Saturday experiements

My amazon order finally came. I ordered some goodies for my shop that are less online then going to the store. I am most excited about my gel coloring. I have not yet tried it, but plan to in the next few few days. I like alot of color and want to express that in my candies.

 I also ordered colored chocolate chips. those have been hard to find. So, I was relieved to find some online. They will definitely brighten up my marshmallows.

I did use colored chocolate to help color some caramels. I made Blackberry Truffle Caramels in honor of Easter. As you can also see, I had fun with the sprinkles. Truffles always have some kind of decoration on top, so..... :)

I also finally made Strawberry Shortcake marshmallows. They have been on my list for sometime to make. 

Dennis, my significant other, had 2 very good ideas for marshmallows, one would work well for caramels also. Peanut butter and Jelly Marshmallows and cinnamon roll marshmallows. I want to try the peanut butter and jelly ones another way, so if anyone reading this wants a free sample, let me know.

The peanut butter and jelly are a little bit messier then I had planned. I wanted to play around with stuffing the marshmallow.

On a different note, we finally had some decent weather. I was able to get some more gardening done. We took out a few dead trees and I now have a whole new area to plant in. I am browsing for pretty bushes and flowers. My little helper has been having fun helping me clear the new space. He likes using the grown up shovels and riding in the wheel barrel. :)

Going to head over to Etsy now.  

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Worms

I know this is a bit off the theme of my blog, but I just can't help myself.

My helper in my business is my son. As of this minute he is 2 years old, but he just loves to make candy and cook with me.

We were out getting our garden ready for planting today, as we finally had a nice day. While I was tilling the dirt, he was gathering worms. He started a worm play group. He showed them tricks, played games, fed them snacks, and made friends with them. He was SO excited. I even got a few education facts in there for him.

Ok- Mom moment over. Thanks for indulging me.

Rain

I have been anxiously waiting to get my garden in. I am so excited to use what I grow in my candy making and cooking in general. Sadly, it has been raining for over a week straight. One of the lovely perks of living in Western Washington. I excited for my herbs in particular. I can't wait to start using fresh lavender and Rosemary in my candies.

I am working on coming up with more flavors. One in particular, is a cinnamon roll flavor. I haven't worked out what I would use as the actual roll part yet though. We are going to road trip to cinnabon and do some research. I haven't had a cinnabon in such a long time.

I am also considering to the Out of the Box Easter egg hunt online at Etsy. I just need to decide what flavor Caramel to donate for the prize. Perhaps I will do some of the new flavors I have been wanting to make. Test them out this way. :) I am excited to do a strawberry shortcake marshmallow and a cereal marshmallow.

This week has been alittle slow for orders. I have been posting on Twitter and Facebook. The rain and being stuck inside is helping me focus on promoting that way.

I am very excited to be taking a chocolate class next month. I hope to expand my store after I complete it. It's a 9 hour class spread over 3 days. I am also taking a advance candy making class in May, which I am equally excited for. I think the classes should really help with my confidence in adding variety to the shop.

Well, that's all she wrote for now. I am looking forward to Sunday, our sunny day!

Until next week......

The Beginning

This is how my candy store became reality.

When I was laid off of my job in November 2010, I was looking forward to working on projects around the house, doing charity work, and having TONS of time with my 2 year old.

This was a good plan for a few weeks, until I realized I needed to do something to help bring in some money.

I had been crocheting, scrap booking, quilting, cooking, and chasing my kid around. Having the time to cook and bake was a new and wonderful thing for me. I found that it is something I truly love and have a passion for. So, I thought, that would be a great thing to do to make a little extra money. I can bake something and sell it on Etsy.

Then I started my in depth exploration of Etsy and what you can, or should I say can't, find. I wasn't too excited about cookies, cakes etc. I was worried about the freshness upon arrival, and there are SO many shops that do those things, and those shops are so amazing I didn't want to compete. :) The holidays were coming up, so I thought, I will try my hand at candy making.

My wonderful and supportive significant other was more than happy to be my taste tester, as he has a tremendous sweet tooth. I started with chocolate truffles. I had pretty good luck with them, but I have yet to get them a good size. I like to do things big, I am working on portion size.

My significant other gave me an amazing candy making book and I started to work my way through it. I wanted to make sure I enjoyed making candy before I started an online store.

I tried lollipops. Let's just say I need to work on that one. Hardened sugar is hard to clean off counters. Nougats were pretty easy to master, but with all the chocolate candies available on Etsy, I wanted to do something a little different and not so common.

That lead me to marshmallows and caramels. My step son loves marshmallows and eats them whenever he can have them. I really love making them. The flavors are limitless and I love watching them change from sugar to that actual mallow. Caramels are equally fun to make and I was able to come up with some great flavor options! The upside of these choices was there wasn't a ton of shops on Etsy selling them.

So, now that I had my product, I needed a name. Both items I would be making needed to be individually wrapped and both were sticky. The Sticky Wrapper was born.