Gloucester Marathon

Well that's gone and done it, just signed myself up for the Gloucester Marathon in January! Timing right as part of my training for the Coast to Coast. If I can't run that distance by then....! 

Please sponsor me! It's all raising money for Children's Adventure Farm Trust

www.justgiving.com/cakenest

oh and before I forget I've set up a Coast to Coast Facebook page, well it did seem to be taking on a life of it's own! Please come and like it, your words of encouragement really are what keep me going!

Happy Birthday!

Helping NOTHS celebrate their birthday too!

It's official. We made it! This month marks two years that we have been in the business of fulfilling you cake needs! Come and celebrate with us. We have launched our new website now and will have so many things following to keep you amused it is unbelievable! This new site is about rewarding you more now. Coming very soon you will see our members section and this is all about you. You will be able to get your hands on some scrummy things just for you! 

Buxton Advertiser

So what has our first two years been like? A rollercoaster! If anyone had told us that we would be posting slices of cake nationally all year round, we would have thought they were having a laugh! If anyone had said we would be shortlisted for Not On The High Street's Make Awards, we would have been amazed. And if you had told me that I would be running 180 Miles for Children's Adventure Farm Trust I personally would have been dumbfounded! 

The biggest is thing is you our customers. Thank you for all the lovely feedback we receive. Without you we would truly be nothing

Buxton Advertiser

Ooooo here it is, my interview with Buxton Advertiser! What do you think?

www.justgiving.com/cakenest

We still need help finding a campervan for the time we are away. If you can help please get in touch 

01663 750447

or

info@thecakenest.co.uk

High Peak Radio

Today has been the day that I've been on the news every hour! Have a click through to hear what i've been saying. As I've said before I really need your help. If you can contribute in any way it would be warmly received even if it's just a few words of encouragement when you see me out training! Talking of which I've just been paying far too much attention to my training plan and am starting to wonder why I'm concerned by 180 miles. My training over the next 6 months will take me over 800 miles. That'll make it around 1000 miles in total! Again if you have any suggested routes around the High Peak area let me know, don't want to be getting bored!

Don't forget you can sponsor me at www.justgiving.com/cakenest

Thanks

Coast to Coast

This blog is a little different. As many of you know my charity of the year is The Children's Adventure Farm Trust. They provide holidays and activities for terminally ill, chronically sick, disabled and disadvantaged children from all over the Northwest. I chose them because they are a smaller charity, that many of you will not have heard of and because they are local to me. I try to do my bit for charity as much as I can and last year together with Mr Cake we raised £1400 for Action Medical Research, another fantastic charity.

This year has been a roller coaster of a year. The Cake Nest is growing fast but everyone knows that comes at a price, generally time and money. So I thought it was time to take a step back and reevaluate life. I made a promise to CAFT that they would be my charity of the year. When I said this I never meant it as a token gesture, I really wanted to help. They survive purely on donations as they get no statutory funding and play a vital role in many children's lives. So let's help offer this to more.

Ok, enough putting it off, you want to know what I'm going to do right? Well you have heard of a popular route called the Reivers Way? No? Ok the coast to coast cycle? Ah yes that's the one! 180 miles from Newcastle Upon Tyne to Whitehaven - before you correct me yes that's the wrong way round! However, I haven't said yet what I'm doing.... I'm running! Over the course of 2 weeks during Easter 2012 I will be accompanied by Mr Cake only on his bike. There to keep my spirit up and refuel me. The plan is to run 10-15 miles a day with the odd rest day but I will write again to let you know the details.

The catch is I still need support...! Do you know any b&bs along the way or great campsites that might want to put up with me (will probably be sleeping)? Do you live nearby or just fancy a run over to give me the lift of running beside me? Spread the word, let everyone know who CAFT are. Lastly do you have any spare change to donate? This is obviously important but isn't about donating your life savings, more like the pound you found down the back of the sofa. You know on twitter we have over 1500 followers, if you all just donated a pound what a difference that would make! Collectively we can bring a smile to another child's face.

So 2012 will be the year of the Olympics, bring it on, let's start it with a bang and show the world what we are made of!

Click here to donate

Click here to email me if you think you could help

thank you

Just So Festival

Hope you are all having a wonderful summer (even if it's a bit damp). We thought it was about time we told you what we had been up to! Last weekend was Just So Festival

time. A wonderful children's festival, where we enjoyed a weekend of fun and games in a beautiful wood near Leek, Staffordshire.

Our stall brought a selection of things to the masses including our new push pop cakes which went down a storm and our individually iced cupcakes. The kids loved this as not surprisingly most of them went for a mixture of coloured stars and popping candy on top.

Possibly the most exciting part of the weekend though were our cake eating competitions! We thought the children looked determined in the morning but that was nothing in comparison to the adults! The winners each won a months membership to our weekly cake slice club.

Have a look through their website to see all the delights the weekend brought and maybe even book your tickets for next year. We especially enjoyed the circus skills tent and the puppet shows.

And so you can enjoy a taste of the festival too we bring you push pops through the post! These are delicious cakes layered with buttercream and filled to the max for your enjoyment! Better still order anything from our website this weekend and we'll send you a box of cake balls free! See we think of you too! Don't forget you can order things for the future and we'll schedule them in so you can get a slice of the action now.

Quantity

x4 £8.00 x6 £10.00 x8 £15.00

Flavour

Chocolate Lemon Strawberry Mixture

If you would like to see the rest of our photos from the weekend we have loaded some on to Facebook

Food for thought

This week has been National Coeliac Awareness Week. This is something I feel is very misunderstood and sometimes seen as a fad. I am not going to go into what happens to someone who suffers when they ingest it but rather talk about how hard it is to avoid.

When you think gluten-free what springs to mind? Bread? Pasta? Pastry? Of course these all contain gluten normally but what you might have missed are sausages, soy sauce, stock cubes or cakes! Flour is put into so many things to stabilise, add thickness or simple bulk it up. The challenge set by National Coeliac Awareness Week has been to try for a day to go gluten-free and see how difficult it is. You will have to start with reading the labels on everything of course so watch out for your cereals and of course your toast is out of the question.  To help you though I will offer you a couple of recipes. They aren't mine but are well worth trying - lemon drizzle cake  and sundried tomato bread courtesy of BBC Good Food. Good luck!

Remember I do make gluten free cake just ask!