The Pickwick Baking Co.

There is so much in a name.

The Pickwick Baking Co. What's in that name? Many many layers of circumstance and coincidence. And happiness. And hard work.

The short explanation here is that Pickwick is the name of the street we live on. And....this is a baking company that will someday hopefully become a bakery. There you have it: The Pickwick Baking Co.

A million (7) years ago, when Bill and I first moved to Marblehead, we were lucky enough to live in an AWESOME little place downtown. It was the best introduction to Marblehead we could have asked for. It was our first home, the house we lived in when we welcomed our first child, where she said her first words, where she took her first steps. We were very happy there, in that little house, next to the harbor, in our sweet little town.

Not long after we welcomed our second child, the house became a little....too small. We needed more space, and so we had to move. I was reluctant to leave downtown, but our need for space won out. We looked at what seemed like every available house in town (thank you, Krista). And not one was right. On a whim, on a Friday, I drove by a house we were scheduled to see the following day and noticed out in front of the house next door, a little For Sale by Owner sign. Desperate to get a look at anything that might work, I parked the car and grabbed the last listing sheet in the little plastic box next to the for sale sign. Then I called our ever patient Realtor, and asked if she could help get us in to see the house.

We did see it. And we fell in love and tried to play it totally cool so we wouldn't show our hand, but really we loved the house so much there's no way it wasn't written all over our faces. It turns out that the family selling the house were planning to take down the for sale sign the day after I drove by. The listing sheet I pulled was the last sheet they were planning to print. If not for the chance drive by to preview an entirely different house, we would have missed this house entirely.

We bought the house, and we'll never leave. At this point, it's about so much more than the actual house, it's the street, it's our community, but the house was what brought us here. We're so lucky.

This kind of happy coincidence is so typical for us. Bill and I tend to stumble into all sorts of wonderful situations (like moving to Marblehead in the first place, but that's another story entirely).

Going back to school to become a pastry chef is something I've dreamed of for so many years, it's hard to count. Ok, ten. I've dreamed of this for ten years. But I was working, and then Bill and I got married, and we started our family, and welcomed our four wonderful children and I was lucky enough to be home with them, and I never really felt like the timing was right. It was always, "in a couple of years" or "when the kids don't need me to be home any more."

And then fate stuck it's foot out again and we had a flood in the house and we lost our kitchen for what felt like an eternity (but what was actually 5 months), and in that time when I had no choice but to step away from the kitchen I got feisty and antsy and it became abundantly clear that NOW was the time. And I know enough to trust that sometimes you have to follow the lead you're given.

And I applied to school. And I was accepted. And here we go.

If not for the happy coincidence of finding this house, on this street, with our wonderful friends so close by, and all of the support I've received from friends and family alike, AND THEN THE KITCHEN FLOOD, I wouldn't be doing this now.

So. The Pickwick Baking Co.