Saturday, August 11~Backpack Give Away WJUMC~

Sorry that it has been so long for this post.  Keeping pretty busy trying to get ready for my trip to Hawaii.  This week our church held a backpack and school supply give away and our Sunday school class was helping (in charge) which kept us all pretty busy.  We were all set for the Wednesday 2-3 give away, so we thought, with 100 backpacks and lots of pencils, notebooks, glue sticks, crayons, colored pencils, ink pens, crayons, index cards, highlighters, erasers and composition books.  What we did not expect were the 130 children that were lined up outside the church waiting to come in for their supplies.  Our plan was to have enough supplies that about half would be given away on Wednesday and we would still have enough for the Saturday 10-11 give away.  However, in about 40 minutes we had given all 100 backpacks away and most of our supplies were nearly gone as well.  The last 25-30 students in line really did not get much.  We were totally wiped out in more ways than the obvious.  We did not know what to do about Saturday since we had nothing left except the second hand clothing.  Pastor Pat came down to see how things were going and with her ever present positive attitude told us that we would try to get enough money to put together a few more backpacks by Saturday.  There was a little money left in our fund and she put a notice on the Church's Facebook page about how successful the day had been and also explained our dilemma.  Literally, within hours we had over $700 to re-stock our supplies.  Today we were able to meet more families with 80 new backpacks filled with basic school supplies.  We were also able to provide new socks and underwear for each student that came in to pick up their school supplies and backpack.  We gave away a total of 136 backpacks and about 50 individual bags of supplies.  The families and children were most appreciative and we were so grateful for the generosity of our community to help to make this Backpack Mission such a success.
On Sunday, we are going to hold our hand bell practice at the Madison House.  They love to hear us play and we love to see everyone.  Several of our Church members are now residents there, including both my parents so it is especially nice to play for them.
Tuesday is the day I will be jetting off to Hawaii so I am getting really excited to spend time with all 3 grandchildren and both daughters.  The flight there may be a bit of a challenge but I look forward to it.  Stay tuned for pictures of our adventure!