Project Night Night

It all started with a facebook post. A friend of mine on facebook posted a link to a cause that she really thought was great. So of course, I clicked. It was called Project Night Night. Basically, what Project Night Night does is provide a Night Night Bag to homeless children. In each bag, there is a blankie, a book, and a stuffed animal. It is all put inside a tote bag. The bags are distributed to local shelters who then give them to children that check into the shelter. The bags are theirs to keep. Kids often show up to shelters with absolutely nothing of their own - this give them a little comfort and something they can keep forever.

As many of you can relate, since having kids, I can hardly bear to think about bad things happening to children. Not that it was tolerable before I had Keira, but since having my own, I can't even watch tv shows where something bad happens to kids. The thought of little children having to live in a shelter is heart breaking. To think about those children having nothing, is heartbreaking. It is making me tear up now just writing about it. I make no secret of the fact that I think my family is very blessed. We have a nice house, two cars, never have to worry about where our meals come from, we go on vacation, have plenty of clothes, etc etc. All the necessities and then some. So this random facebook post, felt like a personal little message to me to get involved. And give back.

At first, I was just going to do it on my own. But then decided, what if I could do it bigger? We just joined a new church and thought maybe I could get the church involved. Now, ya'll know I am not the most out-spoken of people - we really don't know anyone at church (and it's a big church!), so to randomly call the church office and say "Hey, I know you have no idea who I am, but I've got this great idea and was wondering if you could help me" is a big deal. And I actually chickened out a bit and e-mailed (I love e-mail!) ... so now the whole congregation is getting involved. It is in the church bulletin, the pastor talked about it last sunday, and it is in the newsletter that gets sent home. When we went to church on sunday, after news of this project had been in the bulletin for only a week, I decided to check out the drop box, not really thinking anything would be in it yet, but just wanting to check it and make sure the box was where it was suppossed to be. And to my surprise - there was TONS of stuff! I was so excited. After just a week, we already have enough stuff to fill 10 bags. And this drive will run through the end of September!

So this is my latest endeveor. If you are curious about the organization, below is the website. If you want to donate items, just let me know! I am collecting new or gently used books, new stuffed animals, and new or handmade blankets (crib size). The tote bags we purchase from project night night, so if you would like to make a monetary donation to help cover some of those costs, you can do that too (it's tax deductible!). We need as much stuff as we can get - the shelter we are donating these (SafeHome - a shelter for victims of domestic violence) to gets lots and lots of children every year. Or if you want to do your own drive, check out the website on how to get started.

Once we are done collecting, I'll let you know how we did!

http://www.projectnightnight.org/