Birthday Club

Today Jim, Michelle, Natalie, Morgan, Nick and Jack brought us 3 full plates of wonderfully decorated cupcakes and a present for one of our children that is currently staying with us in the shelter. The family is part of the Upper Arlington Birthday Club. They are given a current list of birthdays for the month and then as each birthday approaches the club delivers a cake and a present for the children. It is a wonderful program!

Baby It's Cold Outside...

Limited Brands donated several new coats for our families so on Monday and Tuesday we had a coat giveaway...We not only helped current families but former ones as well...Families that were not able to attend Cecelia delivered them to their homes...Everyone received coats, hats, scarves and mittens...Now everyone can be toasty warm! Thanks Limited Brands...

Donation...

John Martin with Martin Painting and Coating Company visited HFF today and made a donation of $1,000. Thank you!

Heritage Middle School

Students from Heritage Middle School explore the mural at the Dowd Education Center...

5th grade student Colleen wrote a grant for her "Warm Thoughts Program," purchased the materials and taught her classmates to make scarves on a loom for our students. Colleen presents these at the Dowd Center

Hats & Scarves

Today the Limited Brands droped off several boxes of handmade fleece hats and scarves for our families. Since we are expecting a big storm in the morning they are sure to come in handy!

Children Bags...

Yesterday JRobert Enterprises brought us wonderful children bags - each bag had several outfits, diapers, shoes, socks, blankets and a toy. All were arranged by size and each bag was marked with the items that were in there. Thank you!

Groundhog Day

Today we received a visit from the First Link Groundhog. He delivered a box full of handmade braclets for our children.

Snacks...

St Joan of Ark Parish School of Religion delivered bags full of snacks and cookies for our families today....

Girl Scout Bronze Award

We recieved this letter last week and we are happy to post for all to read:

We are so proud to let you know about the recent achievements of local Cadette Girl Scout Troop 1342. Within the last year, these 6th and 7th graders have performed regular service in their communities qualifying them for recognition from both the Girl Scouts of Ohio’s Heartland Council and the Columbus Catholic Diocese.

The Girl Scouts Bronze Award requires Junior Girl Scouts to develop the leadership and planning skills necessary to follow through on a project that has a positive impact on her community. Troop 1342 choose to help the children served by the Homeless Families Foundation (HFF) for their project. For several years, this group of young ladies has conducted an annual drive to collect, wrap and deliver birthday gifts for HFF, believing that every child should be able to celebrate their birthday - no matter where they live. In 2009, in addition to their regular drive, they conducted a community toy drive that produced hundreds of new and gently used toys.

With donations in hand, the girls threw an ice cream party for the children in the HFF program and celebrated with them. Each child received a toy that day in addition to fun and fellowship with these amazing Scouts. HFF also received some wrapped gifts to distribute as birthdays come up. The girls individually donated more than 15 hours of service each to this project – including spending a day cleaning and organizing at HFF. Soon after earning their Bronze Award, the girls celebrated by bridging to become Cadette Girl Scouts. We couldn’t be more proud of them! :)

Please join us in recognizing these young leaders.