So, pre-pregnancy and before moving, I had this whole plan to get a cottage food license. I wanted to sell pies, bread, and homemade butter at farmers markets.
Which farmers market?
I have no idea.
I had not gotten that far.
Also, I’m pretty sure I can’t actually sell the butter under the cottage food laws, but that is a problem for Future Me because, at the time, I was very much in my entrepreneurial era.
The farmers market was supposed to be the starting point for a much bigger dream. My plan was basically:
Farmers market → café → bed and breakfast.
Because why stop at selling pies when I could eventually own an entire establishment?
I’ve worked in the hotel business, so the idea of eventually having my own bed and breakfast has always sounded amazing to me. I want to be both Sookie and Lorelai in this situation. I want the cute little café, the baked goods, the cozy inn, the quirky regulars, and apparently a life that sounds like it belongs in a television show.
And I Had a Whole Business Plan
The funniest part is that I actually had this planned out.
I had an entire Google Doc dedicated to the idea. Starting costs, licenses I would need, company names, what I wanted to sell, and all the other little details I had thought about.
And now?
Gone.
I have no idea where it is.
Because apparently I can remember a completely unnecessary piece of information from 2009, but I cannot remember where I put the document containing my potential future business.
Digitally, I am somehow still disorganized.
Then I remembered that I had told my niece she was going to be my financial partner.
I wanted her to be the money person while I handled customer service, recipes, and basically everything else. By the time I actually got to the point of opening the café, she would probably be somewhere in the middle of college or possibly finished.
And honestly, now that I’m pregnant, that timeline makes even more sense.
The cottage food laws only allow you to make around $30,000 a year, depending on the specifics, and while $30,000 sounds great in theory, that is not exactly café money. Equipment alone can cost a ridiculous amount of money.
So I always saw the cottage food business as the first step. Start small, sell at farmers markets, figure out what people actually like, build a customer base, save money, and eventually turn it into the café.
Then the café becomes the stepping stone to the bed and breakfast.
Again, apparently I do not know how to have a normal hobby.
Apparently My Niece Was Listening
This is where the story gets funny.
On my niece’s first day of school, she apparently wrote on her board that she wanted to be her aunt’s financial partner.
And I was like, “Which aunt?”
And she said, “You.”
And I just stood there thinking…
Oh.
Yeah.
I did say that.
I completely forgot.
She did not.
Apparently this child has been sitting there mentally preparing for her position in my imaginary future company while I’m over here trying to remember where I saved the Google Doc.
I love that she actually remembered this conversation because I genuinely meant it when I said it. I just apparently did not expect her to remember it better than I did.
So now I guess I have a financial partner.
I just need to find the business plan.
Somehow, somewhere, there is a Google Doc containing the blueprint for my future café and bed and breakfast, and I am determined to find it.
Blame it on the baby brain. Blame it on everything that has happened this year. Blame it on the fact that I have apparently been trying to plan an entire business empire while simultaneously preparing to have a baby.
But I really need to find that document because apparently my niece is already taking her future position seriously.
At least one of us is organized.
