Fearless Me

Things I'm afraid of:

• Failure - oh, most definitely!
• New ventures

Why am I admitting this? Because I'm daring myself to try something new, come January. I'd try sooner, but I'd like to adjust to all the other new things in my life before I move on to something else. Besides, I'm great at planning things! And I'll need to plan this.

The best way to achieve international stardom is to spend 10,000 hours honing your skills, says the new book by Malcolm Gladwell. The greatest athletes, entrepreneurs, musicians and scientists emerge only after spending at least three hours a day for a decade mastering their chosen field.

I don't necessarily want to achieve international stardom as a baker, but I do want to be exceptionally successful. Exceptional enough that I can have my little bakery and have loyal customers and love what I'm doing. So I need to start spending time with my cake pans and mixer. Three hours a day. That's a lot of baking. Well, I don't have to spend three hours every day baking, but three hours devoted to my field.

So, here's my little plan. I live in family housing. Lots of families. Which means lots of birthdays. I'd like to offer to bake cakes for anyone who wants them. Just for practice. I'd just print up a calendar and let people sign up for their cake day - and write in their favorite kind of cake. I want people to say that it's the best they've ever had. I'd stick with seasonal ingredients as best I can. I won't do character cakes for kids - that's not something I'm interested in doing in the future. I don't even do it for my own kids! I want to do cakes like Miette and Vanilla Bake Shop.

So, crazy idea? Good idea? I'll move on to other things, but for now, this is what I want to perfect. I can make decent cakes. I want to make spectacular cakes consistently, without thinking about it.