The Bake Sale
I picked up my cute little 14 & 18 year old cousins (who I haven’t seen for 13 YEARS…) from school & brought them back to my house to spend the whole afternoon baking. Both are going to Taiwan for their first missions trip this summer & both need to raise about 2k. I was so happy. & I thought: well, why not do a bake sale? Why not catch up & bake together? I hardly get to see either cousin, & well…catching up while baking espresso brownie bites can’t get any sweeter.
I’ve made hundreds of espresso brownie bites (for my lovely sleep deprived studiomates), so I thought making 4 batches with them would be manageable (88 for them to sell their friends at school, 12 for me to feed my third year friends dying in the worst design charette of their lives) I had my 10 lbs of flour (5 lbs left),3 lbs of butter, 3 cans of cocoa powder, 24 oz. of chocolate chips, 1.5 dozens of lg eggs, my huge bottle of homemade vanilla extract, & my huge can of ground hazelnut espresso all ready.
After I picked them up from school, Emma, my 18 year old cousin (who when I last saw was about 5 years old) updated me that she just got accepted to USC’s School of Architecture. “I really… don’t know how I got in…”
I laughed, because I also felt & still feel the same way about getting accepted to USC’s architecture program She really, really wants to come & asked me for financial aid advice & about my experience studying architecture at USC. I suggested her to politely reach out to the financial aid committee & to show how passionate she is about studying it at USC. Our conversation flashbacks me back to me 3 years ago, when I had the same questions as she did: ”What’s dorming like? Where should I live? What about grades? I’m a slow learner… it’s hard isn’t it? …I don’t know…”
& I just told her about how great the learning experience is at USC. The struggles we have to endure through just brings us so much grace. & oh..the goodness of the Shop Cafe & coffee vending machines by the studio…
& then she told me…“I don’t like even like coffee….”
& I laughed….”Oh, you will. Believe me, I didn’t like coffee either, but you will. You like tea? Yeah, you’ll drink even more of it. & you’ll start liking & drinking coffee too.”
& we laughed together as she cracked the eggs in & I beat the eggs into the brownie batter.
It was a long,but lovely day. We baked for about 4 hours together & I dropped my 2 little cousins back to their church. I hugged them goodbye as we honestly don’t know when will be the next time we see each other. But I am so happy to see how they’ve grown. I am so happy to see Emma take good care of her little sister & our overall cousin-cousin relationship. Even though our parents & families have so much animosity against each other (that hinders us from meeting together), we’ve learned to love God & do anything to talk, see, care & pray for each other. I am so fortunate for my cousins. Thank you God.
