Watching paint dry

We finally have the keys to our bakery, all ready for fit-out which should take a couple of weeks.  It is tiny, as you can see above, but it's ours! It sits in the middle of a boatyard and we share the new building with lockers, offices and the local chiropractor. It's directly opposite the entrance to the largest yacht charter harbour, The Moorings and it is in the 'up & coming'  little area of Wickhams Cay II which is slowly converting from workshops and yards, to trendy shops and offices.

Double blue doors, to left of Tylers white Nissan

Starting with the big oven this week, all the baking equipment is arriving on-island over the next few weeks. I'm currently driving around with a 200 kilogram  Hobart mixer in the back of my car and our garage is now crammed full with stuff for fitting it out.  I've designed the shop fittings and counter and we're whittling down thousands of recipes for the baked goods and homemade goodies.  We have a small fridge for cakes, a good coffee machine and a large blackboard for daily specials. The main thing is the bread however, which will be baked on the premises - sourdoughs, pain de campagne, gluten-free, wholewheat, rye and ciabattas to name a few. We hope to have a 'soft' opening in Mid-June, provided that everything has arrived and some staff are in place, but that still feels like next millennium and not next month.

Big Baby in New York, pre shipping

A colleague (based in Kiev no less) and I were swapping rude emoticons on our internal instant messenger a few years ago, and he was bemoaning our fate chained to the corporate grindstone and I suddenly announced that I was going to run away and open a bakery on a Caribbean island.  I think he even sent me an emoticon to the effect of "dream on" and "hahahahaha good one" (this was before the days of ROFL).

Several years on and here we are, about to give birth to our little bakery. As we enter our final trimester, there is a now a sense of urgency to get all the other stuff finished up before the arrival takes over our lives. Today is a bank holiday and Tyler is busy painting the guest room for our Summer guests and I'm sorting out toys in amongst reading cookery books, pinning a few pics, looking at packaging to order and drafting some ideas for a potential biweekly column I may be writing soon (oohh yes!).

Another big push for a month or so will have us happily ensconced in both our completed home and the bakery. The kids will be on their long Summer holidays and another year would have passed, making it 2 years on August 28th since we arrived on this rather scruffy third world volcano and its eccentric island life. 

For now, we're not even feeling the Braxton-Hicks's yet (not to be confused with our neighbour India Hicks) but I think life is just about to change fairly dramatically for les Famille Dawson.

Since I think everyone is now officially bored to tears with the prolonged gestation of our bakery, I'll write about something else next week until the happy announcement. 'What to Expect in the First Year' probably.