This year as part of setting our new family Christmas traditions, amongst other things, we talked about volunteering becoming part of our holidays. So I set out to start this tradition by taking a day off work and helping out with a local charity that our organisation donates money to – The Joy Fund. This charity collects money throughout the year to purchase new toys for children who might ordinarily not receive toys at Christmas. Every single penny donated goes to purchasing toys, the administrative costs are covered by the local newspaper The Virginia Pilot. This huge programme is run in co-ordination with the Salvation Army, Marine’s Toys for Tots and Operation Hope. Last year almost 10 000 local children received toys at Christmas. In addition to toys, many of the families will also receive brand new clothes for the children and a bag of groceries with a frozen chicken.
I volunteered to help out on the first day that the parents come to pick up the toys, clothes and groceries. The parents get to pick the toys from an incredible selection, some lucky children even get brand new bikes! There were some 800 bikes ready to be distributed. Volunteers help the parents with their ‘shopping’ and go around with the parents helping them pick out the toys; my job for the day was to help load up groceries into their shopping trolley.
every family received a bag of groceries – this was the pile of already packed bags (by local school children), ready to be distributed
I got to meet the parents after they had loaded up their trolleys with the toys and clothes. You would not believe how emotional some of these parents were. They were simply overwhelmed with the generosity they were receiving. Honestly, some of the trolleys had way more toys than I would probably buy my own children. But these toys might be the only toys the children will get for the year. The whole operation was simply incredible.
parents get to choose the toys, volunteers help them with the shopping and make sure the toys are distributed out fairly
toys!
more toys!
There were times throughout the day that I welled up with tears with just the thought of those children opening the presents on Christmas day! The vastness of this operation also made me a little bit sad that in our own local area there are so many families living below the poverty line. We just don’t see them.
It wasn’t until towards the end of my shift that I thought about the toys I was helping the parents load up with, seeing the vast amount of baby clothes and toys; it hit me hard seeing the number of children some of these families had, many had four or five. For a brief moment I was insanely jealous. How ridiculous is that?
Anyway, over lunch we sat with an 84 year old lady who had been volunteering at this programme for over 15 years. She told me that sadly a few of these parents will sell some of the more expensive toys on for cash to buy drugs. She also told me of a story one year she helped a seemingly ungrateful and snotty lady with her shopping trolley full of toys to her car – it was a brand new Mercedes Benz, the lady then barked at the old lady to be careful of the paint on the car. So the old lady pushed the trolley at her and said “Well do it yourself then!” and walked off! You can’t screen out all the bad eggs, the Salvation Army works hard with the schools to prevent fraudulent applications to the programme or stop the parents from selling on items donated to them. I’d say that 99.9% of the programme is all goodness and there will be many happy children with a happy smile on Christmas morning 🙂
If we are here next year I will definitely volunteer again with Chris. What a wonderfully warming family Christmas tradition 🙂
It was an emotional day, hard work lugging around groceries, but rewarding in the festive spirit
The Great Pudding Club Hunt 
You have such a beautiful spirit! Good for you for volunteering and making such a huge difference in so many lives! Merry Christmas to you!
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It was so much fun too 🙂 Merry Christmas
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Great post – it looks like a Toys R Us! Nice that the parents can choose their own toys rather than having a bag of stuff foisted upon them. Good reminder of the real meaning of Christmas.
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Yes that is what I found to be the most amazing thing! It almost looked like a regular store (if you discount the fact it was in an abandoned factory!!) I think it helps make the parents feel like they had a part to play in choosing their child’s presents. It was wonderful!
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Aww this is great! I volunteered for an xmas event a couple years ago at one of the larger shelters here, where they put on a really huge event for the local kids & families. I had the face painting table, with another few volunteers. These kids, whose families have little to nothing to give them over the holidays, are SO grateful for even the smallest luxuries such as being made to feel special for a day. It was heartwarming and heartbreaking. I will surely participate again. Xx
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Face painting sounds like a lot of fun!!! That is awesome!! I am new to the whole volunteering thing…I am much more of a ‘give the money to people who know how to do this caring stuff’ type of person. But I guess I found my inner caring side 🙂
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Yeah it was! I’m no artist, but luckily all the kids wanted easy stuff that was Christmas themed. 🙂
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How awesome!!! I completely understand your jealousy at the fact some parents had 5 or more children…I felt that, among many other emotions, as a social worker & I get it….I do love that you will go back to serve the families who not have a Christmas otherwise, though. That is beautiful xo
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Honestly, I don’t know how you do it!!! 🙂
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The same way you do it 😉
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Love this! I teach in an inner city classroom and encourage all of my families to go to events like this. It truly makes a child’s Christmas so special. Xo
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I didn’t realise the schools + teachers played such a big role in this programme too. The strange thing is that I was just completely oblivious to these kids struggles – you must see it everyday 😦 My hats off to you!
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Good for you! I volunteer each Christmas at our local foodbank with my company and it is heart warming to be able to help some families in such a small way. I have seen the multiple kids too and been jealous. Life isn’t easy go anyone. All the best this Christmas!!
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🙂 that is an amazing place too….especially as I sit here surrounded with practically all the food I could possibly want for Christmas 😐
Have a very merry Christmas!
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Such a lovely program and wonderful of you to volunteer.
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That looks awesome! We did something on a much smaller scale and it was still really quite moving to think stuff I actually chose and bought will be delivered to a few families this Christmas. I’m glad you got to see the fruits of your labours!
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This is a great post! When I was involved with the Jaycee’s, I worked with them on their toys for tots program. We just marked the barcode with “TOT” so that parents could not return the toys.
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