CHRISTMAS GIVING REPORT

Lori Bailes sends this regarding Christmas Giving

Okay, this update is a little late, but better late than never….

Ten Spanish Oaks’ residents sponsored eight families through the Christmas Bureau this holiday. While one experience left a little to be desired, two were good, and five were excellent.

Please see an excerpt from an email that I received from Amanda Tennant:

It went completely awesome! Alec and I delivered everything Wednesday, the 20th and it was such a great experience for Alec—myself as well.
We stayed with them for about an hour and just chatted about life. It was really great. They were so happy and grateful and although I was sad when I left knowing what I had left and what I was going home to, I felt so good that we had made a difference in their life, even if it was only for 1 day.

It was for sure a highlight of our holiday season.

I know that we want to do it again next year—hopefully, we can think of a way to make it more of a community thing like you had said.

I took a bunch of pictures—they didn’t have any on their walls of the kids and was going to mail the prints to them (we also bought them frames).

Thank you Amanda for sharing that!

We were lucky enough to get to deliver to 3 families. I think the delivering was the hi-light for my kids. We barely got out of the door of the first house before they were asking me why their house was so small. Their family room was literally the size of our mudroom. The report from the second house was “those people aren’t poor.” So I got to explain that they were a family where both adults were trying to go back to school to better themselves, so they probably just didn’t have the funds to spend on Christmas this year. Their TV was a bit oversized for a family in need, but I had to ask myself if I’d want to sell off all of my possessions if I was in a rut financially. The kids really wanted to visit a little with the third family as they were the family we sponsored. But, there really wasn’t even room for us to sit down.

One thing that seemed to be a common factor in all three places, their lives seemed to revolve around the TV. I guess even with cable/satellite or what have you, it is still a relatively cheap form of entertainment and everyone deserves a little entertainment.

Of the sponsored families, many just wanted clothes. One young Mother wanted clothes for her children and for her Grandmother who helped her out a lot with the kids. A seven year old was ecstatic to be receiving gifts.

Some of the feedback received from Spanish Oaks residents was: let’s do it again next year, our whole family clued in on the embarrassment the recipients felt.

We had some very generous sponsors. One family provided bikes for all three children. Another reported “we can’t carpool to deliver as our car is too full of stuff.”

For the most part it was an awesome experience. Christmas was made special for many, thanks to Spanish Oaks’ residents. We enjoyed getting to deliver to the actual recipients way more than doing the usual tag off the tree at church deal. And although I still have most of the ingredients for those Christmas cookies we were “going” to bake and many of my decorations stayed in tubs this holiday, I feel like we had our priorities more in line with the reason for the season this holiday.