(WB) For sisters Dawn and Miranda, owners of Confections, a small family bakery in this small town located in the heart of East Texas 115 miles northeast of Houston, life is about love — love of baking sweet treats for everybody. 

So when on Wednesday of this past week they posted a picture of heart-shaped cookies decorated like a Rainbow flag, the immediate and super negative reaction crushed both them and sales. 

“Today has been hard. Really hard,” reads the bakery’s Facebook post from Thursday. “… My heart is heavy. Honestly, I never thought a post that literally said ‘more love, less hate’ would result in this kind of backlash to a very small business that is struggling to stay afloat and spread a little cheer through baked goods.”

One customer canceled a massive order of cookies that were already baked and ready to deliver: “We received a very hateful message on our business page canceling a large order (5dz) of summer-themed cookies for tomorrow morning (that we just finished decorating) because of a rainbow heart cookie we posted.”

What happened next though took the sisters by surprise. After their post was shared by tens of thousands on Facebook and Instagram as well, orders poured in as did long lines around the block to buy their sweet treats. Within hours the shelves were bare and then they had to close to bake more, and when that supply was exhausted and customers just wanted to donate money with buying baked goods the sisters responded with:

“WE LOVE OUR TRIBE SO MUCH! Such an amazing outpouring of support. We’ve had a lot of people wanting to donate money to our shop in the name of kindness, and we appreciate the gesture so much! But. We can’t take y’all’s money like that, but if you would like to donate to one of our local shelters or rescues, that would be so amazing! Y’all are incredible human beings. We’ve always had such faith in humanity, and y’all have just reconfirmed the ABSOLUTE BEAUTY in human nature.”

Sadly the sisters say that they are not set up to ship, but they’re grateful for the outpouring of support that they have received.

Lines literally went out the door and around the block as customers patiently waited to buy the sister’s cookies and other baked goods.