Cake4Kids: Delivering Smiles to PSCDC Residents One Birthday Cake at a Time
Partnerships play a necessary role in our ability to provide the services we offer in our communities across. Cake4Kids, for example, has been a very popular, and important, partner amongst our communities for many years. Their donations make holidays and birthdays unforgettable, and aligns with our mission to provide resident-focused services and foster a stronger sense of community.
Cake4Kids is powered by an amazing and compassionate group of volunteer bakers who donate all the ingredients and supplies to bake cakes for the youth in their own homes, and delivers their baked goods to community partners. They are dedicated in baking and delivering free baked birthday goods for underserved children who might not otherwise receive one. After starting in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2010, the organization has expanded its reach throughout California and opened chapters in San Diego (2017), Sacramento (2018), and Coachella Valley (2022) and has delivered over 40,000 cakes, cupcakes, cookies, and brownies to the youth. Cake4Kids volunteers never meet the children they support, but every baked good is custom-made for each child, and an enormous amount of love is baked into each one. Even though it is just a cake, the children they bake for knows that a stranger took the time and effort to do something special just for them.
Cake4Kids has prepared baked goods for our residnts in Sacramento, San Leandro, and San Diego for birthdays and special occassions. The communities at Willow Glen Apartments in Sacramento and Lakeside Apartments in San Leandro have been able to celebrate special occasions together over the years, thanks to the partnership with Cake4Kids.
"Once a month, I submit an online request for a cake or batch of cupcakes depending on what the birthday boy or girl wants," explains Haydee Pelayo Nuño, Lakeside Apartments' PSCDC Resident Services Coordinator. "They also bake goodies for special event occassions, and for Lakeside, I chose Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Cake4Kids brings smiles to our young residents, especially to the residents whose parents can't provide a birthday cake, or simply forgot. Residnts are just simply happy to be able to celebrate their birthdays with friends."
The charity that the Cake4Kids organization provides has helped in the "increasing feeling of self-worth among the youth they serve," said Willow Glen Apartments' PSCDC Resident Services Coordinator, Lupe Perez-Samaniego. "Not only do parents thank me for overseeing the process of getting them free a cake, batch of cupcakes, or cookies for their child, but I can see the appreciation in the children's huge smiles as soon as they see them! As their trademark states, they help us here at Willow Glen to deliver smiles to children one birthday cake at a time."
PSCDC deeply thanks Cake4Kids for providing special memories that our residents, and youth across California, will never forget. Cake4Kids volunteers, leaders, and the organization has helped many underseved youth get the attention and care they deserve. To see how you can help Cake4Kids continue their mission in serving smiles every year, consider donating to their cause, becoming a volunteeer, or partnering with them and make a child's birthday extra special.
