TOLEDO, Ohio — Jera Stewart of Jera's Heavenly Sweet realized her dream of owning her own bakery about five years ago. Her daughter Brianna Stewart is a master decorator.
"We make our own fillings. We make our own frostings. We make our own whipped cream even," Jera said. "Everything we do is from scratch."
At the bakery on Bancroft Street near the University of Toledo, the pair serve up cookies, scones, cinnamon rolls, pie... "We do cake balls. We do brownies. We do a lot," Brianna said.
Anything sweet you can imagine.
Jera and Brianna want to do more. "When God blesses you with something it's not just for you to hoard. It's to share with someone. It's to do something, but what can I do with a bakery?" Jera said.
So Jera and Brianna had the idea to make birthdays special for kids in foster care. They are now baking and decorating cakes, just for them.
"They get to put their favorite colors. They get to put their name. They get to put any hobbies that they have," Brianna said. "So then me, as the decorator, I get to sit down and think of, 'what can I do to try and convey this image of what they have in their head of what they like?'"
Jera added, "One young man said today, 'you get a trash bag with your stuff in it and you're moving and you're here and you're there. You never get a birthday cake with your name on it.'"
Jera said she just wants to make sure kids know they're important and they make the cakes without meeting the children.
"Because we're dealing with children, they have to be anonymous so we can know only their first name and that's it," Jera said. "But we know whenever the cake goes out, we're believing that it's going to bring joy."
It's possible thanks to some community fundraising that began two years ago but was halted because of the pandemic. Jera's Heavenly Sweet provides the cake at cost.
The first cake was delivered last week.
"We heard back from the foster family and the cake was really good and really pretty and the child just loved it," Julie Malkin with Lucas County Children Services said.
Malkin said this effort means more than the bakers can know. "For a child who's going through a tough time, that's really important. That makes them feel like they matter to somebody. They were important enough to have their name put on a birthday cake."
If you'd like to help with this effort, you can make a donation through Friends of Lucas County Children Services.
Lucas County Children Services is in need of foster parents. Training is held virtually and in person. You can learn more here.