sweets in nebraska

So many things have been going on lately I hardly know where to begin. Michael, my brother-in-law, has inspired me though, and one of my new year's resolutions was to journal more, or at all! So, here goes nothing--will be nice to have something down to record my "journey" as it is, as well! Okay, brief history, or my story up until now...I am a 42-year-old mother of 3, ages 5, 4 and 8 months old. I have been in the restuarant/food service business pretty much always--love it, miss it, as I am a stay-at-home mom right now. We just cannot afford childcare! Anyway, I love to bake, think I am good at it and think people will buy my stuff so I decided to get a kitchen licensed and start selling to other businesses. This way I do not have to worry about a retail front at this stage of the game--can basically bake when I have time (at night when kids are finally asleep) and can hopefully establish a bit of name recognition, etc so that when my wee ones are bigger I CAN open up a retail/dining establishment. Anyway, I found a tiny little building that is perfect for what I want it for and I have been paying rent since October 2007 without having it open. My husband said he would help me get it ready and he moved much slower than I originally anticipated. So, here I am in March 2008, totally broke, and my kitchen is all ready to go but I cannot afford to have the inspector come look at the place. It will run about $200 and I, at this point in time, do not even have money for gas in my van--a very sad state of affairs, I must say! I am going to talk to a couple of local coffee shops to see if they are interested despite my lack of official license--its all there, ready to go, built to the inspector's specs even! Like I said, just cannot afford the $200 until I have some sales! Very much a catch-22, eh? I'm going to work on some samples today and plan on taking them with a copy of my latest menu tomorrow. I have found that with food, you definitely need to get people to taste it. Even if what they are tasting isn't exactly what they're looking for at the time, they will get an idea of what you are capable of, so my first batch of samples is going to consist of double-dutch chocoalate scones, carrot cake scones, cinnamon pecan swirl coffeecake, a sugar cookie shaped like the state of Nebraska, a blueberry muffin and a big, ol' cinnamon roll. That should give them a great idea of what I am capable of! I'm pretty excited. I'll just keep shoving samples down everyone's throats until someone will give in and start buying my stuff!! I also need to get out of the house soon. I've been baking way to many new recipes and sampling them myself too often. Keep it up and I'll have to be fork-lifted from this house-yikes!