12-year-old with severe Epilepsy is turning baking into a career!!!

Photo by Suzy Hazelwood from Pexels

A family who helped during the Knysna Fires started a crowdfund to help daughter reach her dream of owning a bakery someday!

Knysna, Western Cape – Kiera-Leigh, aka Kiki has a passion and talent for baking. She hopes to someday become a professional baker with her very own bakery. However, Kiki isn’t your average 12-year-old, she has complex petit mal epilepsy meaning that she has between 50 and 300 seizures a day.

Kiki’s condition means she can’t attend school, so she is homeschooled as there are no special needs schools in her area. Being home means that she gets the chance to bake and it has helped her thrive.

“From little, she has loved the kitchen. She has gotten very into baking and the change we see her is amazing.  Now we need to be able to get her all the right kitchen equipment”

Not only does her passion for baking make her happy but it will give her a real chance at having a job someday. Kiki’s mom stays home with Kiki to provide her with the best possible care which means they have to live on one salary. The family was one of many affected by the Knysna fires in 2017.

Kiki’s dad is self-employed and lost many customers after the fires. This makes Kiki’s dream a little harder to achieve as things at home are tight. Kiki’s mother Doné wants nothing more than to see her daughter learn a skill that will secure her future.

“It was always a worry that we had on how Kiki was going to be able to support herself when she is older as we are realising that she will never have the ability to be educated formally. Since we started baking at home, it has opened a whole new world for Kiki. She has found what she loves doing. 

She loves mixing and painting the moulds, seeing how ingredients work together, why certain things need to be added, etc and then waiting in anticipation for it to be ready to see how it turned out.”

Doné would love to supply Kiki with all the tools needed to advance her skills so she set up a crowdfunding campaign for her daughter in the hopes that people would help Kiki too. Kiki would love to buy a variety of chocolate moulds and needs a dedicated work station where she can create her beautifully baked goods.

So far she has mastered how to make Sweetie Pies, Chocolate Logs, Peppermint Patties, Rum Truffles, Butter Biscuits, Marshmallow Eggs and Easter Baskets.

People have already started contributing towards the fund and one donor, in particular, was very thankful for the help she received from Kiki’s family, repaying the family’s kindness with her own.

“Hi Kiki, I briefly met you after the fires when your family distributed donated sandals to my daughters. I pray that this dream of your becomes a reality! May your path be blessed! Amy” – Amy Venter

For those based on the Garden Route, you can support Kiki’s little home bakery here.

Sources: BackaBuddy

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