Bake for Family Fun Month-February 2022

Happy Foodie Friday y’all! How has the month been treating you so far? I know it’s only the first week, but February seems like it flies by. Maybe it’s because it’s the shortest month of the year. The week has been interesting for me, as I have a new start time at work for the next couple of weeks, and my body is having trouble adapting. Oh, and we had a snow event, which was interesting because it started with rain. This week I decided to celebrate Bake for Family Fun Month.

What is Bake for Family Fun Month?

Simply put, Bake for Family Month month is a chance to celebrate family and to have a fun project that you work on together. You could bake a cake together or bake the cake and let the kids decorate it. You could work together and make a special treat for a grandparent or family friend. Maybe your family sits down together and watches a season of the Great British Baking Show. As long as you have fun!

For some ideas, check out my Favorite Recipes board over on Pinterest. You’ll find a variety of recipes that my family loves.

Baking Memories

I grew up in a family of bakers. Not professionals, well, not professionally trained bakers. My mom’s oldest sister, Kathy, was an amazing baker. She taught many of the people in my family how to bake; well, I should say she tried to teach many people in the family. And she’s the only one I know of who worked as a baker. Kathy was of the generation who measured by feel. She rarely used a recipe because she had them memorized. Every time the family had a potluck of any kind, Kathy was expected to bring the desserts. I remember when I was in university and would receive packages from her, such a treat to have home-baked goods while away from home.

My mom would bake a lot when I was younger. For some reason, I remember her making pie, and I would steal the scraps of crust to eat raw. I know we aren’t supposed to do that, but we didn’t know any better when I was a kid. The other treat she would make fairly often were homemade doughnuts! I think that is where my preference for the plain old-fashioned doughnut from Tim Hortons came from. Her doughnuts always had a delicious crust on the outside, and the inside was light and fluffy. I can’t explain it, but they were the best! Mom would make several dozen, and they were generally gone in a few days. My dad would always break them open and smear peanut butter on the edges. Such memories!

As for me and my first baking memories? We used to have a recipe for a no-bake peanut butter oatmeal cookie that we would make all the time for bakesales. Ah, the days when you could use peanut butter in bake sale items! My sister and I would make up a batch or two every couple of months because they were just that tasty! I remember burning the roof of my mouth, trying to lick the spoon because I was too impatient to let the cookies cool.

Then one summer, I was home alone and was bored, and I grabbed one of my mom’s cookbooks and started looking at various recipes. When I came across one for cookies called Rocks, I decided to try it. My parents were surprised when they came home from work to see that I had made cookies from scratch. Were they any good? Honestly, I don’t remember, but I know I never make them again!

Baking as an Adult

After graduating from university and moving back home, I started baking again. I would search the newspapers and magazines for recipes to try, and I typically stuck with cookies and cakes. They are just so easy to make. One year around Halloween, I had gotten cookie cutters and decided to do a sugar cookie baking marathon. Some of the cookies went to work with me, while the family devoured others. The reason that session stands out is the fact I managed to get a gnarly burn on my forearm from the oven door bouncing back up and hitting it when I was grabbing a pan from the oven. That was fun trying to explain to people, especially the kids I worked with at the time.

As I got older, I found I would often bake when I was emotional. What I mean is if something had happened that I was struggling to deal with mentally, I would tend to bake to work through whatever it was. I think that’s why I tend to stick with sweet over savory.

That doesn’t mean that I don’t bake for fun because I do. I would make birthday cakes for my niece and nephew for several years. Once my oldest daughter came along, I started making her birthday cakes. And they weren’t just basic cakes. Oh no, I couldn’t do that! For my daughter’s 3rd birthday, I made a firetruck cake. It wasn’t huge, and we ended up having to buy a second cake because we had a big party. But I was proud of that cake.

Around this time, I started entering baking contests through our local fairs. While I did pretty well at the small county fair, I wanted more of a challenge, so I started entering the State Fair. That became a huge deal for me. To the point, I would take days off of work to ensure that I would have enough time to enter everything I had wanted to enter. And of course, it all had to be fresh so that I couldn’t make it ahead of time. I was successful with my entries for the fair, and it was always exciting to go back after judging to see your item with a ribbon on it! Such a rush!

Sadly, we moved, and I had to end my fair baking for several years. Until I found a local fair to enter, imagine my surprise to learn the baking competition at the tiny fair was fiercer than it was at the state fair! While we haven’t been able to attend the fair in the past couple of years due to various lockdown measures, I am looking forward to taking the week off of work to bake. Yes, you read that right; I have taken the week before the fair off of work to bake! And it has paid off for me, as I won a trophy one year for the most points in the baking category and won a best in category for one of my quick bread entries. Co-workers, friends, and family would all benefit from my baking so much for the fair.

Baking with My Kids

I have two daughters, and both appreciate my baking efforts. And over the years, I have worked with them in the kitchen. They have both won their fair share of ribbons at the fair. At one point, they were even competing against each other and would brag about who won what ribbon!

My oldest daughter has tried her hand at baking solo and has not had much success. One time she made a batch of chocolate chip cookies that tasted somewhat metallic. The next time she tried, she ended up with a giant blob of a cookie. She has decided she will stick with making her fudge and leave the cookies to me to make.

My youngest daughter has yet to bake solo. Okay, she has made stuff on her own, especially for the fair. But I have always been hovering around and assisting her as needed. Sadly, she hasn’t shown much interest lately in trying her hand at baking.

One consistent thing between my girls is that they love it when I’m baking and offer the bowl or beaters for them to clean. My youngest especially loves it! If my husband is around, he’ll even jump in and take one to clean.

Baking in My Future

I admit that I haven’t baked a lot in the past year. It didn’t seem to spark as much joy in my heart as it used to. That’s not to say I haven’t done any baking, but when I have, more often than not, it’s been from a package and not from scratch. I hope to change that this year. Don’t get me wrong; there is nothing wrong with package baking. Especially if you don’t have a lot of time, I prefer scratch baking.

My hope for 2022 is to enjoy baking again and share my successes and failures with my family. And that includes all of you! Do you bake for family fun? What are some of your baking memories? I would love to know!

Are you looking for more food-related content? Check out my other Foodie Fridays posts.