Less than a week ago, the Children’s Foundation of Guelph and Wellington put a call out for 80 donors for its Adopt-A-Family program. On Tuesday morning, it announced all of those families now have donors.
The Adopt-A-Family program plans to wrap up operations by the end of this week for a few reasons, said Karyn Kirkwood, program director for Children’s Foundation of Guelph and Wellington .
“First, our team of volunteers has been working non-stop for the past four weeks and some for even longer and so they need to have a week to prepare for their own Christmas holidays,” said Kirkwood. “Social workers who refer families to the program also need to be wrapped up this week as they may be on holidays next week or needing to catch up on other work that has been put aside as they deliver gifts to their families.”
That’s why last week, Kirkwood told GuelphToday she was a little nervous to have 80 families waiting to be matched to donors, but as of Monday afternoon this week, the goal was met.
“We still had 14 large families waiting to be adopted. Given that we are wrapping things up this week, and there wasn’t time for donors to shop at this point, we ‘adopted’ them ourselves and will be filling their needs and wishes with the generous support of many cash donors and our gift drive donors,” said Kirkwood.
In total, 1,134 families were adopted this year, but Kirkwood expects some last minute additions to that list.
“Last year, we helped an additional 19 families in the week leading up to Christmas,” noted Kirkwood. “So there is still a way that donors can help us in preparing for these later family referrals by donating much-needed grocery and gift cards or by making a cash donation.”
The Adopt-A-Family program accepts lists of ‘needs’ and ‘wishes’ from families referred by various social service agencies and neighbourhood groups in Guelph and Wellington County.
The items on the ‘needs’ list can include anything from winter coats and boots, bedding, pyjamas, socks and underwear to items like diapers.
The ‘wish’ list items include anything you would expect a child to ask for at Christmas.
Donors matched to a family provide as many — or all — of the items on that family’s lists.
Kirkwood said the program wouldn’t be possible without the support of the community, donors and volunteers.
"Every year, tears flow as we hear some of the families’ stories of hardship as it is always heartbreaking to hear about the struggles they are going through,” said Kirkwood. “And then when the donors respond with an outpouring of love and support, tears flow again as we see how much care has gone into their shopping for their ‘adopted’ families.”
Donors who wish to still provide support for the holidays can contact Adopt-a-Family at 519-829-0855 or by email to find out more about how they can still help this year.
