May 20, 2025 • 43 mins
Tanya is a hairstylist who decided to bake some cakes for some firemen. And next thing you know, she’s baking over 450 cakes a year for firemen on their birthday! We cannot wait for you to meet “The Cake Lady”.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey, everybody, it's Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks.
And we continue now with part two of our conversation
with Tanya Ray Piper, right after these brief messages from
our general sponsors. So this first year, somebody's telling you, okay,
(00:28):
it's November. Pick the one. These are the three guys
who have birthdays, Three men or women who have birthdays
in November, and you just start making cakes. I just
thrown a.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Cake and I dropped it off at the front desk.
So probably six months in, one of a little volunteer says, oh, honey,
my back is bothering me so much. Could you just
take that cake back to the kitchen for me. I
don't want to watch it. It was a ways from
the front desk area back to the kitchen. I make sure.
So I took the cake. I dropped it off on
(00:59):
the kitchen encounter, I'm halfway down the hallway and literally
surrounded by nine men in uniforms, Hey are you the
cake lady?
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Oh you're kidding. They had no idea where it was
coming from.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
No, I mean, and that's that's my I mean, my
license plate says cake lady. I am the cake lady.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
That's how you became cake lady.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
That's how because of them are you or the are
you the cake lady.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Looking over here, Belda? But the logo, sir, that is hilarious.
I have a small one for you, the cake Lady.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
I am the cake Lady.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
You're like officially a cake lady with your own environment
sticker and everything.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Yeah, I had one of my clients. I brought you one.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Thank you very much. I love that. It says Kindness
Breeds Happiness Jeremiah twenty nine to eleven thirteen. And it's
like the crust that you see on the side of
a fire truck, and instead of it having like department
number or house number or engine number, it just has
(02:08):
cake Lady on it. In the kitchen aid mixer center
of it is a kitchen mixer, which is hilarious. I
love it all right. So they say, hey, are you
the cake Lady. You're surrounded by nine guys.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
And he says. One of the guys goes, not that
we mind. We love what you're doing, but why are
you doing it?
Speaker 1 (02:27):
That's a good question. I was going to ask the
same thing, and.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Well, you can't say, well, God told me to because
then they think you're crazy, right, So I said, I
like to bake what you guys, What you guys do
on a daily basis is amazing, and why not bake
for you instead of the women that get mad at
me when I'm baking for I'm at work, So that
in my mind that was why I was doing it.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
That kind of makes sense. But the thing is, you're
standing on your feet all day doing hair. Then you
go home and you're standing on your feet and I know,
I've seen that cake cannot be easy to make and
it's really good. I mean how many hours. I mean
you're working your butt off doing those and then you
(03:11):
got to deliver them, I guess before work. So you
work all day, go home, make cakes all night, wake
up early, deliver the cakes, and then go to work.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
It's a lot, it is, but I love every minute
of it. Why so at the time, I just thought
it was a fun thing to do. My year was up.
I finally got a routine to where I knew when
the guys were working I had, I got the number
to the station I could actually talk to each individual.
(03:45):
Now with the administration stuff, it was about sixty eight
cakes a year, which sixty cakes a year.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
That's like five that is, that's a little more than
five a month.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
There's yeah, it was.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
First year.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
The first year I did that. When my year was up,
the guys go, hey, your year's up, what are you.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Going to do?
Speaker 2 (04:07):
And I said, no, I just got my system down.
I mean, I have a routine. I'm really liking this,
so no, I'm not going to quit, so I am.
That went on for about six years and then there
was a merger happening with Lindwood Fire Department and department
(04:28):
called District one and District one in Linwood were merging
and it was going from my two lin Wood stations
and sixty eight firefighters to fifteen stations in three hundred
and fifty firefighters total.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
So now you got to choose do I? I would say,
now you have to choose.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
So, because I'm a hairdresser, occasionally there's some of the
guys will come in and get a haircut. One of
the guys he's a battalion chief now and he was
one of my lin Wood guys, and he goes, Johnny Ray,
you were the topic of conversation in our last meeting, Like,
oh lord, that does not sound good. He goes, yeah,
when we merge, we were talking about if we're not
at fifteen, were at station fifteen, we're not going to
(05:10):
get cake anymore. I'm like, Devo, what are you talking about.
Of course you'll get cake. I said, I don't care you.
He goes, No, you can't do that. That's too much.
And I'm like, don't tell me what to do. I'll
do whatever I want. And I started thinking, I'm like,
(05:30):
I just I like to challenge myself, and I thought
this might be kind of fun to see. I thought,
the baking part is not going to be a problem.
I can do that, but the delivering I wasn't sure
how I was going to do with the delivering before work?
Speaker 1 (05:43):
Can we get clear we're talking three hundred and.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Fifteen, three hundred and fifty firefighters, not that. Yeah, yeah,
sixteen stations and yes, three hundred and fifty firefighters.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
That was then, and when did the start?
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Six years ago? Okay, now I've been baking for fourteen years.
I now bake for sixteen stations, four hundred and fifty firefighters,
plus all the girls at work, and last year I
made five hundred and ninety eight things.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
That is in sane I'm slightly crazy. Yes, yeah, so okay,
that's a that's a what kind of cake did you cream?
That's a cookies and cream cakes? Which is which is
(06:36):
a bun cancake cream and cookie icing, which is it's
really really good. M's stick my finger in it when
this is over again. But what other what.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Kind of I mean no, I have made things I've
never heard of before, like a peanut butter ducoa, what
is that? Opera cake layer, Russian honey cake.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
Okay, they're getting spoiled. If these if these guys are
now ordering up these kind of cakes from you, they
are spoiled. So I have I would be like, you
get the cake. I'd be like the cake Nazi, you know,
like the soup Nazi. You want soup, you get the soup.
You want cake, you get this ca. I mean I
would actually tell them let them eat cake the cake
(07:23):
I make.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
But see that that's that takes the personalization away from
it they want.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Well, I'm of course being facetious. It's just unbelievable that
whatever they want, whatever.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Cake, it doesn't have to be cake. I make cookies, cheesecake, pie,
you name it, I make it. If I've never if
I have never made it before, I find a recipe
and I or I like.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
That coconut cream pie.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
So now coconut cream pie. If it's a large station,
it comes in a nine x thirteen pan because it's
feeding nine men and not. I can't just take them
a little pie because it wouldn't be enough, So gosh,
double in and make it big.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
So some of the stations have eight to nine. The
majority of the stations are three men stations.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
Do you before you deliver a first time cake, like,
make a prototype and taste it before you send it to.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
Half of them I've never tasted. I just hope it's
okay if I've never made it before. McCay, could you
give me feedback and let me know if that was okay?
Speaker 1 (08:23):
Do these guys get there and like the guy's birthday
or the lady's birthday who is four gets a piece
and everybody has just devours it? Oh? Yeah, do you
have the fattest group of our people in the United States.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
When I get there, the guys are coming out of
the gym, they're all sweaty, and I'm like, oh, you're
getting ready for cake?
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Yeah? Sorry.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
They give me a hugger. Sorry, I'm sweaty man. It's okay.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
So you are now making about six hundred cakes pause
what ever a year?
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Yeah, I mean for firefighters for about just over four
hundred and fifty. I do one cake or cookies or something.
For the administration. There's about fifty in admin. So once
a month admin get something. When they had their own mechanics,
once a month of mechanics would get some because you know,
they're all part of the thing that buyer service. They
(09:24):
all make it happen.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
You've been a hairdresser for so many years, and I
imagine you have a massive loyal following and make a
great living doing it. There's some expense here, and I
mean just a few months ago, eggs doubled, so there
had to have been a lot I was, I bet
that was. I mean there's a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Oh and I do a cookie of the month for
the clients at the salon too, of course you did
I do. Yeah, last month was scotch Us because there
was no eggs.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
What about the I mean, so got to be expensive.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Honestly, Bill, have no idea how much it cost me.
I don't want to know because it will probably have
a heart attack. The thing is when God tells you
to do something, the means to make it happen. Always. Always,
I don't ever go without anything. I always have what
I need.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Do you get donated as anybody?
Speaker 2 (10:22):
Now? The Union occasionally will give me money, which is
wonderful but not expected, so I don't ever count on it.
They hadn't given me money in about three years, and
this last year they gave me a check for six
thousand dollars, which was very helpful because I needed a
new oven because mine was worn out.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
So that's unbelievable that you make that many cakes and
deliver that many cakes. I mean, this is a you
were taking care of an entire county full of fire people.
Don't they have big, big kitchens in these firehouses?
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Oh yeah, I cook in them all the time.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
How does that work?
Speaker 2 (11:00):
So in the beginning it was just cake, and then
you know, you get to after this many years, I've
built relationships with a lot of these men and women.
That cake is just the catalyst. Cake so much more
than cake. So Thanksgiving every year, I choose one of
the larger stations and I go in and I make
(11:20):
the full Thanksgiving dinner for them, so they can invite
their families and be with their families at Thanksgiving. I
usually have about twenty to twenty five people that come,
and I cook in their kitchens. They have amazing kitchens.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
You're telling me. The guys that have to be on
shift during Thanksgiving, you go and cook for them and
their families so their families can come join them at work,
so their families are able to be together and have
a genuine Thanksgiving dinner together.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
Yes, every Thanksgiving. That say for COVID, they wouldn't let
me go in they didn't care, but the administration said no,
I couldn't, so I had death.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
That is phenomenal. You have to have an entire community
of people that adore you.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
So I'll tell you a story. After COVID, Arcelon was
closed down for three months and I came back to
work and I don't do well sing idle, so I
but I told my boss. He said, lindsay, I just
want you to know I'm never going to retire. I said,
(12:33):
I'm just going to die here, and she goes, please
don't die here, and I said, well, I have been
told that if I collapse, to call nine one one
and say cake lady down, and there'll be eighteen trucks
here to revisement. And they're not kidding Bill. They said that,
(12:54):
and he said, he goes, if anything ever happened, you
make sure you say cake, lady down. I'm like, how
are you going to know? They said, anything that comes
from a nine one one call, it will come through
their little pagers. So if somebody actually said cake, lady down,
it would come through the pager, they would know that
there was a problem with me, and they would all
(13:15):
be there. And he was joking, but he goes, yeah,
there's cake to be made.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
We'll make sure. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
So the South County Fire is the name of the
stations that I work that I beg for. They have
a seventy six percent success rate and all cardiac events,
which is phenomenal, number one in the nation. So they
(13:46):
say it's because they have such a good morale because
of cake. I'm pretty sure it's because of their training.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
It sounds like it's a part of just the entire
culture altogether. Will be right back. So I read a
story that you made a cake for somebody's birthday who
(14:15):
happened to not be on shift, and they came back
and you asked them how they liked their birthday cake
and they said they didn't get any, so he made
them another one. Yeah, what happened to the crew ate it?
Speaker 2 (14:30):
They are ruthless.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
They're ruthless on the cake.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
So this is the stories that they tell. There can
be one hundred dollars bill sitting on the counter for weeks,
nobody will touch it. One of my boxes shows up
and that's gone. At the cake now it has That's
why the logo is important, because there's a lot of
people that will bring things to the fire station and
(14:55):
the guys will go, yeah, we saw their kitchen. We
just kind of put that in the garbage. We've been
in their kitchen and we're not going to eat that.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
You want. Stole once told somebody that was interviewing you
that when a new firefighter or when it came up
some five rider told you that cake was the last
thing they need.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
So that when I when I the merger first happened,
I had one of my battalion chiefs from Linwood took
me to all the other stations and introduced me as
the cake as a cake leader to let him know
what I had been doing for Linwood and that so
I wasn't some That's why I like to have a contact.
(15:43):
So I'm just not some random person showing up with
cake or calling up and saying, hey, you have a
birthday coming, what do you want? And like, who's the
crazy creak lady? Right? So Chief Vanderpoolt took me around
to all the stations and we went to one station
that was it's in a rougher area where they see
lots of lots of stuff and they're there also the
(16:05):
ones that if anybody anything shows up, they pretty much
will not keep it in the kit. It will get
tossed because.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
I can't trust unfortunately.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
So one of the guys looks at me, and so
the attitude there's it was a little bit painted, I guess.
So one of the guys says, cake.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
Hairs cake.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
He kind of walked away, and I'm.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Like, you need cake, you need cake, you need cake?
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Yeah, and you know what ca I go to that
station now and I walk in the door, and you
know what I get? Yeah, that attitude is.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Completely different because they needed cake, they needed cake.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
I go there a lot actually was there. They invited
me for dinner last week. Well, one of the guys
needed the chief needed a haircut, so it's like, hey,
can you come and cut my hair? We'll make your dinner. Sure,
And I bring.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Cake, so of course.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Although cake is very literal here also metaphor clearly as
talking to you, I'm starting to understand that cakes appreciation,
cake is love, cakes, thanks, cake is honoring cake is
(17:31):
cake is so much money cake you think these firefighters
families understand.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Do you know how many times I get messaged on
Facebook or Messenger from moms or wives or family members
saying thank you so much for taking care of my son.
I wasn't there to do it because they're not. They're
either because they're at work.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Sorry.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
I didn't know how much what I do was going
to make a difference when I first started, So when
when I was just making for Lynnwood. Now I tell
them all the time that they saved my life, and
(18:19):
the majority some of them know the whole story, the
majority of them don't. So September of twenty eleven is
when God told me to bake for firemen. The end
of October that same year, something happened that I can't
(18:40):
tell you details, but it turned our family upside down.
And because I had committed to making cake for firemen.
When when you have something that causes trauma in your life,
(19:04):
our first response is to curl up in a ball,
wallow in self pity, feel sorry for ourselves, and just
give up. But because I made a commitment to make
cake for firemen, I couldn't wallow in self pity. I
couldn't feel sorry for myself. I couldn't just curl up
on the ball and say forget it. I don't want
(19:25):
to deal with this because I was making for firemen.
So it gets you out of your own head. When
you're doing something for someone else, can't feel sorry for yourself.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
The third thing we talk about all the time on
the show is so the massive one million dollar payoff pitch.
When you actually commit on a long term basis for
the right reason to employing your passions and discipon scenarios,
is you get a thousand times more out of it.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Oh so much, I mean, And they're like, oh, it's
too much, it's too much. I'm like, no, it's not,
because at that time it's God knows what we need
before we need it. And when he told me to
bake cakes for firemen, I had no idea what the
next few years were going to be And if I
hadn't been doing that and I had that focus on
(20:21):
something else, I couldn't, I wouldn't have had the strength
that I needed to get through that tragedy in our family.
So many I mean I look back now and I'm like,
there are so many things that fell into place, and
I'm like, oh, that's why that happened. I mean, I
(20:43):
went through a divorce in two thousand and nine that
woods devastating. I lost everything. I lost my home, my car,
I had my two dogs, my clothes, and a dresser,
and I moved in with my parents at fifty years
old and Ember standing there. And I had been proud,
And I mean, that's probably one of the biggest problems
(21:05):
with my pride, that I had done all of the
things that I did not without God, because I knew
that he was the catalyst to everything. But I had
done it without a husband. I had done it on
my own. And then because of being married and making
choices that I knew better, left me financially destitute. So
(21:25):
I had to file bankruptcy, lost everything. And I don't
know if I don't know if it's the same everywhere,
but when you file bankruptcy in the state of Washington.
You have to call consumer credit counseling and they're supposed
to tell you how to get out of debt. Well,
I did that, and the lady goes, oh, honey, you
just need to walk away. Can you just walk away
and move in with your mom and or your parents?
(21:46):
And I'm like, really, you're supposed to help me get
out of this, and she says, just walk away, and
I'm like, so here, I am fifty years old. I
move in with my parents, with my two dogs, my clothes.
I didn't have a car. I had to give the
car up in bankruptcy too. I had nothing, and I
was the one where everybody lived with me. I was
(22:06):
the one that took care of everyone. It was not
easy for me to rely on someone else, humbly, very humbly.
So I remember being in the guest room of my parents'
house that was already furnished, so I didn't even have
my own bed, and I remember standing there going, Okay, God,
(22:31):
I'm going to choose to be content and where you've
put me. And a year later, I started baking cakes
and I looked back and I owed my parents a
lot of money because of the divorce, and so to
pay them back. My mom and I were at a
family reunion and somebody said, well, how are you going
(22:53):
to stay with your parents? And I said, well, I'll
until I get them paid back. I said, but you know,
I'm the girl. I'm the one that's going to eventually
end up taking care of them. So I kind of
like living with my mom. So who knows. Mom goes, well,
we really like having her there. But she took the
guest room. We don't have a guest room anymore. I said, oh, well,
(23:14):
we'll just build a guest room on the back of
the house. And she goes, oh, no, no, no, we
do anything. We're building a master suite and I said, okay, fine.
So we had started that the summer before before I
started baking, and I built a nine hundred and fifty
square foot edition on the back of the house. That
(23:35):
was my mother's sanctuary. Her it was, it was all
it was for her. So but when I look back
at all this stuff, I'm like living with my mother,
well my parents at the time. My dad' said a facility.
Now But I I can look back and I have
(23:57):
no regrets. My relationship with my mother we're best friends.
I mean, as you can see, I take her everywhere.
Everything happens for a reason. And if I hadn't listen
to that voice about baking for firemen, that year would
have been completely different. All that time of transition would
(24:20):
have been completely different when they merged. When the two
companies merged and it went from sixty eight firemen to
three hundred and fifty firemen, my Facebook friends changed a
lot too. And I realized that suicide and cancer are
the two biggest causes of death, and first responders had
(24:44):
no idea that suicide was an issue. And I'm thinking,
I remember looking at a feed where two men not
from my department, but in a close area that had
committed suicide. Firefly said, committed suicide, And I'm thinking, but
did they know Jesus? So I'm sorry. I'm doing this
(25:11):
because number one, because God told me to, but because
I know the morale of the station changes when cake comes.
The chiefs have called me and said, hey, Tanya, the
guys had a tough call. Can you bring cake? And
it's not about bringing cake, it's because I am a
(25:31):
comfortable person. I am like the mom, I'm I'm the
firefighter mom. They can talk to me. They'll open up
with me. I talked to a chaplain that worked in
a neighboring city and that goes to our church, and
I said, okay, when they asked me to do this,
what do I say to them? And he says, time,
(25:52):
you have to think of it as like a balloon
that's about ready to pop if you can just let
a little bit of the air out and just give
him a little bit of relief so they can go
on to the next call. So I'll be sitting at
the stations and They'll ask me for dinner, and I'll
sit and talk to him and say, Okay, how do
you deal with what you see on a regular basis? Well,
(26:13):
dark humor and alcohol, Tanya, Well, and how does that
work for you? Well, it doesn't work.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
And so.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
The culture has changed a lot in the past five
years to where they're recognizing what these men see on
a regular basis. They have facilities now that they can
go and they can get help for PTSD. And I
can tell you story after story after a story of
where I've been in a position to where I can
talk to someone and help them with stuff that they've
(26:47):
been going through. I talked to one of the guys
and he says, you know, you think about people in
the military, if they're actually in war and they're on
the front lines, they'll do that for year, four years,
if you know, or in the military for a certain
amount of time. He goes, we do this day after
(27:07):
day after day for years. They get over one hundred
calls a day in the area that I that I
bake for. There's some stations that they're I mean NonStop.
There was a call right after I started baking for
(27:28):
the Linwood Fire Department and it was fourteenagers on graduation
night that were out and there was a semi truck
that was parked on the side of the road that
had trailer hitch. They were drinking. They ran into that
hitch and decapitated the first two kids and killed the
other the kids in the back seat instantly. And my
(27:48):
guys had to go to that. They have to see
that all the time. During COVID there was a lot
of suicide, teenage suicide, and these guys have to go
and they they have teenage kids. That was one of
the calls that the chief called me. There was a
fifteen year old girl who committed suicide and the medics
(28:09):
that went to that call a teenage kids and they
it's devastating to them. So when I the cake is
a catalyst, it's a catalyst to build relationships with them
where I can call them up and say, Hey, I'm
going to come and make dinner for you guys tonight
and just sit and talk.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
It's so much more than cake.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
It's so much more than cake.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
We'll be right back. I'm sitting here listing dolls. Oh No,
(29:00):
ought to pull back. I'm going to do a pullback
on you already.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
It's a professional talk that I've learned recently, and I
make myself a little disgusted using the term, but insupport
your dad he did this his whole life as a
fire off a fire or EMT. But he made the
same calls these guys made, or worse sometimes. But the
(29:30):
point is, you know we got to hear from your mom.
You know that he kissed her good night and goodbye
every time and wouldn't even take out the garbage out
kissing her, and that there was always this recollection that
there was danger in what your father's professionals and only
say all illustrate this point. It is clear you're making
(29:53):
some little bright spot in an otherwise difficult day from
many of these firefighters and EMTs also their families. You're
not just affecting the firefighter. You're affecting the firefighter and
the downhill side who they also deal with some of
(30:14):
the same trepidation and fear, or at least little thoughts
that you guys dealt with when your father went off
to work. They're dealing with when their love. So your
outreach to all these fire people is actually exponentially larger
because these families know that even in the depths of it,
(30:37):
every once in a while at work, my love the
one's going to go to smile because of this crazy
cake lady.
Speaker 2 (30:45):
Well, and then they get mad because the wives never
get any They're like, they never please.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Don't add please, don't add wives to the list. You'll
never get any sleep.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
No, I know that that's not well, I do. I mean,
like some of the guys. One of the guys, his
wife has turned fifty and so I made her take
for a birthday.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
I mean, it's unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
There's never two there's there's never not enough time for cake.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
I guess you don't even have a website or anything.
You just do you You say it like it would
be disastrous for you to have a website for what
to show what you're doing?
Speaker 2 (31:29):
Well, I mean I post, I post everything on Facebook.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
People find you on Facebook? What they do?
Speaker 2 (31:38):
Just my name? Well Instagram is I'm SCF Cake Lady
sc SCF South County Fire Cake Lady, all.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
Right, and on and on Facebook? Is just your name? Right?
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Okay, is with the middle or just just Tanya.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
I think it's Hanks and Piper because it was my
maiden name and married names.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Okay, all right, say it again.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
Any Ray hankson Piper which.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
You can found on Facebook, otherwise known as the Cake
Lady from South County Fire. And there's a bunch of
guys with you in the picture.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
Oh that was my birthday. They showed up at the
salon with flowers.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Tanya Ray has earned her name as the Cake Lady
by baking and delivering birthday cakes for all of our
firefighters at fourteen stations throughout the year. Today, firefighters surprised
her at work with flowers and wishes for a happy
birthday coming up on Sunday. And it's a picture of
a bunch of fire guys standing behind you at Sibawitz
or whatever the place is called that you do it
(32:42):
Zuberans know that, and they're all just grinning like cheshire cats,
And there you are in the middle of them, smiling.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Happiest salon is kind of right in the middle of
the territory. So because they whenever they get a call
close to the salon, they just have to stop, buy
and say and grab a cookie.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
That's hilarious. People listening here, go to Facebook and Instagram
and check out what she does. And if you cannot
be inspired to understand that something as simple as making
a cake can change in entire communities. When I say community,
(33:26):
not the city, the community being the fire and EMT
and first responder communities outlook, I love the metaphor. It's
like a bloom full of air about to pop, and
you're not going to extinguish the whole bloom. But if
you just let a little pressure off that, just a
little way out, that the stress on the bounds of
(33:49):
that bloom aren't so strong. And metaphorically, folks who deal
with what these first responders deal with. After a while,
that balloon gets really ready to pop. If you just
let a little air out, and a little air could
be in lending in ear talking. But you know what,
just smiling and getting your inner child self excited about
(34:11):
a birthday cake, something as simple as that. Do you
allow yourself to appreciate the difference you're making these folks loves? Oh? Yeah? Good?
Do you do you see yourself ever quitting? No? Uh
huh no. No.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
I will quit baking when I can't bake anymore, just
like I'll quit working when I can't work anymore. I
love what I do in all aspects of it. My
mom always says when people ask her, when people ask
me if I if I you know who helps me?
I'm like, my mom makes sure the kitchen is clean
when I get home.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
That's it, because, okay, Bill, our kitchen it's a two
butt kitchen. You can't get any more than I mean,
if you're back to back, you're going to run into it.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
It is.
Speaker 2 (35:00):
Or yeah. And when they see the size of my
kitchen and what I do in that kitchen, they're like.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Really, do you have a double oven?
Speaker 2 (35:07):
No? I don't have room for right.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
All right, here's the deal. This is a call out
to people in the Seattle Edmunds, Washington area. You realize
what this woman, this crazy cake lady Tanya is doing.
It would only seem appropriate that one somebody reached out
to their Facebook or Instagram, it maybe offered a month's
(35:32):
worth or you're worth of eggs. But the other thing
is when you're making six hundred cakes a year about
it's my guess, it's that my mouth right, all right,
that's an averager to today. I would imagine a double
oven would be helping.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
So I went to when I had to buy a
new oven, we have a place called this Homers recycle.
Speaker 1 (35:55):
Yeah that over the year's got some miles on it.
Speaker 2 (35:57):
Well, the old one, yeah, I mean it was per
oven okay, yeah, but I mean it did pretty well.
So when I went to go get a new one,
I went to this recycled place and I brought him cookies.
The owner how to make friends and influence people. Yeah,
what was the second time I went in? And the
(36:17):
first I had gotten one and it was not It
didn't work very well and it wasn't cooking evenly. So
I took pictures and I said, his name's Dave. I said, Dave,
this isn't working. Goes Oh well, that's unacceptable. Cake lady
can not have an oven that doesn't bake evenly. And
so he set me up with like a five thousand dollars.
(36:42):
It's a gas confection oven. I mean I can have
an app and turn it on from work if I
need to. It's fancy, way fancier than the first one
I had picked out, which was nice. But and I said, so, hi,
that's fine. How much more? He goes, Oh, no, so
I got a five thousand dollars.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Who's this guy? We gotta plug it.
Speaker 2 (37:03):
I don't know his last name. It's Dave at this
Homers recycle Scratch and Dent place.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
I love that guy.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean he was awesome. And
so for nineteen hundred dollars, I got a five thousand
dollars brand new and had a little scratch on the
side that nobody sees.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
So perfect. Yeah, but it's one well yeah, but.
Speaker 2 (37:25):
It's a confection has three racks. I can I can.
Speaker 1 (37:28):
Bake three cakes at once differently, well, not.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
Three cakes, but I can do two cakes. And I
can do like three trays of cookies at a time.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
And also, so, yeah, anybody listened to me in Seattle.
Think of the good she's doing for the first responders
out there. Reach out to her. Buy eggs, buy flour,
buy more pans. She has her favorite spoon, she travels
with it, So don't worry about that. But something else,
you know, a little bit of support for you would
(37:59):
be appropriate. I think for what you're doing for everybody
in your community, you're an inspiration. You're also hilarious to
hang out with. I bet the fire people love it
when you just flop down and hang out.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
Oh yeah, we have a lot of fun.
Speaker 1 (38:15):
I bet you did. Alex, you have anything to say
to Danya before we go? I think I'm good. How
about you, Tanya? Is there anything you think we've missed
that you'd like to cover?
Speaker 2 (38:28):
Oh? Do you want to see?
Speaker 1 (38:30):
Yeah? I want to see. Tanya's got a fire department calendar.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Not firemen, it's fire trucks. Just so you don't think
that I got a bunch of half naked firemen on
my calendar.
Speaker 1 (38:43):
Oh I see, it's not that kind of fireman. It's
a fire truck calendar. Got it. Yeah?
Speaker 2 (38:50):
So this now, this is all my mother. I am
a tech tard. I do not do computers whatsoever. So
I have a spreadsheet for every month. This is this
month's fireman.
Speaker 1 (39:02):
Okay, one, two, three, four of fives?
Speaker 2 (39:06):
Yeah, thirty six she total? Is it at the bottom,
so I know what I'm doing.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
This is a list color coded of thirty six uh
people and their data birth, their rank and their shift.
And can I read one of these people's names? It's
a second on May six, Tony Mace and Corey Dow
(39:34):
you're up. One of you is in plane field and
one of you that's a.
Speaker 2 (39:39):
Different fire Oh yeah, pain Fields and fired. I kind
of adopted them on top of the other. They're at
the airport and they're all alone and lonely.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
And so Tony Tody Pace at Painfield and Corey Dowe
at ten b on five to six? What what are
we cooking? These people?
Speaker 2 (39:57):
So then then I write it on the calendar.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
So this is on neked Fireman calendar with our trunks by.
Speaker 2 (40:05):
Tony Mason is getting carrot cake on the seventh at Paynfield.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
All right, what's Corey?
Speaker 2 (40:12):
Well he hasn't responded yet.
Speaker 1 (40:14):
Wait no, there he is right there, German chocolate. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
So that's my deliveries for that day, and my deliveries
for that.
Speaker 1 (40:21):
Day that is on.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
That's just the beginning of this month. I just started
texting them for this, but this this was last month.
Speaker 1 (40:31):
Smokes Alex. You need to put this on on social media. Yeah,
hold it up. This is this is the that is unbelievable.
Don't don't move. We got we got blueberry Chris, we
got red Velvet Coffee, cheesecake, Baba Cakes, arawberry cake, something, monster,
(40:57):
monster cookies, oh, monster cookie on cookies, chocolate can, banana cheesecake.
Holy crap. There is every kind of cake on earth.
And I don't know why you don't open a bakery,
but I think, yep, there we go, because that's It's
(41:17):
not about the money for you, is it. Yeah, it's awesome. Tanya.
Thanks for being a memphisis is a great story. I
loved telling your story. And somebody in the Wash area
reach out to this woman's helped support her. She's doing
amazing good for a lot of good reach out from anywhere,
and all of you first responders that have to be
listening to this on behalf of Tanya. Thank you for
(41:41):
your service, thank you for what you do, and in
the very very most still way, I hope you eat cake.
Thanks a lot for being every time.
Speaker 2 (41:51):
You're very welcome.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
Thank you all right, let's eat some more cake, and
thank you for joining us this week. If Tanya rap
Piper has inspired you in general, or better yet, to
take action by baking cakes for firemen or someone else
in your community, or making a cake for your favorite
podcast host so he can dive in with his fingers
(42:13):
and his face only, and oh my gosh, that cake
was good. Did you get any I did, But her
intention was not for you to use your fingers. That's
not why she brought it. It's the best wait to cake.
You dive in with your fingers and you just scruff
it down your face, your curit email. If the cakes
for yourself is what most listeners are thinking right now,
well that cake was for me, wasn't it. I mean
(42:34):
the rest of us were going to have something too.
Get your own podcast show and maybe someonell cook you
a cake. But that was my cake and I loved it.
It's awesome. So anyway, if don your Apiper has inspired
you to do any of that or something else entirely,
please let me know. I'd love to hear about it.
You can write me anytime at Bill at normal folks
(42:55):
dot us and I promised I'll respond, And if you're
sending a cake, I'll give you my address. And if
you enjoyed this episode, share a friends and on social
subscribe to the podcast, rate and review it. Join the
army at normal folks dot us consider becoming a Premium member.
There all of these things that will help us grow
(43:17):
an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney. Until next time,
do which you can
Hey, everybody, it's Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks.
And we continue now with part two of our conversation
with Tanya Ray Piper, right after these brief messages from
our general sponsors. So this first year, somebody's telling you, okay,
(00:28):
it's November. Pick the one. These are the three guys
who have birthdays, Three men or women who have birthdays
in November, and you just start making cakes. I just
thrown a.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Cake and I dropped it off at the front desk.
So probably six months in, one of a little volunteer says, oh, honey,
my back is bothering me so much. Could you just
take that cake back to the kitchen for me. I
don't want to watch it. It was a ways from
the front desk area back to the kitchen. I make sure.
So I took the cake. I dropped it off on
(00:59):
the kitchen encounter, I'm halfway down the hallway and literally
surrounded by nine men in uniforms, Hey are you the
cake lady?
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Oh you're kidding. They had no idea where it was
coming from.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
No, I mean, and that's that's my I mean, my
license plate says cake lady. I am the cake lady.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
That's how you became cake lady.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
That's how because of them are you or the are
you the cake lady.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Looking over here, Belda? But the logo, sir, that is hilarious.
I have a small one for you, the cake Lady.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
I am the cake Lady.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
You're like officially a cake lady with your own environment
sticker and everything.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Yeah, I had one of my clients. I brought you one.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Thank you very much. I love that. It says Kindness
Breeds Happiness Jeremiah twenty nine to eleven thirteen. And it's
like the crust that you see on the side of
a fire truck, and instead of it having like department
number or house number or engine number, it just has
(02:08):
cake Lady on it. In the kitchen aid mixer center
of it is a kitchen mixer, which is hilarious. I
love it all right. So they say, hey, are you
the cake Lady. You're surrounded by nine guys.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
And he says. One of the guys goes, not that
we mind. We love what you're doing, but why are
you doing it?
Speaker 1 (02:27):
That's a good question. I was going to ask the
same thing, and.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Well, you can't say, well, God told me to because
then they think you're crazy, right, So I said, I
like to bake what you guys, What you guys do
on a daily basis is amazing, and why not bake
for you instead of the women that get mad at
me when I'm baking for I'm at work, So that
in my mind that was why I was doing it.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
That kind of makes sense. But the thing is, you're
standing on your feet all day doing hair. Then you
go home and you're standing on your feet and I know,
I've seen that cake cannot be easy to make and
it's really good. I mean how many hours. I mean
you're working your butt off doing those and then you
(03:11):
got to deliver them, I guess before work. So you
work all day, go home, make cakes all night, wake
up early, deliver the cakes, and then go to work.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
It's a lot, it is, but I love every minute
of it. Why so at the time, I just thought
it was a fun thing to do. My year was up.
I finally got a routine to where I knew when
the guys were working I had, I got the number
to the station I could actually talk to each individual.
(03:45):
Now with the administration stuff, it was about sixty eight
cakes a year, which sixty cakes a year.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
That's like five that is, that's a little more than
five a month.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
There's yeah, it was.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
First year.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
The first year I did that. When my year was up,
the guys go, hey, your year's up, what are you.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Going to do?
Speaker 2 (04:07):
And I said, no, I just got my system down.
I mean, I have a routine. I'm really liking this,
so no, I'm not going to quit, so I am.
That went on for about six years and then there
was a merger happening with Lindwood Fire Department and department
(04:28):
called District one and District one in Linwood were merging
and it was going from my two lin Wood stations
and sixty eight firefighters to fifteen stations in three hundred
and fifty firefighters total.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
So now you got to choose do I? I would say,
now you have to choose.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
So, because I'm a hairdresser, occasionally there's some of the
guys will come in and get a haircut. One of
the guys he's a battalion chief now and he was
one of my lin Wood guys, and he goes, Johnny Ray,
you were the topic of conversation in our last meeting, Like,
oh lord, that does not sound good. He goes, yeah,
when we merge, we were talking about if we're not
at fifteen, were at station fifteen, we're not going to
(05:10):
get cake anymore. I'm like, Devo, what are you talking about.
Of course you'll get cake. I said, I don't care you.
He goes, No, you can't do that. That's too much.
And I'm like, don't tell me what to do. I'll
do whatever I want. And I started thinking, I'm like,
(05:30):
I just I like to challenge myself, and I thought
this might be kind of fun to see. I thought,
the baking part is not going to be a problem.
I can do that, but the delivering I wasn't sure
how I was going to do with the delivering before work?
Speaker 1 (05:43):
Can we get clear we're talking three hundred and.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
Fifteen, three hundred and fifty firefighters, not that. Yeah, yeah,
sixteen stations and yes, three hundred and fifty firefighters.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
That was then, and when did the start?
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Six years ago? Okay, now I've been baking for fourteen years.
I now bake for sixteen stations, four hundred and fifty firefighters,
plus all the girls at work, and last year I
made five hundred and ninety eight things.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
That is in sane I'm slightly crazy. Yes, yeah, so okay,
that's a that's a what kind of cake did you cream?
That's a cookies and cream cakes? Which is which is
(06:36):
a bun cancake cream and cookie icing, which is it's
really really good. M's stick my finger in it when
this is over again. But what other what.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Kind of I mean no, I have made things I've
never heard of before, like a peanut butter ducoa, what
is that? Opera cake layer, Russian honey cake.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
Okay, they're getting spoiled. If these if these guys are
now ordering up these kind of cakes from you, they
are spoiled. So I have I would be like, you
get the cake. I'd be like the cake Nazi, you know,
like the soup Nazi. You want soup, you get the soup.
You want cake, you get this ca. I mean I
would actually tell them let them eat cake the cake
(07:23):
I make.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
But see that that's that takes the personalization away from
it they want.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Well, I'm of course being facetious. It's just unbelievable that
whatever they want, whatever.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Cake, it doesn't have to be cake. I make cookies, cheesecake, pie,
you name it, I make it. If I've never if
I have never made it before, I find a recipe
and I or I like.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
That coconut cream pie.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
So now coconut cream pie. If it's a large station,
it comes in a nine x thirteen pan because it's
feeding nine men and not. I can't just take them
a little pie because it wouldn't be enough, So gosh,
double in and make it big.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
So some of the stations have eight to nine. The
majority of the stations are three men stations.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
Do you before you deliver a first time cake, like,
make a prototype and taste it before you send it to.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
Half of them I've never tasted. I just hope it's
okay if I've never made it before. McCay, could you
give me feedback and let me know if that was okay?
Speaker 1 (08:23):
Do these guys get there and like the guy's birthday
or the lady's birthday who is four gets a piece
and everybody has just devours it? Oh? Yeah, do you
have the fattest group of our people in the United States.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
When I get there, the guys are coming out of
the gym, they're all sweaty, and I'm like, oh, you're
getting ready for cake?
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Yeah? Sorry.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
They give me a hugger. Sorry, I'm sweaty man. It's okay.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
So you are now making about six hundred cakes pause
what ever a year?
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Yeah, I mean for firefighters for about just over four
hundred and fifty. I do one cake or cookies or something.
For the administration. There's about fifty in admin. So once
a month admin get something. When they had their own mechanics,
once a month of mechanics would get some because you know,
they're all part of the thing that buyer service. They
(09:24):
all make it happen.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
You've been a hairdresser for so many years, and I
imagine you have a massive loyal following and make a
great living doing it. There's some expense here, and I
mean just a few months ago, eggs doubled, so there
had to have been a lot I was, I bet
that was. I mean there's a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Oh and I do a cookie of the month for
the clients at the salon too, of course you did
I do. Yeah, last month was scotch Us because there
was no eggs.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
What about the I mean, so got to be expensive.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Honestly, Bill, have no idea how much it cost me.
I don't want to know because it will probably have
a heart attack. The thing is when God tells you
to do something, the means to make it happen. Always. Always,
I don't ever go without anything. I always have what
I need.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Do you get donated as anybody?
Speaker 2 (10:22):
Now? The Union occasionally will give me money, which is
wonderful but not expected, so I don't ever count on it.
They hadn't given me money in about three years, and
this last year they gave me a check for six
thousand dollars, which was very helpful because I needed a
new oven because mine was worn out.
Speaker 1 (10:40):
So that's unbelievable that you make that many cakes and
deliver that many cakes. I mean, this is a you
were taking care of an entire county full of fire people.
Don't they have big, big kitchens in these firehouses?
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Oh yeah, I cook in them all the time.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
How does that work?
Speaker 2 (11:00):
So in the beginning it was just cake, and then
you know, you get to after this many years, I've
built relationships with a lot of these men and women.
That cake is just the catalyst. Cake so much more
than cake. So Thanksgiving every year, I choose one of
the larger stations and I go in and I make
(11:20):
the full Thanksgiving dinner for them, so they can invite
their families and be with their families at Thanksgiving. I
usually have about twenty to twenty five people that come,
and I cook in their kitchens. They have amazing kitchens.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
You're telling me. The guys that have to be on
shift during Thanksgiving, you go and cook for them and
their families so their families can come join them at work,
so their families are able to be together and have
a genuine Thanksgiving dinner together.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
Yes, every Thanksgiving. That say for COVID, they wouldn't let
me go in they didn't care, but the administration said no,
I couldn't, so I had death.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
That is phenomenal. You have to have an entire community
of people that adore you.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
So I'll tell you a story. After COVID, Arcelon was
closed down for three months and I came back to
work and I don't do well sing idle, so I
but I told my boss. He said, lindsay, I just
want you to know I'm never going to retire. I said,
(12:33):
I'm just going to die here, and she goes, please
don't die here, and I said, well, I have been
told that if I collapse, to call nine one one
and say cake lady down, and there'll be eighteen trucks
here to revisement. And they're not kidding Bill. They said that,
(12:54):
and he said, he goes, if anything ever happened, you
make sure you say cake, lady down. I'm like, how
are you going to know? They said, anything that comes
from a nine one one call, it will come through
their little pagers. So if somebody actually said cake, lady down,
it would come through the pager, they would know that
there was a problem with me, and they would all
(13:15):
be there. And he was joking, but he goes, yeah,
there's cake to be made.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
We'll make sure. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
So the South County Fire is the name of the
stations that I work that I beg for. They have
a seventy six percent success rate and all cardiac events,
which is phenomenal, number one in the nation. So they
(13:46):
say it's because they have such a good morale because
of cake. I'm pretty sure it's because of their training.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
It sounds like it's a part of just the entire
culture altogether. Will be right back. So I read a
story that you made a cake for somebody's birthday who
(14:15):
happened to not be on shift, and they came back
and you asked them how they liked their birthday cake
and they said they didn't get any, so he made
them another one. Yeah, what happened to the crew ate it?
Speaker 2 (14:30):
They are ruthless.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
They're ruthless on the cake.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
So this is the stories that they tell. There can
be one hundred dollars bill sitting on the counter for weeks,
nobody will touch it. One of my boxes shows up
and that's gone. At the cake now it has That's
why the logo is important, because there's a lot of
people that will bring things to the fire station and
(14:55):
the guys will go, yeah, we saw their kitchen. We
just kind of put that in the garbage. We've been
in their kitchen and we're not going to eat that.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
You want. Stole once told somebody that was interviewing you
that when a new firefighter or when it came up
some five rider told you that cake was the last
thing they need.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
So that when I when I the merger first happened,
I had one of my battalion chiefs from Linwood took
me to all the other stations and introduced me as
the cake as a cake leader to let him know
what I had been doing for Linwood and that so
I wasn't some That's why I like to have a contact.
(15:43):
So I'm just not some random person showing up with
cake or calling up and saying, hey, you have a
birthday coming, what do you want? And like, who's the
crazy creak lady? Right? So Chief Vanderpoolt took me around
to all the stations and we went to one station
that was it's in a rougher area where they see
lots of lots of stuff and they're there also the
(16:05):
ones that if anybody anything shows up, they pretty much
will not keep it in the kit. It will get
tossed because.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
I can't trust unfortunately.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
So one of the guys looks at me, and so
the attitude there's it was a little bit painted, I guess.
So one of the guys says, cake.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
Hairs cake.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
He kind of walked away, and I'm.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Like, you need cake, you need cake, you need cake?
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Yeah, and you know what ca I go to that
station now and I walk in the door, and you
know what I get? Yeah, that attitude is.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Completely different because they needed cake, they needed cake.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
I go there a lot actually was there. They invited
me for dinner last week. Well, one of the guys
needed the chief needed a haircut, so it's like, hey,
can you come and cut my hair? We'll make your dinner. Sure,
And I bring.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Cake, so of course.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Although cake is very literal here also metaphor clearly as
talking to you, I'm starting to understand that cakes appreciation,
cake is love, cakes, thanks, cake is honoring cake is
(17:31):
cake is so much money cake you think these firefighters
families understand.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
Do you know how many times I get messaged on
Facebook or Messenger from moms or wives or family members
saying thank you so much for taking care of my son.
I wasn't there to do it because they're not. They're
either because they're at work.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Sorry.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
I didn't know how much what I do was going
to make a difference when I first started, So when
when I was just making for Lynnwood. Now I tell
them all the time that they saved my life, and
(18:19):
the majority some of them know the whole story, the
majority of them don't. So September of twenty eleven is
when God told me to bake for firemen. The end
of October that same year, something happened that I can't
(18:40):
tell you details, but it turned our family upside down.
And because I had committed to making cake for firemen.
When when you have something that causes trauma in your life,
(19:04):
our first response is to curl up in a ball,
wallow in self pity, feel sorry for ourselves, and just
give up. But because I made a commitment to make
cake for firemen, I couldn't wallow in self pity. I
couldn't feel sorry for myself. I couldn't just curl up
on the ball and say forget it. I don't want
(19:25):
to deal with this because I was making for firemen.
So it gets you out of your own head. When
you're doing something for someone else, can't feel sorry for yourself.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
The third thing we talk about all the time on
the show is so the massive one million dollar payoff pitch.
When you actually commit on a long term basis for
the right reason to employing your passions and discipon scenarios,
is you get a thousand times more out of it.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Oh so much, I mean, And they're like, oh, it's
too much, it's too much. I'm like, no, it's not,
because at that time it's God knows what we need
before we need it. And when he told me to
bake cakes for firemen, I had no idea what the
next few years were going to be And if I
hadn't been doing that and I had that focus on
(20:21):
something else, I couldn't, I wouldn't have had the strength
that I needed to get through that tragedy in our family.
So many I mean I look back now and I'm like,
there are so many things that fell into place, and
I'm like, oh, that's why that happened. I mean, I
(20:43):
went through a divorce in two thousand and nine that
woods devastating. I lost everything. I lost my home, my car,
I had my two dogs, my clothes, and a dresser,
and I moved in with my parents at fifty years
old and Ember standing there. And I had been proud,
And I mean, that's probably one of the biggest problems
(21:05):
with my pride, that I had done all of the
things that I did not without God, because I knew
that he was the catalyst to everything. But I had
done it without a husband. I had done it on
my own. And then because of being married and making
choices that I knew better, left me financially destitute. So
(21:25):
I had to file bankruptcy, lost everything. And I don't
know if I don't know if it's the same everywhere,
but when you file bankruptcy in the state of Washington.
You have to call consumer credit counseling and they're supposed
to tell you how to get out of debt. Well,
I did that, and the lady goes, oh, honey, you
just need to walk away. Can you just walk away
and move in with your mom and or your parents?
(21:46):
And I'm like, really, you're supposed to help me get
out of this, and she says, just walk away, and
I'm like, so here, I am fifty years old. I
move in with my parents, with my two dogs, my clothes.
I didn't have a car. I had to give the
car up in bankruptcy too. I had nothing, and I
was the one where everybody lived with me. I was
(22:06):
the one that took care of everyone. It was not
easy for me to rely on someone else, humbly, very humbly.
So I remember being in the guest room of my parents'
house that was already furnished, so I didn't even have
my own bed, and I remember standing there going, Okay, God,
(22:31):
I'm going to choose to be content and where you've
put me. And a year later, I started baking cakes
and I looked back and I owed my parents a
lot of money because of the divorce, and so to
pay them back. My mom and I were at a
family reunion and somebody said, well, how are you going
(22:53):
to stay with your parents? And I said, well, I'll
until I get them paid back. I said, but you know,
I'm the girl. I'm the one that's going to eventually
end up taking care of them. So I kind of
like living with my mom. So who knows. Mom goes, well,
we really like having her there. But she took the
guest room. We don't have a guest room anymore. I said, oh, well,
(23:14):
we'll just build a guest room on the back of
the house. And she goes, oh, no, no, no, we
do anything. We're building a master suite and I said, okay, fine.
So we had started that the summer before before I
started baking, and I built a nine hundred and fifty
square foot edition on the back of the house. That
(23:35):
was my mother's sanctuary. Her it was, it was all
it was for her. So but when I look back
at all this stuff, I'm like living with my mother,
well my parents at the time. My dad' said a facility.
Now But I I can look back and I have
(23:57):
no regrets. My relationship with my mother we're best friends.
I mean, as you can see, I take her everywhere.
Everything happens for a reason. And if I hadn't listen
to that voice about baking for firemen, that year would
have been completely different. All that time of transition would
(24:20):
have been completely different when they merged. When the two
companies merged and it went from sixty eight firemen to
three hundred and fifty firemen, my Facebook friends changed a
lot too. And I realized that suicide and cancer are
the two biggest causes of death, and first responders had
(24:44):
no idea that suicide was an issue. And I'm thinking,
I remember looking at a feed where two men not
from my department, but in a close area that had
committed suicide. Firefly said, committed suicide, And I'm thinking, but
did they know Jesus? So I'm sorry. I'm doing this
(25:11):
because number one, because God told me to, but because
I know the morale of the station changes when cake comes.
The chiefs have called me and said, hey, Tanya, the
guys had a tough call. Can you bring cake? And
it's not about bringing cake, it's because I am a
(25:31):
comfortable person. I am like the mom, I'm I'm the
firefighter mom. They can talk to me. They'll open up
with me. I talked to a chaplain that worked in
a neighboring city and that goes to our church, and
I said, okay, when they asked me to do this,
what do I say to them? And he says, time,
(25:52):
you have to think of it as like a balloon
that's about ready to pop if you can just let
a little bit of the air out and just give
him a little bit of relief so they can go
on to the next call. So I'll be sitting at
the stations and They'll ask me for dinner, and I'll
sit and talk to him and say, Okay, how do
you deal with what you see on a regular basis? Well,
(26:13):
dark humor and alcohol, Tanya, Well, and how does that
work for you? Well, it doesn't work.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
And so.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
The culture has changed a lot in the past five
years to where they're recognizing what these men see on
a regular basis. They have facilities now that they can
go and they can get help for PTSD. And I
can tell you story after story after a story of
where I've been in a position to where I can
talk to someone and help them with stuff that they've
(26:47):
been going through. I talked to one of the guys
and he says, you know, you think about people in
the military, if they're actually in war and they're on
the front lines, they'll do that for year, four years,
if you know, or in the military for a certain
amount of time. He goes, we do this day after
(27:07):
day after day for years. They get over one hundred
calls a day in the area that I that I
bake for. There's some stations that they're I mean NonStop.
There was a call right after I started baking for
(27:28):
the Linwood Fire Department and it was fourteenagers on graduation
night that were out and there was a semi truck
that was parked on the side of the road that
had trailer hitch. They were drinking. They ran into that
hitch and decapitated the first two kids and killed the
other the kids in the back seat instantly. And my
(27:48):
guys had to go to that. They have to see
that all the time. During COVID there was a lot
of suicide, teenage suicide, and these guys have to go
and they they have teenage kids. That was one of
the calls that the chief called me. There was a
fifteen year old girl who committed suicide and the medics
(28:09):
that went to that call a teenage kids and they
it's devastating to them. So when I the cake is
a catalyst, it's a catalyst to build relationships with them
where I can call them up and say, Hey, I'm
going to come and make dinner for you guys tonight
and just sit and talk.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
It's so much more than cake.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
It's so much more than cake.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
We'll be right back. I'm sitting here listing dolls. Oh No,
(29:00):
ought to pull back. I'm going to do a pullback
on you already.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
It's a professional talk that I've learned recently, and I
make myself a little disgusted using the term, but insupport
your dad he did this his whole life as a
fire off a fire or EMT. But he made the
same calls these guys made, or worse sometimes. But the
(29:30):
point is, you know we got to hear from your mom.
You know that he kissed her good night and goodbye
every time and wouldn't even take out the garbage out
kissing her, and that there was always this recollection that
there was danger in what your father's professionals and only
say all illustrate this point. It is clear you're making
(29:53):
some little bright spot in an otherwise difficult day from
many of these firefighters and EMTs also their families. You're
not just affecting the firefighter. You're affecting the firefighter and
the downhill side who they also deal with some of
(30:14):
the same trepidation and fear, or at least little thoughts
that you guys dealt with when your father went off
to work. They're dealing with when their love. So your
outreach to all these fire people is actually exponentially larger
because these families know that even in the depths of it,
(30:37):
every once in a while at work, my love the
one's going to go to smile because of this crazy
cake lady.
Speaker 2 (30:45):
Well, and then they get mad because the wives never
get any They're like, they never please.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Don't add please, don't add wives to the list. You'll
never get any sleep.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
No, I know that that's not well, I do. I mean,
like some of the guys. One of the guys, his
wife has turned fifty and so I made her take
for a birthday.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
I mean, it's unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
There's never two there's there's never not enough time for cake.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
I guess you don't even have a website or anything.
You just do you You say it like it would
be disastrous for you to have a website for what
to show what you're doing?
Speaker 2 (31:29):
Well, I mean I post, I post everything on Facebook.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
People find you on Facebook? What they do?
Speaker 2 (31:38):
Just my name? Well Instagram is I'm SCF Cake Lady
sc SCF South County Fire Cake Lady, all.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
Right, and on and on Facebook? Is just your name? Right?
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Okay, is with the middle or just just Tanya.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
I think it's Hanks and Piper because it was my
maiden name and married names.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Okay, all right, say it again.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
Any Ray hankson Piper which.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
You can found on Facebook, otherwise known as the Cake
Lady from South County Fire. And there's a bunch of
guys with you in the picture.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
Oh that was my birthday. They showed up at the
salon with flowers.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Tanya Ray has earned her name as the Cake Lady
by baking and delivering birthday cakes for all of our
firefighters at fourteen stations throughout the year. Today, firefighters surprised
her at work with flowers and wishes for a happy
birthday coming up on Sunday. And it's a picture of
a bunch of fire guys standing behind you at Sibawitz
or whatever the place is called that you do it
(32:42):
Zuberans know that, and they're all just grinning like cheshire cats,
And there you are in the middle of them, smiling.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Happiest salon is kind of right in the middle of
the territory. So because they whenever they get a call
close to the salon, they just have to stop, buy
and say and grab a cookie.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
That's hilarious. People listening here, go to Facebook and Instagram
and check out what she does. And if you cannot
be inspired to understand that something as simple as making
a cake can change in entire communities. When I say community,
(33:26):
not the city, the community being the fire and EMT
and first responder communities outlook, I love the metaphor. It's
like a bloom full of air about to pop, and
you're not going to extinguish the whole bloom. But if
you just let a little pressure off that, just a
little way out, that the stress on the bounds of
(33:49):
that bloom aren't so strong. And metaphorically, folks who deal
with what these first responders deal with. After a while,
that balloon gets really ready to pop. If you just
let a little air out, and a little air could
be in lending in ear talking. But you know what,
just smiling and getting your inner child self excited about
(34:11):
a birthday cake, something as simple as that. Do you
allow yourself to appreciate the difference you're making these folks loves? Oh? Yeah? Good?
Do you do you see yourself ever quitting? No? Uh
huh no. No.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
I will quit baking when I can't bake anymore, just
like I'll quit working when I can't work anymore. I
love what I do in all aspects of it. My
mom always says when people ask her, when people ask
me if I if I you know who helps me?
I'm like, my mom makes sure the kitchen is clean
when I get home.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
That's it, because, okay, Bill, our kitchen it's a two
butt kitchen. You can't get any more than I mean,
if you're back to back, you're going to run into it.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
It is.
Speaker 2 (35:00):
Or yeah. And when they see the size of my
kitchen and what I do in that kitchen, they're like.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Really, do you have a double oven?
Speaker 2 (35:07):
No? I don't have room for right.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
All right, here's the deal. This is a call out
to people in the Seattle Edmunds, Washington area. You realize
what this woman, this crazy cake lady Tanya is doing.
It would only seem appropriate that one somebody reached out
to their Facebook or Instagram, it maybe offered a month's
(35:32):
worth or you're worth of eggs. But the other thing
is when you're making six hundred cakes a year about
it's my guess, it's that my mouth right, all right,
that's an averager to today. I would imagine a double
oven would be helping.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
So I went to when I had to buy a
new oven, we have a place called this Homers recycle.
Speaker 1 (35:55):
Yeah that over the year's got some miles on it.
Speaker 2 (35:57):
Well, the old one, yeah, I mean it was per
oven okay, yeah, but I mean it did pretty well.
So when I went to go get a new one,
I went to this recycled place and I brought him cookies.
The owner how to make friends and influence people. Yeah,
what was the second time I went in? And the
(36:17):
first I had gotten one and it was not It
didn't work very well and it wasn't cooking evenly. So
I took pictures and I said, his name's Dave. I said, Dave,
this isn't working. Goes Oh well, that's unacceptable. Cake lady
can not have an oven that doesn't bake evenly. And
so he set me up with like a five thousand dollars.
(36:42):
It's a gas confection oven. I mean I can have
an app and turn it on from work if I
need to. It's fancy, way fancier than the first one
I had picked out, which was nice. But and I said, so, hi,
that's fine. How much more? He goes, Oh, no, so
I got a five thousand dollars.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Who's this guy? We gotta plug it.
Speaker 2 (37:03):
I don't know his last name. It's Dave at this
Homers recycle Scratch and Dent place.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
I love that guy.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean he was awesome. And
so for nineteen hundred dollars, I got a five thousand
dollars brand new and had a little scratch on the
side that nobody sees.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
So perfect. Yeah, but it's one well yeah, but.
Speaker 2 (37:25):
It's a confection has three racks. I can I can.
Speaker 1 (37:28):
Bake three cakes at once differently, well, not.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
Three cakes, but I can do two cakes. And I
can do like three trays of cookies at a time.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
And also, so, yeah, anybody listened to me in Seattle.
Think of the good she's doing for the first responders
out there. Reach out to her. Buy eggs, buy flour,
buy more pans. She has her favorite spoon, she travels
with it, So don't worry about that. But something else,
you know, a little bit of support for you would
(37:59):
be appropriate. I think for what you're doing for everybody
in your community, you're an inspiration. You're also hilarious to
hang out with. I bet the fire people love it
when you just flop down and hang out.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
Oh yeah, we have a lot of fun.
Speaker 1 (38:15):
I bet you did. Alex, you have anything to say
to Danya before we go? I think I'm good. How
about you, Tanya? Is there anything you think we've missed
that you'd like to cover?
Speaker 2 (38:28):
Oh? Do you want to see?
Speaker 1 (38:30):
Yeah? I want to see. Tanya's got a fire department calendar.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
Not firemen, it's fire trucks. Just so you don't think
that I got a bunch of half naked firemen on
my calendar.
Speaker 1 (38:43):
Oh I see, it's not that kind of fireman. It's
a fire truck calendar. Got it. Yeah?
Speaker 2 (38:50):
So this now, this is all my mother. I am
a tech tard. I do not do computers whatsoever. So
I have a spreadsheet for every month. This is this
month's fireman.
Speaker 1 (39:02):
Okay, one, two, three, four of fives?
Speaker 2 (39:06):
Yeah, thirty six she total? Is it at the bottom,
so I know what I'm doing.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
This is a list color coded of thirty six uh
people and their data birth, their rank and their shift.
And can I read one of these people's names? It's
a second on May six, Tony Mace and Corey Dow
(39:34):
you're up. One of you is in plane field and
one of you that's a.
Speaker 2 (39:39):
Different fire Oh yeah, pain Fields and fired. I kind
of adopted them on top of the other. They're at
the airport and they're all alone and lonely.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
And so Tony Tody Pace at Painfield and Corey Dowe
at ten b on five to six? What what are
we cooking? These people?
Speaker 2 (39:57):
So then then I write it on the calendar.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
So this is on neked Fireman calendar with our trunks by.
Speaker 2 (40:05):
Tony Mason is getting carrot cake on the seventh at Paynfield.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
All right, what's Corey?
Speaker 2 (40:12):
Well he hasn't responded yet.
Speaker 1 (40:14):
Wait no, there he is right there, German chocolate. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
So that's my deliveries for that day, and my deliveries
for that.
Speaker 1 (40:21):
Day that is on.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
That's just the beginning of this month. I just started
texting them for this, but this this was last month.
Speaker 1 (40:31):
Smokes Alex. You need to put this on on social media. Yeah,
hold it up. This is this is the that is unbelievable.
Don't don't move. We got we got blueberry Chris, we
got red Velvet Coffee, cheesecake, Baba Cakes, arawberry cake, something, monster,
(40:57):
monster cookies, oh, monster cookie on cookies, chocolate can, banana cheesecake.
Holy crap. There is every kind of cake on earth.
And I don't know why you don't open a bakery,
but I think, yep, there we go, because that's It's
(41:17):
not about the money for you, is it. Yeah, it's awesome. Tanya.
Thanks for being a memphisis is a great story. I
loved telling your story. And somebody in the Wash area
reach out to this woman's helped support her. She's doing
amazing good for a lot of good reach out from anywhere,
and all of you first responders that have to be
listening to this on behalf of Tanya. Thank you for
(41:41):
your service, thank you for what you do, and in
the very very most still way, I hope you eat cake.
Thanks a lot for being every time.
Speaker 2 (41:51):
You're very welcome.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
Thank you all right, let's eat some more cake, and
thank you for joining us this week. If Tanya rap
Piper has inspired you in general, or better yet, to
take action by baking cakes for firemen or someone else
in your community, or making a cake for your favorite
podcast host so he can dive in with his fingers
(42:13):
and his face only, and oh my gosh, that cake
was good. Did you get any I did, But her
intention was not for you to use your fingers. That's
not why she brought it. It's the best wait to cake.
You dive in with your fingers and you just scruff
it down your face, your curit email. If the cakes
for yourself is what most listeners are thinking right now,
well that cake was for me, wasn't it. I mean
(42:34):
the rest of us were going to have something too.
Get your own podcast show and maybe someonell cook you
a cake. But that was my cake and I loved it.
It's awesome. So anyway, if don your Apiper has inspired
you to do any of that or something else entirely,
please let me know. I'd love to hear about it.
You can write me anytime at Bill at normal folks
(42:55):
dot us and I promised I'll respond, And if you're
sending a cake, I'll give you my address. And if
you enjoyed this episode, share a friends and on social
subscribe to the podcast, rate and review it. Join the
army at normal folks dot us consider becoming a Premium member.
There all of these things that will help us grow
(43:17):
an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney. Until next time,
do which you can
Host
Bill Courtney
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