March 1st – March 31st 

*Win Our No Kid Hungry Cookie Jar*

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How It Works:

Tickets are $1.00 and can be purchased online by

Clicking the Donate Now button below and donating $1.00 (or more) to Team Cookie Central

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On April 1st my super cute children will 

Draw the winning raffle ticket out of our trusty 

No Kid Hungry Water Jug.

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The drawing will be filmed and posted on our

YouTube channel, here on our Bake Sale Blog,

and heck while we’re at it the Cookie Central Main Site too.

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100% of your donation will support Share Our Strength’s efforts to ensure children at risk of hunger have access to the nutritious food they need to live learn and thrive. 

I love to eat, but it’s not just about the food.  It’s about the company kept, the conversations had and the memories made while sitting down to a meal.  Sitting down with my own children, reminds me of when I was young.  My mother frying chicken on the stove top, NPR playing in the background, the smell of the white rice cooking at every meal.  We were – we are – fortunate.  Sure there were, and are still, plenty of nights full of fighting children, burned vegetables and absent family members.  But as I look back I realize, the majority of my fondest memories revolve around the meals I’ve shared with the people I love.

Picture: flickr.com/photos/paghababian

A Nation of Food

If you can picture yourself in a room filled with tables of food prepared by the greatest restaurants in your area then congratulations, you have officially made it to Taste of the Nation.  This culinary benefit to support Share Our Strength’s efforts to end childhood hunger in America began back in 1988 as most things do, with a small group of restaurants (25 to be exact) coming together to share their love of food and wine in the hopes of making a difference.  A difference they made, raising nearly $250,000 in a single day!  Taste of the Nation has since raised more than $75million and has blossomed into a nationwide movement with nearly 40 events scheduled to be hosted across the country (even one in Canada!).

Share The Love

Picture: funandfearlessinbeantown.blogspot.com

My first experience with Taste of the Nation was one of glorious overindulgence (as was my second and soon to be third).  I found myself eating things I never thought I would, things I never knew existed and things that I just couldn’t help but go back for seconds, thirds, fourths, fifths (yeah, I’m talking about you Wit & Wisdom).  I implore anyone who loves food, GO!  Get a couple of friends, go on your own, rent a party bus and bring everyone….but go.

Find An Event Near You

*Sharing Your Strength* is not just for adults  

Cookie Central’s Great American Bake Sale is creeping up on it’s 4th year and I would like to take a moment to highlight two of the most important people in our campaign – my little girls Jazmin (10) and Mia (5).  From the very first bake sale they have been such a driving force.  From lemonade stands to mini flash mobs, these girls have not only taken part but motivated their friends to help as well.  It’s a true testament to how well even the youngest child can understand the hardships hungry children face each day.

It’s Not Just My Kids!

Growing numbers of children and young adults are eager to help in the fight against childhood hunger in America.  And now, with the help of  Sodexo Foundation,  Share Our Strength has released No Kid Hungry 2 and has embraced Share Our Strength’s mission to end childhood hunger offering a one stop site full of resources, ideas and inspiration for any young person to make a difference.

This portion of the No Kid Hungry 2 website is all about fun easy ways for the elementary school aged child to get involved. Find tool kits on how to collect Coins for Kids, sell Share Our Strength donation pin ups, host a bake sale (my favorite) and so much more.

Leaders Tackle Hunger

This portion of the No Kid Hungry 2 site is perfect for teens, providing tools to build momentum online using Facebook and Twitter as well as great fundraising/awareness raising ideas like The Food Stamp Challenge and (another favorite of mine) The Flash Mob.

As Always, Thanks For Reading! ~ Michele

In & Around Town:

Bake Walk For No Kid Hungry

The Great American Putt Putt

Glow Ball Night

Also Welcoming Back:

North Andover’s Craft & Sheep Shearing Festival

North Andover’s 4th of July Celebrations

Great American Golf Tournament

Online Promotions:

On A Completely Separate Note:

Hitting The Pavement
The table didn’t last but 5 minutes.  The RV lot stayed pretty barren on our end, so we took the show on the road and hustled for No Kid Hungry.  I am a genius for bringing baskets with handles and having this guy as my right hand man for the night was a HUGE plus! Many thanks to Dave for a job well done and really embracing the No Kid Hungry Message!!

I want to note, if strength.org saw a huge spike in hits between the hours of 6-8, it is most likely because I had to show practically everyone I spoke with that:

Swag In The Stadium

We brought it!  Whether or not we made it on the tube is another story… Either way, Team No Kid Hungry made it’s presence known inside and out of Gillette and hopefully we reached even just a handful of people.

Pick Of The Night
At every bake sale I always come across that one person.  Someone who really listens and will leave to make a difference. A chance encounter, during a brief altercation with a man who had been bitten by a camel (blog for another day) was how I met Chad.  Not enough good things I can say about the conversation we had, but let’s leave it at – this guy gets it!  Chad, if you happen across this blog, I hope you make it to Taste of the Nation Boston and can’t wait to introduce you to the hubby!

Taste of the Nation Baltimore

For those of you who read our post about Taste of the Nation Boston, you very well know The Cookie Lady is all about gorging…and gorge I did!  Of the 20-some participating restaurants, I spent the most time with Wit & Wisdom where I ate enough maple custard with caramel sauce and vanilla crumble to put the entire room into a food coma. My hubby and I mixed and mingled with the incredible people like famed chef Timothy Cipriano,  Eve Lee, host of the Great American Bake Sale at Phillips Healthcare, Bill Wooldridge one of Share Our Strength’s Cutting Edge Scholarship Program participants and many, many more.

TOTN Baltimore Had A Photo Booth! 

see the entire flicker stream here

What an absolutely GREAT idea!  People could hop in the booth, snap a couple pictures and bring home a No Kid Hungry keepsake.  The pictures were also projected on two large screens during the event…some information I could have used before hoping into the booth .

Conference of Leaders

This was a weekend full of such inspiration, such education and such passionate people, but I realize my attempt at writing about the entire conference in an itty bitty little blog post would be feeble at best.  That said, I would like to hilghlight two of my favorite portions – Cooking Matters and the Getting Personal With No Kind Hungry session.

Cooking Matters – Share Our Strength’s food education course that teaches families, teens and individuals how to prepare healthy, delicious food on a limited budget – staff and volunteers were prominent throughout the entire conference.  To know that Share Our Strength offers a program to help parents and children really work with what they get (which, too often, is very little) is fantastic.  There was a lot of discussion about nutrition and food insecurity and this is a phenomenal campaign that helps families face challenges they may encounter.  I especially love that Cooking Matters is rocking it out up here in the northeast!  Check out the Cooking Matters home page for links to downloadable tool kits, finding a program near you and getting involved.

One of my favorite sessions, Getting Personal With No Kid Hungry, was interactive!  Led by Amy Crowell – Director of Great American Bake Sale & Grassroots Fundraising, this session gave me the opportunity to meet Aleta Greer, woman behind Coins For Kids, hear from Jackie Price who started hosting bake sales at 14 and has since raised over $10,000(WOW!), and brainstorm with other session participants on how to expand, better and evolve Great American Bake Sale.  GABS is a campaign that, obviously, I love!  To have the chance to hear other participants feedback was awesome and there is much that I will be taking away and utilizing in my 2012 campaign.

10 Things You Missed At Share Our Strength’s Conference Of Leaders 

Blog Post By Clay Dunn

Other Awesome No Kid Hungry Links: Get Local, Best Practices

5 Fun Off Topic Facts About My Weekend: written by me

• Occupy Baltimore has approximately 15 tents
• If you stay at Days Inn Inner Harbor you get a bag of microwave popcorn…and a microwave
• If you take the escalators down from the ballroom in Renaissance Inner Harbor, you will not be able to get back up without walking around
• Fred got pulled into the airport security box on the way home
• We were on the same plane as Billy Shore (heading to Baltimore) and Jason Santos (heading home)

WOOOOOO!!!

I am honored and humbled to receive Share Our Strength’s 2011 Great American Bake Sale Leadership Award!  Please find Share Our Strength’s press release with the names of all 17 award winners HERE

Again, WOOOO!!!

Very Special Thank Yous To:   

Our Campaign Sponsor – BJ’s Wholesale Club of Haverhill, MA

The Ladies of Great American Bake Sale – Amy Crowell, Jessica Bomberg and Sylvia Vidal

Twitter Peeps That Really Helped Spread The Word – Ty Sullivan, John Scroggins, Amanda Hite, Joel Owens, Jamie L. Simon, and Steff Childs

Facebook Peeps That Did So Too – Carolyn Kolowsky, Brian Gardner, Monte Tareski & Steve Presley, Herbert Chao

The Friends of Kevin Radio Show – Especially Kevin Willet

My Little Girls – Jazmin & Mia

My Parents- Who show up at every event

My AWESOME Husband – who I now owe $10

My daughter’s 10th birthday is October 13th and now that she’s a little older, she has decided to ask for one big present rather than one big party.  Wondering what she asked for?  A Kindle of all things!  And oddly enough, this is exactly the prize for Share Our Strength’s Great American Bake Sale’s Take Your Best Shot Contest!!

Why Vote “Team Cookie Central” Today?

Just look at that face….

 **VOTE TODAY**

*Join The Fat Baker Club*

**During the month of October, we will donate your entire membership fee to Share Our Strength to support their efforts to fight childhood hunger in America*

It is great customers like you that keep Cookie Central running! As a way to give back we now offer The Fat Baker Club, featuring free monthly giveaways, discounts on all your orders and a complimentary gift basket when you sign up. Check out the Fat Baker Club Blog to learn more.

Yearly Membership Includes:

5% off All Your Orders For The Entire Year

One Compilmentary Gift Basket

Automatic Entry Into Our Monthly Giveaways

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Share Your Holiday Basket

If your like me, you’ve alerady started your holiday shopping, possibly having some of the presents wrapped and ready to go.  So for all you early birds, here’s a preview of what basket specials we will have available for 2011.  What makes these basket that much more special, is that each is attached with a Share Our Strenght holiday gift tag, letting your friends family and client know that you too are making a difference.  Wth each basket sold, a $10.00 donation will be made by Cookie Central to Share Our Strength and support their efforts to fight childhood hunger in America.

Friends Basket

Family Basket

Gourmet Basket

Our Take Home Bags & Centerpiece

Month’s of planning and within a day our 1st Annual Great American Golf Tournament is over.  For all of you out there dancing to the sun gods, many thanks! We were graced with a gorgeous 80 degree day with lots of sun and the day’s events from registration to saying farewell went off without a hitch. Together we raised about $3,900! (final total to be determined by the silent auction results).

Thank You To All Our Wonderful Players

Methuen Fire

Comprised solely of friends and co-workers, the field of players for our tourney was just outstanding.  It was our goal to create an event that people would enjoy and look forward to each year.  To see so many supporters join us for our first ever Great American Golf Tournament was heartwarming and motivation to revisit the event in 2012…which is already in the works!

 To Our Wonderful Volunteers Thank You!

We could not have done it without you!!  A big fat thank you to Mandy and Abbey who did an unbelievable job throughout the whole tournament, Lisa of LI Designs who took most of our pictures and my mom Sharon who helped get things rolling at registration.

I’d also like to send a very warm thank you to Dennis McCarthy of Lazarus House Ministries who, even though was not on the volunteer roster, showed up (twice) to donate his time.  What incredible support!

To My Wonderful Husband Fred

Like I mentioned on The Friends of Kevin Radio Show, “It always seems to start with Fred…” and without a doubt, this golf tournament was all Fred.  He got the golfers, ran the games, he made the speech at the reception, heck* he even came up with the idea!  To have him hop on the bake sale band wagon with me and be so excited about doing it all over again next year is phenomenal.  We have truly become a family fundraising for No Kid Hungry…and that’s just plain awesome.

To Our Wonderful Sponsors, Vendors & Donators

1st Hole

KBK Sports who hosted the silent auction and whose founder is the VP of The Lowell Spinners.


Blast Mixer Smoothies, Lemonade and Skinny Alternative Energy Drinks for hosting a table at the registration area and making a charitable contribution to our tourney.

Click Here For The Full List of People Involved

 
A Big Fat Thank You to Merrimack Valley Golf Club!  

The View From Registration/Clubhouse

 Awesome, awesome people!  I showed up well before I was expected (a habit of mine) and was greeted by the most exceptional staff.  From the help with set up to coordinating the tournament, these guys were top notch.  We heard from just about every golfer that the course looked incredible and played well.  Merrimack Valley Golf Club

Incredible Food From Simply Elegant Catering!

Breakfast’s Coffee & Pastry Table

Simply Elegant Catering provided us with the most incredible guy -Andrew- to manage the meals served at our tournament.  He bent over backwards for us and was a great addition to the tournament staff for the day.  Sam and Michele were very accommodating and really made a huge impact on the success of the day.  Also, they donated all the left over food from the tournament to Lazarus House Ministries’ emergency shelter.

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Other Fun From The Day

1, 2, 3…Shoot!

Carts were driving around the course offering samples of wine, scotch and tequila. I know, I know- It sounds like a bad idea, but the golfers loved it!

Posing for the camera

Bobby (right) and my wonderful husband Fred (left)

No, we’re not kidding.  This guy actually shot the worm….

The Putt Off

Our 11 Finalists

The Peanut Gallery! Or should I say hecklers.

Dennis Gillespie, who didn’t make the $5K putt (sorry Dennis!)

Great American Golf Tournament

8:00 Shotgun

Monday, September 26th

Merrimack Valley Golf Club

Methuen, Ma

Below is a list of all our wonderful sponsors, participating businesses and raffle prizes donated.  So many thanks to everyone involved!!

Register Here……Volunteer Here……Donate Here

Have an awesome day everyone!

Tournament Winner Prizes

Haverhill Country Club Foursome

Bradford Country Club Foursome

Merrimack Valley Golf Club Foursome

Raffle Prizes

3) Adobe Photo Shop Elements 9 (Donated by Bill Sahlas)

$75 Gift Certificate to Burton’s Grill

3) $50 Gift Certificates To The Loft (Donated by MerchantCircle)

Ticket to Taste Of The Nation Boston 2012

$50 Gift Certificate to Independent Tire

$100 Gift Certificate to A Great New Look

Dinner for Four from The Meat House

2) Lube/Oil/Filter Changes at Trombley Bros., Inc.

Pizza Party from Stachey’s Olde-Time Pizzeria

4 Passes to LaserCraze

One Month Membership to Choice Fitness

Starbucks Gift Basket

Ice Cream Cake from Mad Maggies

$35 Gift Certificate to New England Seafoods

$25 Gift Certificate to Atkinson Country Club

$25 Gift Certificate to Jamie’s Restaurant

$25 Gift Certificate to Palmers Restaurant

$25 Gift Certificate to Outback Steakhouse

$25 Gift Certificate to T.G.I. Fridays

$25 Gift Certificate to Mexico Lindo

$20 Gift Certificate from Stop N Shop

$25 Worth of Free Product from Cedars Foods

Hole Sponsors

 Auclair’s Auto Body
Auto Spa Car Wash
Bada Bing
Bada Boom
BJ’s Wholesale Club of Haverhill
Body Works Auto Body
Boles Funeral Home
C & D Auto Glass
Durso & Jankowski Insurance Agency
Global Glass
Jamie’s Restaurant
LaFlemme, Barron & Chabot Attorneys At Law
LI Designs
Merrimack Valley Corp. Climate Design Systems
Merrimack Valley Property Maintenance
Methuen Fire Department Local 1691 (2)

Mike Condon Councilor at Large

Polar Bear Insulation

Ron Marsan Candidate for East District Councilor

The Sweetheart Inn

The Wonderful Businesses Involved

Gardner Graphics
The Swamptones
K & K Floral and Design
Jungle Stuff
Lounge 59
Chuckles Comedy Club
Boston Auto Glass
Merrimack Valley Golf Club
Bj’s Wholesale Club

Did you know we ran a promotion for Great American Bake Sale’s National Baking Week August 29th-September 4th?  If you answered “No” you are not alone!  While we had three of our lovely customers participate by joining our new rewards program The Fat Baker Club, all of us here in the Cookie Central kitchen think that we can do better.  With that said, get ready for the month of October when we will be revisiting our Fat Baker Club/National Baking Week promotion.

During the entire month of October we will be donating 100% of all the membership fees for The FBC to our Great American Bake Sale campaign!  Have plans to thank your clients with our corporate baskets, send a few gift baskets to friends and family, or order some of our wonderful decorated cookies?  With the holidays coming, everyone can benefit from the 5% discount, free cookie basket and monthly giveaways.
Subscribe to our blog.and check out The FBC Blogger page for updates.

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Cookie Central on The Friends Of Kevin Radio Show

That’s right folks, we hit the airwaves to promote our upcoming golf tournament and talk about Cookie Central’s 2011 Great American Bake Sale season.  A special shout out to WSMN Radio and the incredible Kevin Willet, founder of Friends of Kevin and host to the show! Make sure you check out some of our other YouTube videos we have posted.  PLEASE NOTE*** The Cupcake Wars audition video is not suitable for all audiences.  There’s your disclaimer, consider yourselves warned

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Great American Golf Tournament 

“Driving For No Kid Hungry”

Well, it’s getting close people. Plans for our tourney are rolling right along and boy do we have some awesome prizes!  Tourney winning teams will each receive a foursome to one of three local golf clubs. Raffle prizes range from restaurant gift cards to Adobe products.  We will be joined by Lowell Spinners VP for a silent auction of sports memorabilia.  Whiskey and wine tasting will take place on the course and don’t forget the incredibly awesome band we will have during the reception (Dinner & A Show tickets are available for non-golfers).  Needless to say, it’s going to be an amazing event, BUT registration closes this Friday. So if you are coming, register now!!

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Do You Dine Out?

September 18th marks the beginning of Dine Out For No Kid Hungry.  Restaurants will will support Share Our Strength’s efforts to fight childhood hunger in America by offering specials, gifts and promotions from 9/18-9/24.  This is a nationwide event that many of your favorite restaurants may already be involved in, so make sure you check out the Dine Out Map to see who’s participating in your area.

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Excuse Me While I Take Off For……

It’s that time of year and Cookie Central will be closed October 14-18 as we attend Share Our Strength’s Conference Of Leaders and Taste Of The Nation Baltimore.  I’m thrilled to say that I’ve been nominated for the 2011 GABS Community Leadership Award…and not by my mother (whoop, whoop!).  I can only imagine I will be pouring out a whole boat load of tweets during the conference, so if you would like to follow along please follow me on Twitter.

As always, thank you for reading! ~ Michele Gorham