Amber Hartsook bakes cookies named Sluggers Sourdough and Victory Chocolate Chip from her Olathe kitchen, each one a small tribute to her 18-year-old son Treyton, who loved baseball and died in a car crash less than a year ago. The 44-year-old, who was a special education teacher last year, calls her home-based venture Hey Batter Batter Bakery, and its menu reads like a lineup card drawn from her son's favorite sport.
A Family Tragedy on the Road to California
Treyton Hartsook died on December 20, 2025, in a car crash in Oklahoma while the family was traveling to California to visit relatives for Christmas, according to The Kansas City Star. Amber Hartsook and four other passengers, including her fiancé and three stepchildren, were injured in the same crash, the paper reported. Treyton, who was born in Merriam, Kansas, to Amber M. Hartsook and Galen M. O'Baner, played baseball at Olathe South High School and pitched for Team KC, according to his obituary published by Kinsley Mortuary.
In July, months after the crash, Hartsook baked cookies for her son's former baseball team, the Star reported. She has said that baking brought her and others joy and felt soothing, a sentiment that eventually grew into the idea for a full-fledged bakery operating out of her Olathe home.
A Cookie Menu Built From Baseball Memories
Hey Batter Batter Bakery currently sells cookies only, each weighing four ounces and priced at four dollars apiece, per the Star's reporting. The classic lineup includes Sluggers Sourdough, Heavy Hitters Cookies & Cream, 2 Run Chocolate Crunch and Victory Chocolate Chip. Hartsook has said the Sluggers Sourdough, a chocolate chip cookie made with sourdough and brown butter and topped with flaky sea salt, is one of her personal favorites.
The bakery also rotates in seasonal specials, including a Celly cake-batter cookie and an autumnal pumpkin-spiced crumble cookie. The Celly is named for Treyton's shortened word for celebration after getting a hit on base, a detail that ties the dessert directly back to her son's time on the field. Customers can order a Starting Lineup of one of each classic cookie for fourteen dollars, or a pick-your-dozen order of seasonal cookies for forty-four dollars.
How Orders Work, and What Comes Next
Orders can be placed now through the bakery's website, with customers arranging pickup at an address Hartsook provides or at an agreed delivery meeting point. Larger orders ship only to Kansas addresses, the Star reported. Hartsook accepts custom orders with at least three days' notice and says she is open to making cookies for corporate events, birthdays, showers and celebrations of post-baseball-game wins.
Looking ahead, Hartsook has said she plans to enter the catering business and may expand into selling cookies at stadiums or opening a brick-and-mortar bakery, along with other baked goods beyond cookies. She has also said she hopes to start a foundation in Treyton's name to support youth sports opportunities, and that she wants to sponsor children who want to play youth sports.
Hartsook's bakery operates as a home-based business, and Olathe's zoning code does regulate such operations. The city's Unified Development Ordinance permits home occupations as accessory uses in several residential districts, but it also limits such businesses to no more than two clients or patrons on the premises at a time and generally restricts commercial exchanges of goods with the public at the home, with an exception for people invited individually in advance. Separately, Kansas state law generally requires a valid license for conducting a food establishment or food processing plant, subject to multiple exceptions, according to an excerpt from the Kansas State Legislature. It is not established whether or how those rules apply to Hey Batter Batter Bakery's current setup.
