Great taste starts with the ingredients

Mothers know best

Mother's day cake and birthday cake for Mom below

There was a time I used to purchase cakes for family events and special occasions (I was too tired to come home and make a cake from scratch). Then one day I decided to surprise my mother and made a cake for her after a long day of work. When she tasted it, she looked at me and said, “Where did you get this cake? It is way better than the ones that you usually get for me.” She didn’t have to say anything else after that, I just knew that the time of purchasing cakes for my mom was gone; it was the beginning of desserts made with love just for a special person “MOM”.

Isn’t it funny the way most of us talk about our mother more than our father? Yes, I make cakes for Dad too and he really loves them. But there is a special bond that exists between children and their mothers that only God created. Father’s Day came and went, you didn’t hear that much talk about it through the media or just people among themselves. Is it because us men, we are “macho?” or is it just the way our world tries to recognize the special place women have in our lives? You will see in many families that most people have longer and deeper conversations with their moms more then to their dads. Do you remember last Mother’s Day? What a question, probably nobody can forget it! People were talking about it two or more months before and you had to have a reservation if you wanted a seat in a restaurant -- or you had the option of waiting for hours before your family was seated.

Mother's Day is truly special, and in my personal opinion women should be treated with high regard. Our society as a whole should go back to the system that used to exist in biblical times when there used to be a “college” of older mature women that had the role of training the younger women about life. Today, everything is just fast, “rapido”, and in a hurry and, unfortunately, no time is given to training. Yet, we still need to have married women who will be able to handle life in the 20^th century so that they will be helpmates to their husbands, and we still need single women to carry themselves with such grace that men have no choice but to be gentlemen towards them. Mother's Day is the day that we honor our mothers, but it should also be a reminder that older women should mentor younger women.

I enjoy making pastries for special people, especially for Mother's Day, and I thank God that by His grace I am surrounded by them -- God bless all the Mothers!

A wonderful, nice and blessed weekend of July 4th

What a weekend this 4^th of July was for us! For you to understand what just happened I have to take you back many years. I don’t want to trouble you with the details but I can tell you this: In 2000 my wife and I went to CLC (that became our church) in Gaithersburg and after the service at the guests reception Patrick Ryan welcomed us. From that moment forward this godly man has been our friend and prayer partner. So when he asked me to pray for him as he was seeking God’s guidance as to propose to Norma, I started to pray along side with other prayer warrior from the church. Then the time came when Patrick proposed to Norma and she said yes. At that moment I told Patrick that I was going to make his wedding cake. As the time was going by and we were coming closer and closer to the wedding date, many things had to be done. I volunteer to paint their houses (my mom got all her children trained to do handy work-- like painting, sewing, building houses--). Since he knew that I am also a photographer, Patrick asked me to take pictures for his wedding as the main photographer.

300 people were invited to the wedding, so I had to make enough cake to satisfy all guests. The wedding date was July 3^rd 2010 at 1 PM, but I had to be at the church at 11 AM for picture taking. As I was getting things together to make the cakes, another friend Steve came to me and asked if I can make a birthday cake for his son who was turning 14 on July 4th. Early this year I made a cake for Jane (Steve’s wife) and their son told them that on his birthday he would like for me to make him a cake. So when I was asked, I couldn’t no, so I said yes. How can you turn down a young adult’s request?

To put things in perspective, just imagine that I work every day 10 hours. Making these cakes was a labor of love, I had a wonderful time making them sleeping only for couple hours. For me these two families (and many others) have been there for my family in prayer and other ways. The lack of sleep or my feet hurting for standing for a long period of time was worth it, because of the honor and opportunity to give back to those you love. You cannot put a price to that.

The way I look at life is that God gave me gifts and talents: I try to use them to bless those that come on my path. After the wedding many guests came to me and wanted my business card. They were saying: “the cake was delicious-- I had a small piece then wanted more and went for seconds-- One lady said that she sent her husband twice to get her a piece and the second time she asked him to get her the biggest piece available".

On Sunday Steve’s son came with his dad to pick up the cake, he was surprised to see that I made him a cake decorated with a red electrical guitar just like the one he got for his last birthday. I never saw a young man so joyful like him for his birthday cake. I thank God for the opportunity to serve.