I know you’re all zoomed out, but I had to share one of the coolest (and scariest) things I have ever done in my life! I had been trying to plan something fun for Aja’s friends on the last day of school—like a Zoom “Nailed It” baking challenge—but honestly I was just too pooped (after reviving my YouTube channel) and it seemed too daunting. But that had already been percolating in my head—whilst we still had zero plans for summer (because like the rest of you all camps and trips had been cancelled)—when Aja said, “Mom, you should do a baking camp!” What?! Light bulb on! The next day I reached out to two friends—amazing fellow-bakers Beth Saltz (@BethSaltzRD) and Shani Dayan (@shanis_sweets)—to collaborate, and our four week Baking Camp/Contest was created! Within a week we had 22 kids, ages 8 – 17 signed up! This would all, of course, have been completely impossible without the expertise of my extremely supportive and brilliant hubby, Sam. (Who is pretty much ready to kill me now 😬) Sam set up my laptop/camera in front of my (giant) 27 inch monitor (love 😍) so I could see everyone clearly on one screen. I even got our sweetheart genius niece, Rachel, to help with a practice Zoom so we could figure out the logistics. (Because we all know how annoying a bad Zoom can be!) When one was teaching, the other two would be “spotlighting” anyone who had a question and switching between the teacher’s close-up and main cameras. We needed for them to really be able to see what we were doing and ask questions, and show us what they were doing. And more importantly to feel as if they were in the room with us; if they didn’t feel connected they might as well just be watching YouTube or TV. Luckily I already had experience teaching voice lessons on Zoom, but the thought of switching to the closeup camera and finding the right face/name/hand in time was terrifying. (Can you tell by the four pairs of eyeglasses below?) I had no idea how much fun the “producing” part would be! But to complicate things, I had Aja baking next to me (basically alone!) while I was either manning the Zoom or teaching. She has grown leaps […]
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