Baking for a Cause

Virginia-Highland resident Anna Sargent simply wants to help innocent victims of the recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan.

Sargent, 28, searched online and around the neighborhood for an opportunity to raise money to help children in devastated areas that are unable to receive the care they need.

“I had read on the news all of the things that are happening over there… I was just so devastated and heartbroken,” Sargent, who has lived in the neighborhood for almost three years, said in an interview with Patch.

When she only found bake sales at local elementary schools or ways to donate money through local businesses, she decided to put together an event of her own.

“I just thought, what if I have a bake sale?” she said.

In an effort to get the neighborhood involved, she emailed a few friends and posted her idea on a neighborhood email group.

The overwhelming response was far beyond what she expected.

“I got so many responses that I was just blown away,” she said. “The community has completely helped me.”

Mark Basehore, general manager of on N. Highland Avenue, offered space for Sargent to hold the bake sale, “,” on Sunday, April 3, from 12 to 2 p.m.

Neighbors volunteered to post flyers around the neighborhood and donate baked goods, and several local businesses including , and Highland Bakery donated food for the bake sale.

“Just to be so supported by the community when half of these people don’t even know who I am… I am just so excited,” she said.

From cupcakes to cookies, Sargent will have a wide-variety of goodies for the whole family, including dog treats that were donated by Big Daddy Dog Biscuits and Taj Mahound.

All of the proceeds from the bake sale will be donated to Save the Children, a nonprofit that helps children and families in distress.

Sargent said she chose Save the Children because it specifically focuses on the needs of children.

Sargent, a nanny for two boys in Ashford Park, said it “broke her heart” to think about them “not having food or water or a house,” and the idea for “Bake for the Quake” was born from there.

She has no personal ties to Japan, but just wants to help in any way she can.

“If we could just give maybe 200 dollars, I would be so happy… but it’s looking like it’s a lot more than that,” Sargent said.