Two great media mentions of Drop In & Decorate this week:
Boston Globe, Sunday June 28: 50 Tasty Satisfying Fun Yummy Surprising Finger-Licking Scrumptious Enticing Finds!
East Bay Newspapers, Thursday, June 25: Volunteers Find That Cookies Equal Smiles All Around
Cookies were more than dessert... they were the main course last weekend when Lisa and Champe Speidel, owners of Persimmon in Bristol, Rhode Island, hosted the first restaurant-based Drop In & Decorate® event. I asked Lisa to tell us about it:
Continue reading "And now for something completely different...." »
Come to a Drop In & Decorate® cookie decorating party -- part of Express Yourself, a summer program of creative activities for kids at the Harmony Library in Glocester, Rhode Island.
Tuesday, July 7
4:00 - 6:00 p.m.
For students entering grades 6-12 (and parents, too!)
Harmony Library
195 Putnam Pike
Harmony (Glocester), Rhode Island
Help us decorate 200 cookies for the Glocester Food Pantry and Glocester Senior Center. Instruction and all materials will be provided -- and each decorator gets to take home one of his or her own creations. Of course, any broken cookies must be eaten on the spot!
The program is free, but space is limited. Be sure to call the library at 401-949-2850 to sign up.
A quote from Thich Nhat Hanh, Vietnamese Buddhist monk, author, poet, peace activist:
When I was four years old, my mother used to bring me a cookie every time she came home from the market. I always went to the front yard and took my time eating it, sometimes half an hour or forty-five minutes for one cookie. I would take a small bite and look up at the sky. Then I would touch the dog with my feet and take another small bit. I just enjoyed being there, with the sky, the earth, the bamboo thickets, the cat, the dog, the flowers.... I was entirely in the present moment with my cookie.
Congratulations to Kat, whose Massachusetts Drop In & Decorate® event donated 300 cookies to four agencies in Franklin, Bellingham and Attleboro as part of our coast-to-coast Mothers' Day celebration in early May.
Kat's prize package contained a reuseable canvas shopping bag, three Wilton comfort-grip cookie cutters, and coupons for enough cookie dough to make 120 cookies, donated by Immaculate Baking Co.
We have more photos to post, including those from our Rhode Island cookies-for-donation event, so please check back next week.
To all of the hosts, coast to coast, who baked, decorated and donated... thank you!
For Brenda and her daughters, Drop In & Decorate® was a two-for-one event.
Two-for-one, because they ended up making 65 cookies twice, decorating twice, and delivering to SafePlace in Olympia, Washington, twice. Sort of.
Here's the end of the story:
My delivery today went without a hitch!! YAY! Since the office staff knew I was coming today, they were ready for me and accepted the cookies graciously. This is such a cool thing that I will definitely do it again. Count me in when you do any more events. It was fun!!
To read the beginning of the story and see more wonderful photos, please visit Brenda's blog.
Special thanks to Brenda and her daughters for creating such beautiful cookies, and for their dedication and determination to deliver those beautiful cookies to SafePlace.
What do CORA, Haven House, and Ronald McDonald House at Stanford have in common?
They all received donations of beautifully decorated cookies as part of the Coast-to-Coast Mothers' Day Drop In & Decorate® celebration -- a total of 160 cookies!
Gudrun, also known as Kitchen Gadget Girl, organized the party, her second cookies-for-donation event, and invited friends Stacey, Lisa, Charissa, Donna, Christy, Kelly, Celia, Sue, Noreen and Marsha.
When you go to Gudrun's blog to read more about her event, you'll see many more photos, too.
Special thanks to everyone who helped make this event such a great success.
One of the cool things about Drop In & Decorate® parties is that they can be very large, or very small. And sometimes the best things do come in small packages.
Three of the cookies-for-donation parties in our coast-to-coast Mothers' Day celebration were either small by design, or small by happenstance. Hats off to each of these hosts (all terrific food bloggers) who were determined to find ways to bring some cheer to others on Mothers' Day.
From Rebecca, in Denver, who writes From Argentina with Love:
I baked and decorated some cookies (just by myself, no big deal) and brought them to a retirement home near my home. They loved them! They were so surprised and appreciative. I told them all about Drop In & Decorate and they were very interested. They were so glad to be thought of -- many of them didn't have visitors that day or had no children. I had a lot to be thankful for that day!!
Photo reprinted from Olivejuiced.
Molly in New York City posted about her cookie decorating party on her blog, Olivejuiced. Their cookies were donated to Ronald McDonald House of New York City.
Natashya, of Living in the Kitchen with Puppies, baked and decorated seven dozen cookies with her daughter and her daughter's friends. They donated to The Denise House.
Special thanks to everyone! Your cookies are beautiful and your efforts brought smiles to the faces of many women and children for Mothers' Day.
In Massachusetts, Kat hosted her first Drop In & Decorate® event as part of the coast-to-coast Mothers' Day celebration, in memory of her mother who was a wonderful baker. She and her friends donated more than 300 cookies to four local agencies, including a domestic violence agency and two senior centers.
Kat kindly shared this note, which she received from one of the agencies:
I am an employee of New Hope and wanted to thank you for your generous donation to New Hope. Laura told me about your project in honor of your mother who passed away from cancer. What a beautiful way to memorialize your loved one and bring joy to others from what I know must have been a grueling journey for you and your mother.
My beloved sister is currently fighting her battle with cancer. Our family anticipates losing her within the next few months. You have inspired me to create a project of my own to honor my wonderful sister and I truly thank you from the bottom of my heart.
To read Kat's beautiful write-up about her Drop In & Decorate® experience, please click here to visit her blog. You will be inspired by what she's written.
Special thanks to Kat and her friends who baked and decorated.
The food blogging community has been so supportive of Drop In & Decorate™ during the past year, and last month one of my favorite bloggers, Terry of Blue Kitchen, wrote a lovely piece about the Coast-to-Coast Mothers' Day Celebration.
Lynnae, in Minneapolis, read Terry's post and, that same day, organized her first cookies-for-donation party. She shared her great photos (and some photos by her friend Emily, too) and this report:
We had a successful decorating party on Friday May 1st! We had 5 adults and 4 toddlers in attendance. The party started promptly at 9AM and decorating ended around Noon with 100 cookies decorated.
Our party was amazingly smooth considering we had toddlers eying the "pretty" cookies for two hours! We had cookies set aside for the little ones, and as you can see in the picture (below), they enjoyed a little cookie break after all the decorating was complete!
We were all so happy to participate in this event, and I am very excited to deliver our cookies tomorrow morning to the Ronald McDonald House in Minneapolis!
Thanks to Lynnae and Emily (who shared her photos, too) and their friends, and the adorable "quality control team" who tasted the cookies! And special thanks, too, to Terry of Blue Kitchen, and to the food bloggers everywhere who have helped Drop In & Decorate grow.
