Spring ? Summer - St. Margaret's Hospital

20 spring.summer 2009 | spirit
Baked
with Care
Cake maker Martha Lushina has been
part of Illinois Valley celebrations for
more than three decades.
When Martha Lushina decided to try her hand at cake
decorating, her only goal was to supply goodies for family
events. “I just wanted to make cakes for my children,”
she recalls. That was 37 years and thousands of cakes ago.
The owner of Lushina’s Cakery in LaSalle, Martha is
now making wedding cakes for a second generation of
brides and grooms. She also designs cakes to mark any
special occasion, from birthdays to anniversaries.
Martha got her start after taking a community college
class. Though she learned little more than how to create
borders and roses, it piqued her interest. With a Wilton
Yearbook (or as she calls it, the “cake bible”) in hand, the
mother of five was soon crafting cakes for her extended
family. Then she began to get calls from others who had
seen her creations.
For the first few years, she primarily made baby, birthday
and graduation cakes. Then, one of the graduates whose
cake she’d baked asked her to make a wedding cake.
That first cake turned out just fine, despite her “beginner’s
mistake” of preparing it the morning of the wedding, leaving
herself no room for error.
After that, her business grew purely through word of
mouth. “I’ve never put a dime into advertising or been in a
bridal show,” she says.
At her peak, she was busy baking and decorating as
many as eight cakes a week. “My kids could never sneak
in late, because I was up all night,” recalls Martha of
that busy time.