely feed your soul in your decision making in a purposeful way that you're you're, you're showing your art and sharing your art. So so I can, definitely I can. You know, I share a similar sentiment to you around that joy that you know that baking brings for me, as as what teaching does for you.
Speaker 3:Exactly, exactly, tell me yeah.
Speaker 2:Is it easier to teach kindergartners or adults? What's the difference?
Speaker 3:That is a really good one, Let me tell you, I tell, I tell the cookie world class participants that the benefit of teaching the adults is that they don't pick their nose. Yeah, and then keep the icing things like that. But besides that, the younger crowd is an easier crowd because they're so no judgy, they're not judging at all, they are literally just looking at you. For that, for that glimmer of of light and love, they're not going. Oh, that wasn't a very good letter. K on the on the blackboard, Mrs.
Speaker 3:L so kindergartners are a lot easier. Now, most people don't agree with that, because the idea of having 25 five-year-olds in front of you can be quite scary for some people. But for me I think again, they're just so innocent and their love of learning and their just respect at that age is just amazing. So I think the five-year-old crowd is a little bit easier.
Speaker 2:Okay, so you hear that five-year-old crowd is a little bit easier. Okay, so you hear that she prefers the kids.
Speaker 1:Well, they're easier because they don't judge. They love the babies.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she loves them babies okay.
Speaker 3:Yes, the babies, and listen, even my gray hairs. My kindergartner, one little girl, called it tinsel one year and she wondered why I covered my tinsel up and so literally after that I said I am not covering my gray because this is tinsel.
Speaker 2:Tinsel? Absolutely, you're inspired by nanny, and. But who else inspires you out here in this cake world, as you were deciding to embark on this full-time? Who inspires you?
Speaker 3:Another great question.
Speaker 3:When I was first learning about having a cookie business, I went on YouTube and the first person that I followed that was really interesting to me was Lisa at Borderlands Bakery and what I liked was that she was putting out more like educational videos, little mini tutorials about how to make your dough and your icing and coloring and consistencies, and that got me thinking that being a cookier is not just about fulfilling orders and I knew I could fulfill orders, but I wanted to figure out a way to kind of tie that teaching with decorating cookies and that is really what sparked me.
Speaker 3:So having Lisa as that mentor and somebody that was doing it. She wasn't making money at the time off of those cute little videos, it was more of a way to I'm assuming for her also kind of give back and spread that joy of cooking to those beginners who were eager. Right, we're eager, we want to learn, but we want to feel connected to somebody and I really really respected and have continued to follow her and love, love, love what she's doing with her business. So I would say Lisa at Borderlands was really my very first person that I was like wow, I want to be like her.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so Lisa inspires you and you're inspiring almost 100,000 individuals on TikTok here. Take us through your process from idea to execution of your cookie.
Speaker 3:When it comes to my cookie business, in terms of the orders and the custom orders that I do. Generally speaking, it comes from an inquiry form on my website. Somebody says, hey, I want to have birthday cookies January the 2nd, and I respond with an email that says, yes, I have availability. I tell them what my starting price is and then I ask them for inspiration either photos or maybe an invitation of something that they like, so that I can kind of get their vibe. And then, once they give me that vibe, I then am able to quote them with a price per dozen and then fulfill the order.
Speaker 3:That way I like to do most of my designing on a program called Canva and I absolutely adore that for being able to maybe put an image in there of something Maybe it's a number one birthday candle and then I can actually create my own cookie cutters from that image. And then, because I have Eddie, I can print on that cookie or I can hand pipe on that cookie and I feel like it's a really personalized vision for what a customer has wanted. So I would say Canva has really been my go to program for designing my ideas and then cookie CAD for making those cookie cutters. And of course, eddie's a big winner for printing cookies and logos and photos too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was just about to ask you to share with our listeners what Eddie is. Do you use Eddie? What percentage of your work do you use Eddie for?
Speaker 3:Great question. Eddie is an edible ink printer created by Primera actually in Minnesota. That's where they are, that's where they create their Eddie, and Eddie is a tool kind of just like any other tool that we have in our back pocket for cookie decorating, and Eddie is able to print directly on an iced cookie. So if you have a printer at home where you have to print on icing sheets and then kind of glue that icing sheet onto a cookie, this is a step up from that for sure, because we're literally just decorating right on a cookie. So I, for instance, do little Polaroid pictures.
Speaker 3:My daughter got engaged and I made a cookie that says she said yes with their picture on it, and I was able to take their photograph, print it right on a cookie and then I can add my embellishments to it in terms of making it into a cookie for a customer. So, eddie, I would say I do probably use Eddie on most of my orders. For instance, I may not print with Eddie on a cookie, but I might use Eddie to print a pattern for me, for instance to make royal icing transfers. Eddie can print patterns for me on a tray and I will often use him as a tool, even if it's not on the actual finished product. In terms of the cookie, I like Eddie for backgrounds. I can print a background on a cookie and then hand pipe writing on top. So I would say I use them in every order.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you light up when you talk about Eddie. It's almost like it's a primary discovery, something that you're really excited about, just like a new tool, because you do light up when you're talking, and that's the light I saw when you taught in that Eddie class. Let me tell you all that. So, yeah, yes, and honestly it's it's.
Speaker 3:It's very um. It's very true in the sense that if I didn't have Eddie, could I still survive and do my business Absolutely, but with Eddie I'm able to, um, have orders that I would not have before. So when I first purchased Eddie, eddie, the reason I bought Eddie was because of my husband and he said Karen, you've got to think of Eddie as a revenue generator. Right, if you don't have Eddie, you can't accept that wedding photography Polaroid order, you can't do the logos for the Baltimore Orioles or what have you. So it opened my mind to thinking you're right, it's not. There's an initial investment, of course, but without him I wouldn't have the opportunity to do the things that I can do. And time is money, as you know, and Eddie is a huge, huge time saver for me. So they're not paying me, I promise, but it is. It's just one of the tools that I feel like is right there at my, at my beck and call if I need it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you're using Eddie, you're making these cakes, you're teaching on TikTok, you're teaching online. Do you find this whole artistry to be therapeutic at all, and does it feed your soul, especially with such, you know, especially with such a beautiful beginning with your grandmother? Tell me about the therapeutic aspect of your baking, and how does it feed your soul absolutely.
Speaker 3:And I think for me it really does come back to being that educator, that teacher. I feel like every new technique or strategy that I learn I don't want to keep it. To me it's like that gatekeeping idea of keeping something for my personal value and nobody else's. It is just I don't understand it. So every time I learn a new tool, I want to just get on TikTok, or I want to do a video, or I want to teach a class that shows somebody else that was just like me back in the day, who maybe doesn't know or just doesn't have the exposure or the access to that idea, how to make it work for them.
Speaker 3:So the joy really does come from giving back and sharing that. To me, if I kept it all in, it would just be a job, it would just be a way to retire a little bit early, and that was not enough for me. I really wanted to spread that joy because for me, in terms of the therapy, what comes, what helps me get through life and get through hard times, is sharing with others with a similar experience or kind of what you said bake through it. So decorating or teaching through something, all of a sudden that problem doesn't seem quite as big right, because I've now gone past it, or my mind has settled into it, or I've given that, maybe just that mental break from thinking about it. Now I'm looking at it a little bit differently in terms of perspective, and oftentimes even on my TikTok live there have been several occasions where I've cried, and usually it's around family things or maybe health issues that somebody has gone through, and again I'm vulnerable, right.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 3:I let people know if I'm having a bad day. I'm not going to get on. Honestly, that is not my thing. I'm not going to come on and necessarily work through it when I'm in a bad place. If I'm in a bad place, that's when I've got my head down and I'm thinking and I'm creating and I'm listening to music. But once I've worked through it, I can share it in hopes that I can then be a help to somebody else that might be going through the same thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, else that might be going through the same thing. Yeah, absolutely, that's the message that we're we, we we try to send with our foundation, the Cake Therapy Foundation, where we're really intentional about engaging women and girls who've been excuse me, where we're really intentional about engaging women and girls who have been through it, experienced some trauma in and out of the foster care system, being displaced out of of their homes, that you can bake through it. Um, you know, just you, engage, you can, and then baking could also be a vital business. You know, you, if you decide that it's just a skill for you to respond to some trauma, great, but then you can benefit, you can change the outcome of your children's lives and your own life through baking. I remember at the top of our conversation you mentioned your daughter coming home. What are you most looking forward to as she returns? Are you looking forward to just the mommy daughter moments, the conversations? What have you missed the most in the kitchen with her?
Speaker 3:Oh, my goodness, I'm going to cry.
Speaker 3:I think for me, facetime is great, but there's just not that same feeling of just being able to look someone in the eyes and really know what they're feeling and what they're going through, and being able to just sit down, whether we are having a deep discussion or not, and just touch and hug and feel.
Speaker 3:To me, that is what I'm really most looking forward to, as well as having her in the kitchen with me, because her joy, the baking, the rolling the, the just the kind of diving into it for her is very therapeutic and I think she's missed that. So her being able to kind of get in there and just sometimes she'll even have her headphones on right, she's a 24 year old, so she'll have her headphones on. But she, I know she's working through it, you know she's working through something. I'm I'm excited to be closer in proximity, to be able to help her through things like that and just having her and Adam home. They're getting married in September, so kind of this wedding process of being able to be in the same state, not across the country is going to feel really really good too, so I'm super super looking forward to that yeah absolutely.
Speaker 2:You've been an educator for in the classroom, I would say, because you continue to educate, right yeah, For over 30 years. What do you, what do you want your legacy to be? What is your legacy?
Speaker 3:I hope that other people look at their self and want to be like me, like I want people to say wow, I want to be able to give back, I want to be able to share, I want to be able to be that voice for somebody. I hope that that's what I am for people and that they are looking at maybe content creators or people that they're seeing out there on TikTok or Instagram as accessible and that they, too, can kind of like what you said. You can do this.
Speaker 3:You could keep it as a hobby or you could actually make a business out of it for yourself as small or as big as you would like, and I hope that people understand that just being kind and sharing is really what it's about. I always strive to have community over competition. There is more than enough room in this baking world for all of us, and if we empower each other and we share and we continue to give back, the world is just going to be a better place.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. If we continue to give back and share, the world will definitely be a better place. And we are going to leave it here, and this has been an amazing conversation. We're happy to have you here. Share with our listeners how they can find you.
Speaker 3:Absolutely so. You can find me using the name Custom Cookies by Karen, and that is on all of my platforms, so mostly on TikTok and Instagram, YouTube, my website. All you're going to use is custom cookies by Karen and you'll be able to find me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, cool, so guess what you know. You didn't mention TikTok and I did talk about um having over 90,000 followers. Do you consider yourself an influencer? Like tell me?
Speaker 3:I think I'm influencing people. I hope I'm influencing people meaning that they're looking at me going oh my gosh, she's 57 and look at her on TikTok. Right, I promise I don't sing or dance, I literally decorate cookies. But I hope I'm influencing people in all of the goodness that there is there. I'm hoping and I'm not looking at that as like a influencer in anything except just be kind and share and find the joy. That's hopefully what I'm influencing people joy.
Speaker 2:That's hopefully what I'm influencing people, yeah, good, so we're going to leave it here with influencer Karen from Custom Cookies by Karen. This has been an amazing conversation and this has been a slice of joy and healing for me too, to our listeners please go check out our website. It's the wwwcake-therapyorg. Look at the work that we're doing and wanting to do for girls. You can, you know, buy me a coffee. All that funding goes towards helping the girls in Minnesota, you know, to really help teach them other art forms to respond to their trauma. We understand here that talk therapy is great and it's real, but let's increase individuals knowledge around other art forms that can really help the individual to become a better them. So thank you so much for listening. This has been great, karen, and I, karen, you and I will definitely need to partner in something else yes amazing conversation absolutely an amazing conversation today, so thank you so much for coming.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much for having me. You're amazing yeah.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, karen. Thank you, guys for joining the Cake Therapy Podcast.
Speaker 1:Thank you for tuning into the Cake Therapy Podcast. Your support means the world to us. Let us know what you thought about today's episode in the comment section. Remember to subscribe wherever you get your podcast and if you found the conversation helpful, please share it with a friend. Also, follow Sugar Spoon Desserts on all social media platforms. We invite you to support Cake Therapy and the work we do with our foundation by clicking on the buy me a coffee link in the description or by visiting the cake therapy website and making a donation. All your support will go towards the cake therapy foundation and the work we are doing to help women and girls. Thanks again for tuning in and we'll catch you on the next episode.