For the Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n Makers’ Mercantile and RylieCakes Gluten-Free Bakery, a matched pair of Kent retailers, celebrate their first anniversary in business on March 1-2 at 18437 E. Valley Highway, Suite 102, Kent, owner Karin Skacel announced.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The craft shop offers lines of yarns, spinning fiber, fabric, buttons and bags. It has a crafter’s lounge, classrooms and meeting space for local groups, and offers its own classes, demonstrations, and guest appearances by noted crafters from around the world.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The gluten-free bakery sells made-from-scratch cakes, cookies, bars, breads, muffins and pastries, as well as a breakfast menu, coffee and beverages.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n “For 20 years, I dreamed of the perfect shop,” Skacel said, “a community place where friends could sit and craft and chat and have a cup of Joe with a sweet treat in comfort.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Makers’ Mercantile and RylieCakes Bakery have made a measurable impact on the retail market with customer traffic, classes, social outings, lively websites, blogging and social media activity.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The stores employ two full-time and nine part-time positions for residents of Yelm, Seattle, Burien, Kent, Renton, Covington, Tacoma, Enumclaw and Federal Way.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Rylie Haack, Skacel’s daughter, holds a finance degree and became a pastry chef at about the same time her mother planned to open the business.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n “Seeing the smiles our treats bring to customers, especially the kids, makes it all worth it,” she said.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Sharon Zientara, the manager at Makers’ Mercantile and a former magazine editor in the Denver area, was recruited after a national social media job search.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n “The moment I walked in the front door, I knew that if I could dream up the perfect craft shop, Makers’ would be it,” she said. “It was easy to say ‘yes’ to making this place my home.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The anniversary celebration is from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. March 1, and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. March 2.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Highlights include live demonstrations, make-and-take projects, and raffle prizes offered by both businesses throughout the weekend. Breakfast will be served both mornings from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Rylie Cakes.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The celebration also marks expanded hours for both businesses. Starting March 3, Makers’ Mercantile and RylieCakes will be open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Mondays.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Makers’ Mercantile and RylieCakes Gluten-Free Bakery, a matched pair of Kent retailers, celebrate their first anniversary in business on March 1-2 at 18437 E. Valley Highway, Suite 102, Kent, owner Karin Skacel announced.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":6204,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-6203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6203"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6203"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6203\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6203"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=6203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}