Arizona woman goes viral on TikTok for selling baked goods in honor of her dad

PHOENIX (AZFamily) — A woman in San Tan Valley is going viral on TikTok for selling baked goods in honor of her father, who recently passed away.

Kaley Petersen recently lost her dad back in December unexpectedly due to undiagnosed diabetes. “He struggled with health medical issues very silently and kind of related them to different things, maybe getting older. He didn’t know that he was sick,” Petersen said.

Since then, Petersen said that she found out that her dad was nearly $200,000 in debt. She said her childhood is at risk of foreclosure, so last week, she posted on social media that she was selling homemade baked goods to help collect money to save her father’s home.

The response has been overwhelming. “Since everyone’s coming and supporting me, I feel so happy, and I haven’t felt happy in a long time,” Petersen said.

Every week, Petersen puts her pop-up shop on the corner of Pecos and Sossaman in Mesa. She’s already raised $5,000 between her GoFundMe and baked goods sales. “I picked up some cookies yesterday, and we liked them so much that he decided to come back out here today,” said one customer.

Petersen said she plans to continue selling her baked goods in honor of her dad and hopes one day she can save the home and raise her family there. “It’s just really just to help fundraise towards keeping his legacy alive,” she said.

If you’d like to show your support, Petersen will sell her baked goods on the corner of Sossaman and Pecos roads on Thursday, June 5, from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. You can also donate to her GoFundMe.

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