EXCHANGE: Family works to satisfy sweet needs

DECATUR, Ill. (AP) - Megan Mowry gave up her career as a registered nurse to bake cookies, cakes and cupcakes in her family business.

Although she still holds on to her nursing license, Mowry has put aside tending to newborn babies to satisfy the public’s appetite for sweet treats.

“It’s been good, really good,” Megan said of her new position, which she began in September when Mowry’s Baking Co. opened downtown. “It’s fun. I don’t ever feel like I’m at work. I don’t feel like I’m ever going to work.”

As she tops a batch of cupcakes with a frosting filled with pecan pieces and coconut flakes, Mowry said she misses some aspects of her nursing job, such as her co-workers and the moms and babies.

But there is something about baking she enjoys even more. She derives satisfaction from the responses customers have to the bakery’s products.

“I liked nursing, but I love doing this,” said Mowry, who also helped out when the business was located in the family’s garage during the past two years.

Although Mowry acknowledges that her mother, Holly, is the overall boss, it is clear that she is the head baker and her younger sister, Allison, is the chief cake decorator. Their youngest sister, Morgan, who has a full-time job working for an airplane manufacturer in Springfield, also helps on a part-time basis.

The Mowry family, which has been perfecting its recipes and improving its techniques for many years, includes three generations of bakers.

Holly, who began selling cakes she baked when she was 13, learned from her mother, who occasionally helps out at the store on North Main Street.

Allison, a senior at Millikin University, graduated from the Wilton School of Cake Decorating when she was 12. The next youngest student in her class was 27. Allison paid the $800 tuition with money she earned from selling almost 100 dozen cookies she had made.

Allison said she and Megan complement each other well. Megan likes to bake and decorate the cupcakes and Allison enjoys decorating cakes.

“We’re complete opposites,” Allison said. “We like to do what the other one doesn’t like to do. She’s very detail-oriented and I like to go with the flow. She likes to work early in the morning and I’d rather work late at night. I keep her from getting stressed out and she keeps me from getting too relaxed. So it all works out.”

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Source: (Decatur) Herald & Review, https://bit.ly/1oldujl