Yes, I'm a Cupcake Camp Dropout...

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Well Hello, There!

Jorie, circa 1998. As you can tell, I’ve always had a deep love for cake.

Jorie, circa 1998. As you can tell, I’ve always had a deep love for cake.

If you’ve made it to this page, you must want to know the *real* reason I started Jorie Cakes. I can’t make it up, I really can’t. It’s my hope that you’ll find as much joy reading as I do writing—and enticing you with dreamy cake pictures—throughout my ten-years-and-counting cake story. 

Before we dive in to twelve-year-old Jorie, here are the bullet points of who I am now, though lacking details such as my love for trees and my strict diet comprised of the pairing of chocolate and peanut butter.

I am:

Jorie, circa September 2019, in the cake-baking off-season.

Jorie, circa September 2019, in the cake-baking off-season.

  • A Dublin, Ohio, native who’s now found her way out of the brutal winters to sunny Atlanta, GA

  • A 22-year-old senior at Berry College in Rome, GA (check it out!)

  • A member of the Berry Women’s Golf Team, my other life passion, as you can see

  • An only child (I’ll forgive you if you don’t want to read after this point, I know only children are the worst)

  • A Christian, whose life is fully dependent on the grace I constantly receive from God (because I’m totally incapable of anything on my own, trust me)

  • A self-proclaimed foodie & Food Network addict, with the occasional Say Yes to the Dress marathon

  • An avid yogi, grocery store aficionado, and research junkie (there’s so much to learn!)

That’s me in a nutshell. Now we can get on to the story you really came here for. Sit back, flip on Food Network in the background, and scroll through the first installment of my story. Enjoy!

Summer, 2009:

I was twelve. A very mature twelve, but nonetheless a kid in search of a job. I have no idea what I so desperately wanted money for (Littlest Pet Shop? American Girl Dolls? A trip to the mall with my middle school friends?), but I found myself in search of an income. 

The logical solution? Babysitting *shivers*. Okay, it can’t be that bad. Oh, it was bad. At least the one time I tried it, it was bad. If I had any say-so in the matter, I would never again willingly find myself in charge of someone else’s kids, no matter how good the pay was. Scratch that off the list. Back to square one. What else can a twelve-year-old do? No babysitting, definitely no dog or cat sitting (tried that, too), and not old enough for a big-girl job. 

 

My first little cupcake army, circa 2011, NOT made at Cupcake Camp. *Also shot this photo on an iPod touch, because that’s what middle schoolers did.

My first little cupcake army, circa 2011, NOT made at Cupcake Camp. *Also shot this photo on an iPod touch, because that’s what middle schoolers did.

Here we go—Cupcake Summer Camp! 

Sounded like a blast. And a blast it was—for all the wrong reasons. That summer, a friend invited me to cupcake camp at our local, successful bakery. Coming from a big Italian family, I’d always been a natural in the kitchen. My mom taught me how to use a butcher knife to cut my after-preschool apples at the age of four when I refused to use the inefficient plastic kiddy knives. 

 

Anyway, here we are at cupcake camp, the oldest campers in what seemed like a glorified daycare center in the back room of this bakery. Everything was going great. I cracked my singular egg into the bowl and returned to my seat. 

 

Then, the horror. 

 

The little girl next to me, who clearly lacked any sort of sanitary common sense or public decency, took her hands that were previously, um, in a place they shouldn’t have been, AND STUCK THEM IN THE BATTER. Gasp! Yes, she took her hands out of her drawers, put them in the batter, LICKED THEM, and PUT THEM BACK IN THE BATTER! 

 

*faints*

 

It’s true, and it’s a wonder I ever returned to the kitchen after that episode. As I, a self-proclaimed stress-cleaner and perpetual hand-washer, watched in sheer terror, I tightened my apron and willed myself to finish out the day. Upon returning home, my parents oohed and ahhed over my bakery case-worthy cupcakes but were stopped in their tracks when I yelled across the driveway, “DON’T EAT THOSE!” to my dad as he had a cupcake halfway to his mouth. I explained the tragedy that had ensued only hours earlier, and the cupcakes promptly found their new home in the garbage.

 

That was day one. I’d tell you about days 2-5, but I wasn’t there for those. I’m sure they were great.

 

I guess this makes me a Cupcake Camp dropout. You know, maybe babysitting wasn’t so bad after all…

Thanks for reading! Check back to see how I overcame the horrors of Cupcake Camp, or subscribe below to have it delivered straight to your inbox.

Cheers!
jorie