Let the Baking Begin

Yesterday, I mentioned to my dad that since the holidays are nearing maybe I should advertise on facebook that I will take orders for baked goods, with profits going to New Hope Orphanages or child sponsorships via SEAPC.

This was after I made a batch of apples cinnamon bread which he couldn't stop eating and demanded that it go. Samples! I could make samples for people to try and then have an order form sitting next to the samples! Of course, once you get someone hooked, then they have to buy some, right? So I will be making samples and sending it down to his office and another office, thanks to him enlisting the help of a very generous business associate and brother in Christ. Pray that this goes well!

Also, here is a rough draft of the "Cupcakes for Cambodia" Story that will be attached to the order form so people will understand my heart and God's plan for this!

Cupcakes for Cambodia…

About a year and a half ago, I became seriously interested in baking. I realized how many kids my age didn’t know how to bake (or cook) anything from scratch, and immediately accepted the challenge of mastering home baking from scratch. I became obsessed with baking everything from scratch: if I was making cupcakes, both the cupcakes and frosting had to be made from scratch. It soon became a passion and filled up all my extra time; cupcakes became a particular specialty.

Years before my baking obsession had started, my dad became acquainted with a missionary who worked all over Southeast Asia building orphanages, schools, and starting micro-economic development projects. His specialty and obsession was walking and praying: through cities and villages and for people and over lands that would eventually become transformed into homes for orphaned and abused children. Our family knew we were supposed to be connected with this man and his ministry, SEAPC which stands for Southeast Asia Prayer Center. Around the holidays our families would get together and Mark would tell us about all the new and exciting projects that were going on. We supported them financially and in prayers, as well as participate in their Coins for Kids program to build orphanages and schools as well as support other special projects.

The spring of 2012 I was a senior in highschool, deciding what I was going to do with my future. Other students were filling out college applications and touring universities, but I had prayed that past December about what God would have me do with my future. I just didn’t think that college at that point was part the plan, so I patiently waited. By spring I knew I was supposed to go to work for the family business, which supported SEAPC as well as other ministries internationally, but I also knew that my passion for baking wasn’t and accident. I had a God given dream to use my skills and passion to further His kingdom; God had placed a dream in my heart to start a bakery and donate all the profit to Cambodia to fund orphanages and schools, or child sponsors.

I had the opportunity to visit Cambodia in September of 2012. It was a life changing experience. We toured 5 New Hope orphanages as well as several schools that are partners with SEAPC. They house about 400 orphans, with plans to build an orphanage in every province. Driving through the country I saw the conditions of some of the children living outside the orphanages, as well as heard stories of those who get dropped off at city dumps because their parents can’t feed them. When I got home, I knew it was time to become more active and help these kids. God has plans and dreams for these kids and a future. There were so many success stories I heard of kids who grew up in New Hope homes. I wanted to give more kids that opportunity. I knew it was time to start doing something to make that happen.

So this is how I came up with the idea for Cupcakes for Cambodia. Despite the name, I bake many other things including cakes, pies, bread, bars, cookies, brownies as well as any requests you might have. My goal is to make baked goods with excellence that will sell at a reasonable price and send the profits to build New Hope orphanages as well as sponsor children. 

Children at the Siem Reap orphanage

Without ever firing a bullet.

It's Been Awhile.

And I do apologize, but adjusting to life back in the States was not the easiest thing. I was not really functioning normally my first two weeks back at least. I seemed empty headed I'm sure, but in all reality my head was filled with thoughts of Cambodia, Laos, and Singapore. A constantly flashing of memories from the past 15 days kept replaying themselves, on repeat. After the thrill of seeing what God is doing in a nation so different from mine, seeing with my own eyes, traveling by bus from place to place and interacting with such a great group of people almost constantly made it hard to come back and sit in an office away from everyone. What was harder was being confronted by the American ways of life and thinking. It's an experience like no other, and for a long time everything just seemed so meaningless.

What was not meaningless, was welcoming a new life and miracle into our family, my niece Gabrielle Brynne!

But I remember walking through the mall to find our baby a new outfit and listening to the conversations and with glazed eyes watching everything pass by me and thinking "this is so meaningless."

The drama, the superficiality, the vanity, the materialism. The heaping up of an empire of dirt that fades and burns up into nothing.

So, I was pretty upset. But my life had changed. I had just come from a place where children barely had clothes, and most of the ones outside of the New Hope orphanages had clothes that were filthy.

Children walked around, seemingly unsupervised. It was just after the rainy season so everything was saturated and swampy. I remember seeing a few of the children from the village outside our university playing in about a foot of water/rice paddy.

Starting in the 70's when the civil war and Khmer Rouge turmoil happened, the Cambodian people fried spiders for food.

And we complain when we have to eat leftovers.

I felt the need to do something. I felt a desire to pour out all my efforts to help these people. I expected poverty and scenarios like the ones I saw, but when I thought "This is a person's home and life. I wouldn't want to have to live like this, in these conditions" is when it hit me, this isn't just us touring through, this is a person's life, day in and day out.

Something had stirred inside me during those long exhausting days in the hot humid Cambodian and Laos jungles as we traveled by bus over paved and dirt roads, past mansions sitting next to mud huts and past temples where impoverished people gave the best of their food on an alter to a dead god so that he would be pleased and maybe they wouldn't go hungry again.

We walked through a city stupa and shrine and I saw people who lived in mud huts come into gilded temples filled with beauty and wealth and leave their best in there, to go on and live there life with utter poverty and despair.

Buddha did not offer these people hope. You could feel the hopelessness hang heavy and thick in the air, suppressing, crushing and killing the spirits of these precious people.

You looked into the eyes of people as you drove by down the streets and saw the utter despair, the complacency, the lack of self worth and purpose.

But let me tell you about the people who SEAPC has partnered with...

These people who have such a dream and vision for the children and youth of Cambodia.

The are areas christened the "Killing Fields" in Cambodia from the mass slaughters committed under the reign of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.

And in those same areas men and women of faith are building orphanages, agricultural centers and schools and calling them "New Hope."

Out of the killing fields comes fields of harvest. The pastors and leaders and overseers of these projects have dreams to change a communist, depressed nation.

Without EVER firing a bullet.

They are reaching the youth and training them spiritually and physically to love Jesus, work hard, get good grades, be number one in their class and go on to be managers and overseers of places of business. Children who have been raised in New Hope orphanages have gone on to be doctors and business men. In fact, the houseparent of one of the new orphanages we built had been an orphan himself in a New Hope orphanage.

And here he was, pouring back into the next generation of Cambodian leaders, doctors, lawyers, preachers, and parents.

All of this was constantly on my mind for two weeks.

But, I think I have changed my outlook. As I look back on Cambodia, I choose not to see a nation, struggling to bounce back from decades of war and killing. I choose not to see the hopelessness, desperation, and frustration of a people who can't feed their family or find a job.

I choose to see a people who have a dream, who are determined. I see hope shining in the eyes of those people. I heads lifting, and dreams growing bigger. I see potential and fields of harvest in such beautiful nations.

Sometimes wars are won with guns. But in my opinion, wars are best won with faith, hope and love. Without ever firing a bullet.

The Seeds You Sow and the Life that Grows

My Uncle George and Aunt Dot at a Relay for Life event

I'm not exactly fantastic at keeping up with my blogging...and my deepest apologies. I have really no excuses this time, only determination to consistently become better at it :) The more 
I become interested in food and baking, the more I follow and learn from other bloggers. One of my favorites has got to be Deb from smitten kitchen. So basically, I hope to be posting more frequently in the future. I also hope to be sharing some recipes, or at least links to recipes along with adaptations and tips that I used when baking them. For instance, for my sister in law's 30th birthday I made her a pink lady cake, which I made from a recipe on smitten kitchen. Unfortunately, my cake baking began at 11:30 p.m. and didn't end until about 3:00 a.m. and somewhere in the middle I ran out of baking powder...what's a girl to do? So I obviously decided to Google subsitutes for said baking powder and came up with this. I woke up the next morning before church to frost it only to find out that my sister in law and brother couldn't make it to our house for dinner. My aunt had passed away the afternoon before so we brought the cake along with us when we went to visit my uncle and family. The afternoon passed by filled with laughter and tears, full of memories of Aunt Dot, 

My Grandma Swogger

Grandma and Grandpa Swogger, and my cousins childhood memories. It's been a long time since I have had a Sunday that I've enjoyed so much, and to top it off the cake was a hit. I try to look for lessons in my baking or cooking, as well as in stories, because I believe that things just don't happen. God gave me the Holy Spirit to lead me and teach me, and like Jesus illustrated spiritual principles through natural examples, so does the Holy Spirit. The body of Christ is supposed to be like that tight knit community of baking bloggers. It seems like a silly example, but as brothers and sisters in Christ we are commanded to love one another, just as Christ loved us.

Aunt Dot at her 80th birthday party

We are supposed to be there when one of our brothers or sisters needs a helping hand, prayer, wise council, or even just a shoulder to cry one. And I have to admit, at first I was disappointed that we couldn't have the fun festive celebration for my sister in law, but my seed was still sown, and the somber cloud that could have hung over our family in this hour of mourning melded into joyful remembrances as we reminisced about times past over warm home cooked food, fruit, and dessert that family had brought. We celebrated the life of a woman who was a fighter, beating cancer numerous times, a mother who raised a family in love and devotion, a wife who had an inseparable bond with her husband. Galatians 6:9 comes to a new light as it states, " And let us not lose heart and grow weary and faint in acting nobly and doing right, for in due time and at the appointed season we shall reap, if we do not loosen and relax our courage and faint." Don't lose, heart...never give up or quit on your seed; act nobly; do right. In the APPOINTED season we WILL reap...IF we do not loosen and relax our courage. I know my Aunt Dot didn't, and now she reaps the ultimate reward of spending eternity with her Lord and Savior Christ. Everyday we have the option of seeing what is good and wholesome and sowing good seed, or focusing on the negative and downcast and sowing and reaping curses. Your choice...like Galatians 6:9 says, will you fight or faint?

Touching Hearts

So in my introduction post I mentioned my heart and my passion for Cambodia and Tibet. Even now as I sit and think about it, about the possibility and dreams that God has dropped into my heart it overwhelms me to the point where I want to cry. I find life so beautiful, so fresh and full of meaning lately and I truly believe its because everything within me is striving to accomplish God's purpose for my life: this specific purpose to help children half-way across the globe! South East Asia Prayer Center (SEAPC), the missions my family is connected with and helps, has a project currently in Tibet and the surrounding area. Because of the high altitudes in Tibet, it is my understanding, that more children are susceptible to congenital heart disease. The procedure which corrects CHD is very simple and not too expensive in the U.S., but in the Tibetan countryside where there are not doctors or medical facilities readily available, and families simply cannot afford it, children die from such a simple, fixable disease. However, SEAPC and the head of the ministry, Mark Geppart have surveyed and treated thousands of children and families across the countrysides of Tibet, while ministering the love of Christ. This amazes me so much! It was this specific project which really inspired the whole cupcake idea. I wanted to specifically raise awareness by making heart shaped cupcakes with red frosting, whose proceeds would go specifically funding even more screenings and heart procedures for the children of Tibet, to mend the holes in their heart while the Word of God heals the holes in all areas of their lives. The more I thought about it the bigger the dream grew...needless to say my dream is now a runaway dream and I don't want to try to suppress, catch, or stop them. I want to chase them. I want to connect people across the globe, use everyday measures, something as simple as a cupcake to change the life of a child. Everyone deserves life and a heart full of dreams. Everyone.

Patient and her mother

Find out more about Touching Hearts.

Chapter 1 of my story

Ok...so I'm new to the whole "blogging" thing, but I must say that I recently have spent hours searching every nook and cranny, investigating and researching various cupcake and baking blogs and websites....in search for the perfect cupcake recipes and mouth watering pictures. I found a few favorite websites that were very relatable and had creative recipes.

My search for cupcake recipes was not only inspired by my love of baking and the need to find trustworthy recipes for my mammouth task of baking hundreds of cupcakes for my graduation, but because I believe people are passionate about things for a reason and purpose. I am passionate about baking...but I believe it has more purpose than racking up the calories for me, my family, and friends.

I am a Christian and my family is involved with a missionary who does extensive work in Cambodia, Tibet, Laos, and Central America. The more I learn about the work that they do, from microeconomic development, to heart screenings, to building schools across Cambodia, the more my heart burned with a need to help. An entire nation is being changed and lives being rebuilt without firing a bullet. Needless to say, I am more than elated that I will soon be traveling to Singapore, Laos, and Cambodia for a total of 10 days.

cupcake I baked right before this blog!

It wasn't long before my passions became intertwined; I believe God placed a huge dream in my heart which is this: to use my passion for baking for a bigger cause, one that can help children in Cambodia, effect the lives of families in Tibet, and raise awareness and action from those who would buy the cupcakes. My dream is to one day (very soon) open a bakery where a portion of the profits of every cupcake go straight towards aiding and education children in Cambodia. Until then, I am perfecting my skills and finding more people to become as passionate about this as I am.

Well, that's my story. Enjoy the pictures, stories, and create memories of your own!



p.s. if you want to learn more about getting involved in what's happening in Cambodia, check out South East Asia Prayer Center.

These are cupcakes from the 4th of July 2011