The Toy Drive

Last Saturday I had the opportunity to co-spearhead a Toy Drive for our local foster kids in the Rexburg area. My friend and fellow intern, Erik, and I volunteered to put it on as a service to our internship at Child Protection. We spent hours cutting out little Christmas Trees and snowmen-each had a real foster kid (that we know and love)'s gender and age on them. 

We got volunters to do 2 hours shift from 9am-5pm.

The day of, Erik took the morning and I took the afternoon. 

How it worked: We stood outside WalMart (a volunteer on each door, with a cart and a handful of paper snowmen and christmas trees) and asked patrons as they were walking in if they would like to buy a present for a local foster kid in their area. They could generally pick form the pile the age and gender they preferred to buy for, and then return it to us in our carts at the door. 

The response that we got was incredible.

We had a good 4 or 5 van loads of presents by the time we were done. 

The people of Rexburg were so generous and willing to help!

It was freezing.. frost bite is a real thing.. it stopped being funny when it hurt to walk, my feet were so cold! im 99% sure i got sick from this day.

But it was worth it. 

People were coming up to me and saying. "Of course we will help, what do you need?"

or

"No.. thank you. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to serve."

To me, that is what the gospel of our Savior Jesus Christ is all about. 

I was reminded of that this weekend. 

Thanks, Rexburg. I just love you. Youve brought so much joy to my life!

Dev was my runner. He came the last part of the day-when a cart would fill up with presents, he would empty it into the van!

Mary holding our paper snowmen and holding down the side door!

Stuffing the van to the brim!

Erik and I in front of our loot! The tables stretched clear down the hallway behind us.

..And there were presents on every surface of the tables.

Thank you, thank you. To everyone who helped in any way. Happy Christmas:)