Thank you!

Thank you to everyone who helped over the last few weeks to make our Holiday Store a huge success! Everyone of our families will be sharing a wonderful holiday with their children.

Happy Holidays!

Santa Letter

What are your children asking Santa for this year? A young man, age 11, living with his family at The Homeless Families Foundation recently told Santa what he wants and it probably sounds like your child’s list. He listed WWE action figures, Tee-shirts (size 14, XL in boys), and Ohio State football items, etc. I am posting a copy of his letter so that you can see his entire list.

HFF is setting up our annual Christmas store so that parents can chose gifts for their children, using HFF dollars, and wrap them with the help of volunteers. This unique and wonderful program helps these families enjoy Christmas.

Anything you can do to help the children and families being served by HFF would be greatly appreciated. Our store still needs of tween and teenager items, baby dolls, trucks, learning games and clothing. Please feel free to contact Karie for more information (614) 461-9247 or by email – kgallegos@homelessfamiliesfoundation.org

Holiday Wish List

As the holiday season is approaching we at The Homeless Families Foundation are looking forward to another successful season. Last year we were able to provide a wonderful holiday for approximately 225 children, helping over 100 families.

For the past several years we have set up a Holiday gift “store” where the mothers and fathers could go “shopping” to choose gifts for their children. We did this as a way to more involve the parents in the Holiday season. We helped current families and some previous families that found themselves still needing assistance.

We are going to be doing the same thing this year and are asking for donations for newborns through the age of 18. (See list below) We need to have new toys and clothing into our main office by Tuesday, December 13th. We are also asking for donations of gift wrap, tags and tape.

It is such a joyous time at The Homeless Families Foundation and without community support we would not be able to provide such a wonderful Holiday for our families. We thank you in advance for your support.

Should you have any questions please call Karie @ (614) 461-9247 or by e-mail
kgallegos@homelessfamiliesfoundation.org

Wish List

Clothing
New sweatshirts/sweatpants/ jeans and tops all sizes both boys and girls
New underwear all sizes toddler to teenager both boys and girls
New socks all sizes toddler to teenager both boys and girls

Toys
Fisher Price toys
Lego sets
Learning toys (all ages)
Board games (monopoly, sorry, checkers, operation)
Popular DVD’s
Basketballs, Footballs, Soccer balls/ pumps
Diary’s with gel pens
Books (Harry Potter, Junie B Jones, Box Car Children etc)
Make-up and Hair accessories

Teenagers tend to get left out so we are asking for gift cards from: Target, Wal-mart, Old Navy, Famous Footwear, Bath & Body Works, AMC Movies, Best Buy, McDonalds etc.

On-Going shelter needs:
Gift cards (Kroger, Wal-Mart, Target) $5/$10/$20
Pots and pans
Twin size bedding (sheets, blankets, pillows)
Bath & Kitchen towels
Cleaning supplies (409, Pine-sol, Dish Soap etc)
Lysol Disinfectant Spray & Wipes
Diapers/Wipes (all sizes)

Holiday Help

Holiday Help

December 13th~ Donations should be dropped off by this day
Monday-Thursday 8:30-5:00 and Friday 8:30-3:00.

December 12th-December 16th ~ We need help setting up the holiday store & organizing general donations. The hours will be Monday-Thursday 9:00-4:30 and Friday 9:00-2:30.

December 19th-December 22nd ~We will need help organizing the store and general donations, helping the families shop for their children and then gift wrapping the items. The hours will be Monday-Thursday 9:00-4:30 and Friday 9:00-2:30.

January 3rd -January 6th~ We will need help cleaning out the holiday store and putting away general donations. The hours will be Monday-Thursday 9:00-4:30 and Friday 9:00-2:30.

Thank you in advance for your help this year we certainly could not do what we do at HFF without community support….

Halloween 2011

Thank you Diane and Joy for bringing 70 Halloween Costumes for our children to wear this year! Thank you to everyone who supported this project at St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Upper Arlington....Our children are going to be thrilled!

Come Home for the Holidays

It is that time of year again! The annual Come Home for the Holidays silent auction and wine tasting event at Brookside Golf and Country Club is scheduled for Friday, November 4th from 6:00pm-10:00pm. Come Home for the Holidays is the premier fundraise for The Homeless Families Foundation (HFF).

HFF is a family shelter in Columbus, Ohio. It provides shelter and support services for homeless families and an extensive tutoring and enrichment program for homeless and at-risk school aged children. HFF's mission is to provide shelter, support, stability and nurturing to homeless children and their families as they prepare to acquire permanent housing.

Your support as a volunteer is critical to Come Home for the Holidays and to the continued success of HFF in providing shelter and critical programs to families and children in Central Ohio. Over 60 volunteers are needed. I hope you will consider volunteering from 6:00pm-10:00pm on Friday, November 4th for Come Home for the Holidays.

Please let me know if you are interested in assisting the children and families of Central Ohio by volunteering at Come Home for the Holidays and what volunteer jobs you are most interested. Positions available for volunteering:

Silent Auction Table Staff Greeters
Raffle Ticket Sellers and Surprise Boxes
Check In
Registration/Check Out

In addition, please feel free to pass this information along to your friends, family, co-workers, neighbors, and colleagues. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at subhalembach@gmail.com or 614.743.0104.

Best,

Subha Lembach
Chair, Volunteers
Come Home for the Holidays
http://www.homelessfamiliesfoundation.org/

Community Care Day

Thank you NBC4 and Bob Evans....So fun to see everyone's smiling faces as they gave back to their community today!

Thank You....

Tomorrow starts a fresh new school year for our kids...Thanks to our wonderful community over 120 children (current and former families) will return on the first day with a new outfit and a back pack full of supplies....The smiles on everyone's faces is contagious!

Back To School Project

Thanks to our dear friends and supporters with the Tom Fennessy / Mike Harden Back-To-School Project for the wonderful backpacks full of supplies. The project helps us every year so that we may send our kids back to school with everything they will need to start the year out right!

http://www.tomfennessy.org/history.htm

Back To School

July is quickly coming to an end, hard to believe. The staff and volunteers @ HFF are starting to get things ready for our children to return to school, but we can not do this without your help. Our goal this year is to help approximately 125 children with their first day of school. This will include a new outfit and backpack full of supplies.

Volunteers shop for the younger children and our teenagers are given a budget and are taken shopping to see how many fun things they can purchase, with one requirement - they must purchase at least one complete outfit, the rest can be used for accessories, make-up or cologne etc.

It is really an exciting time and we look forward to sharing the results with you!

For more information please feel free to contact Karie - kgallegos@homelessfamiliesfoundation.org or by phone (614) 461-9247.

Thank you for your support and have a great day!
www.homelessfamiliesfoundation.org

Ohio State Fair....

Can you imagine never having been to the Ohio State Fair??

Most of the kids at HFF have never experienced it. Our summer school teachers want to take our 5th and middle school students to the Fair as a reward for doing excellent work on the curriculum being used through the Main Library. The reward is for students who have shown 80% mastery in their prescribed standard areas in both math and reading. These children have shown a willingness to succeed and an excitement for the overall program.

The funding for our summer programs was cut by over 35% this year. We need another $375 to take this trip so we can reward our kids for their great academic achievement. Will you help us raise this by tomorrow?

Please go to www.homelessfamiliesfoundation​.org or contact Susan Davis at 614-461-9247.

25th Anniversay Kick Off

What a great way to kick off our 25th Anniversary! Employee Appreciation Breakfast was put together for the staff today and what a wonderful morning it was. Muffins, scrambled eggs with bacon, juice, fresh fruit, and great conversation. Thanks so much to Lynne Smith, Lisa Newkirk and her daughter Brenna for all their hard work and thank you staff for 25 years!

Back To School

Wow is it really July 12th already? How fast time flies! We know that school just ended for most the first part of June but here at the Homeless Families Foundations we are already in full motion so we can be ready for the new school year in August.

Our goal this year as well as in years past is to provide each elementary child with 2 new outfits, new socks, underwear and a backpack full of supplies. For our Middle School and High School children we give them a budget and take them shopping. With guidance, most have come home with 4 tops, 2 pairs of pants and accessories.

It is a very exciting time but we need your help! We are currently accepting donations of new clothing, socks, underwear, and cash (for teenage shoppers/to purchase outfits and uniforms). We will also need volunteers to assist with organizing donations, filling the backpacks with supplies, shopping for uniforms and assisting our teenagers with their shopping experience.

If you have any questions or are interested in assisting us this year you can call Karie @ (614) 461-9247 or e-mail kgallegos@homelessfamiliesfoundation.org


Thank you for your continued support and have a wonderful day!

St Matthew's group lends a helping hand....

Thank you to the youth group from St. Matthews who came today with helping hands. They were only here for a short period but they got a lot done....Thanks kids!

Cassie's Artwork....

I’m having my first gallery showing and am inviting everyone to come out and not only see my work, but check out the this wonderful little gallery that supports local artists.

My pieces will be hanging from June 4- June 14th but the Artist Reception Event is on Saturday, June 11th from 8:00pm-Midnight at CS Gallery, located at 66 Parsons Ave. (Between E. Broad and Main St, Cattycorner to CaraBar). The gallery is open during the week (Monday-Friday normal business hours) so patrons are always welcome to stop by and view the art prior to the reception. All the artwork is done by local artists and is up for sale.

I have a wide arrange of things I can do and am more than happy to meet with people to show them my portfolio. My prices are very reasonable right now because I am working on establishing myself as an artist.

For more information on CS Gallery and Studio, go to http://www.cobenickstudios.com/csgallery/index.htm

Thanks and I look forward to seeing everyone there!

Heart of Ohio Run

The upcoming 5K, 10K, 1M Heart of Ohio event will be held in Downtown Columbus on July 30, 2011 is designed to be a fund-raiser for HFF. This event was created to help Ohio area non-profits raise much needed funding. The process for our organization is simply that we gather as many volunteers as we can to walk, run, wheelchair or str...oll the race. They take pledges for doing so. Every penny they raise goes directly to HFF. We report how much we have raised to Champions for Charity.

http://www.heartofohiorun.com/

We need a volunteer to head this up for HFF. Training is provided. Please call Susan Davis @ (614) 461-9247 ext. 121 if interested. Thanks so much.

The Dowd Center Gardens

The Dowd Gardens have been created to teach our children in the afterschool and summer programs about gardening, nutrition and using fresh vegetables in their meals; to increase the amount of fresh produce used by the Center’s cook in preparing meals for the children; and as a way to supplement the food supply for the families of the participating children. In these pictures the kindergarten and first grade classes are preparing their beds for next week’s planting.

Email Address....

Have you ever wondered - am I missing something? Well don't let that be a worry! We are working hard to update our data base and we need your help....Please email Karie with your email address so you never have to miss an update, a wonderful success story, or an upcoming event... kgallegos@homelessfamiliesfoundation.org

Stay dry and have a wonderful afternoon!

www.homelessfamiliesfoundation.org

Fans....

The last few days have been beautiful! With the weather heating up, so will our apartment units for our families. We are in need of fans! We have found the fans that work best are the ones shown in this picture. We have purchased them in the past from places like Wal-mart and Target in the $25-$30 price range. If you have any questions please feel free to call Karie (614) 461-9247 or email kgallegos@homelessfamiliesfoundation.org. Enjoy the sunshine!

Happy Mother's Day...

"To the world you may be one person, but to one person you may be the world."

Homeless Families Foundation staff would like to wish all the beautiful mother's a Happy Mother's Day....Relax and enjoy!

http://www.homelessfamiliesfoundation.org/

Tiffany...

Tiffany is a Case Manager with the Rolling Stock Program. She holds a Bachelors Degree from Randolph Macon College in Ashland Virginia. She is originally from the Westside of Columbus, and now lives with her husband and daughter here in town. Tiffany brings a variety of experience to the team. Tiffany enjoys backpacking and being in the mountains or on the beach.

Rotary Day 2011

Thank you Rotarians for all the help on Saturday! Bushes were pruned, weeds were pulled and mulch was spread at The Dowd Education Center.

It is only through community support that we can continue our mission. To provide shelter, support, stability, and nurturing for homeless children and their families as they prepare to acquire permenant housing.

http://www.homelessfamiliesfoundation.org/

Pine Wood Derby 4/14/2011

The Homeless Families Foundation Dowd Education Center hosted its Annual Pine Car Derby. The Center's Boys Scouts, Girl Scouts, and staff all built and raced their cars while families cheered them on. Everyone had fun during the race and afterwards enjoyed a family style dinner and swapped stories.