Welcome to our Birthday Bags Site

Link to News10 Segment

Hi everyone.  Here is the link to our "Birthday Bag" segment on News10.  Check it out!!

Or Watch it here,

We Reached 200 Bags!!

Over 200 Birthday Bags Delivered!!! 

We did it!  We delivered our 206th bag in 2006!!!  What a great way to end the year!  This was a special month for us, Grandpa and Grandma Martin (aka Bob and Della) funded the birthday bags this month which meant we got to go shopping as a family, and Danny and Sarah got to pick out ALL of the gifts.  The kids usually get to pick out one or two gifts each month but I get most of our gifts when I find things on clearance, and I never know when or where that's going to be.  Sarah picked out dog and cat books with coordinating stuffed animals, Danny couldn't resist a couple of Star Wars items (a C3PO figure and light saber), and both kids picked out Littlest Pet Shop figures.  We also had some board games and Henry and Mudge books (again, a Danny favorite).  The kids really enjoyed shopping and picking out all the gifts, our basket was full, and it was hard to narrow it down to just 10.  As always, we had fun putting the bags together, and since the kids were out of school they came with me to drop them off.  We posted more pictures in the photo album.  Check them out!

We are looking forward to another fun filled year making our "Birthday Bags" and brightening the birthdays of local children.  It means so much to us to have found a hands-on way to help local families, especially children, and we are so thankful and grateful for the support of our family and friends.  I think our family gets as much joy from making the "bags" as the recipients get from receiving them and we hope that when you read our blog that it puts a smile on your face and warms your heart.  We fill with pride every time Danny and Sarah do something totally on their own in support of our "bags".  We are so proud of them!

We wish everyone a happy and healthy 2007.

Christmas Stockings for Senior Citizens

We came up with a fun school project in December. We coordinated with Meals on Wheels and made Christmas stockings for Auburn area seniors. Two 2nd grade classes from Skyridge Elementary (including Danny's) personalized, decorated, and stuffed 46 stockings that were delivered to seniors the week before Christmas.  Each child picked a senior from the Meals on Wheels list and used glue and glitter to write the recipients name on the stocking and then added custom decorations to make the stocking a one of a kind creation.  We added a note that said, "Made just for you by:" and the child signed their name. The students really took ownership of "their" senior and it was really neat to see. 

We asked the students and their families to bring in little items to stuff the stockings with and the families came through with lots of great stuff. We had all kinds of goodies: bath accessories, word searches, note pads, pens, ornaments, cookies, candy, stuffed animals, just to name a few. The kids had a lot of fun with this project and were even featured in the Auburn Journal (check out the story).

The stockings were distributed by Meals on Wheels drivers (myself included).  One of the Meals on Wheels volunteer drivers donated mandarin oranges and cute Christmas themed stuffed animals as well. It was so fun to knock on the seniors doors, hand them the stocking with their name on it, and tell them they were made by second graders just for them.  One of my senior friends told me this was the first real stocking she ever had.  As a child, she and her siblings hung her fathers socks over the fireplace but this was her first "stocking".  All of the seniors greeted us with smiles and thank yous!

Some of the 2nd graders wrote letters about their "Stocking for Seniors" experience and they all said they really enjoyed it.  This was a fun and easy project the kids enjoyed, the seniors enjoyed, the teachers enjoyed, and the Meals on Wheels drivers enjoyed.  We're hoping we can do it again next year with Sarah's class!!

Merry Christmas!

Children's books for AIFC

Danny, Sarah, and I donated 39 books and 24 children magazines to the Auburn Food Closet.  They have set up a new program where children may select and take home a book each time they come to the food closet.  Parents are also encouraged to take a book home to their child if the child isn't with them that day.  Danny and Sarah love books and we think this is a neat program.  Most of the donated books were from Sarah's library since Danny's books are passed along to Sarah.  She was really cute, looking at the books, deciding she had read them enough times, and saying "it's time to pass it along."  Of course we kept several of our favorites, you can never read them enough times!!  Most of the books were very well loved, we get a lot of our books passed down to us or we buy them at the thrift store, but we hope the children who read them love them as much as we have.  If you have any books you're ready to pass along let me know and we'll be happy to drop them off for you with our monthly delivery of Birthday Bags.

Happy Reading!!

How we make bags (by Danny)

How we make bags is we first choose the toy for the boy or girl who receive them. Then we choose the bag, cake, frosting, tissue, and candles. And my mom drives us to the AIFC to drop them off.

From,Danny

Birthday Bags (by Sarah)

I like making Birthday Bags for kids.  We give them to the food closet.    I hope the kids had GREAT birthdays!!!!! 

Love,  Sarah

WOW! We're going to be on TV

Hello again!  December is an exciting month for us and our Birthday Bag program.  We'll be hitting a big milestone in December, delivering our 200th bag, and last week we were interviewed by News10 about our "Birthday Bag" program.  The AIFC (Auburn Interfaith Food Closet) called a few weeks ago and told us that News10 was interested in running a story about us and our bags.  The kids and I were so excited, we watch News10, so we were already familiar with their news cast and their Good News/Good People segments. 

Last Friday, 12/1, News10 reporter, Dea Diamant, and camera man, Dave Novick, came to the house.  Trish Jensen from the food closet was also here, she and Doug were awesome moral support (I was so nervous!).  I set the dining room up as I usually do each month; with bags, cake mixes, frostings, candles, tissue paper, and gifts, so the kids could "shop" and put together their bags.  The kids were a little nervous, too, but they did a great job putting together the bags, and Dea did a wonderful job interviewing them.  After all the bags were made and loaded into the van, we all headed to AIFC to drop off the bags.  The president of AIFC, Sandy Bassett, met us at there and we presented her the bags.  Sandy was so friendly and warm, and she said very nice things about our "Birthday Bag" program. Our only disappointment of the day was that our friend, Shirley, had another engagement and was not able be at the food closet Friday afternoon.  She has been our partner and contact since the beginning, we would have loved to have shared this with her.

We enjoyed meeting more of the AIFC volunteers and learning more about the food closet.  They serve over 465 families a month (with over 553 children).  We also learned about other areas where AIFC could use our help.  I will discuss these in more detail soon and see if we can find ways to help them even more.  I would love to be able to match up needs with resources.

The whole day was a fun experience for Danny, Sarah, Doug and me. It's not often that a news crew comes to your house and spends some time.  We don't know when our segment will air, but Dea said she would call when she has a date, and I will follow up at that time.  It would be really exciting if people saw our segment and thought "Wow, I could do something like that!"  We would love for a person, family or organization to see our "Birthday Bag" segment and start one of their own, like I did when I heard the story.  Or maybe there might be some interest in helping us grow so we can reach even more children.  You never know what the future holds and I'm just excited about getting the idea out there.  Everyone we've met through this entire experience has been so thoughtful and wonderful, it would be great if more people could share in the fun with us.

Thanks again to everyone for your time and support and I'll be in touch soon. -Cheri

A Year in Review

Hello Everyone!  I can't believe it's been over a year since I sent out my last update.  I thought I would have a little more free time when both kids were in school for full days but as many of you know, it doesn't work out that way.  I'm sorry for the delay; here's an update on our "Birthday Bags".

Our "Birthday Bag" program is still going strong!!  Yesterday we dropped off our 196th birthday bag (we were accompanied by News10, which was very exciting, and I'll write more about that soon).  We've settled into a nice groove; we've learned the best places to get really good deals and supplies, and we've learned some of the gifts that are more popular than others.  Danny and Sarah still enjoy working on the bags and helping to brighten the birthdays of Auburn area children.  We continue to donate 10 bags a month and each month all of the bags get distributed to parents who have a child with a birthday that month. 

This past year we've had some really nice help.  Our neighbor Gena gave us 9 new Bionicle and Knights Kingdom figures.  Over the years, Gena's boys and Danny have really enjoyed building Bionicles so it was exciting to have some to share.  Gena's generosity supplied us with older-boy gifts for 9 months.  Having a great gift for older boys is AWESOME!  Thank you Gena!

My friend Michelle recently donated $20 to our program and I purchased 80 boxes of birthday candles.  That's 8 months worth of special birthday "wishes"!  When's the last time $20 touched so many children?  Making a wish and blowing out candles is such a part of childhood birthdays and it's exciting to be a part of that.  Thank you Michelle for helping us share this joy with so many children!

My husband Doug has been working on a website/blog for us so that we can keep everyone updated on our progress.  Now I have no excuse for not publishing updates!  It's going to be great having somewhere I can post our news and where friends and family can check in on us when they have time.  We'll be keeping you posted as we move forward.  A special thank you to Doug!

Many other friends and family members have offered their support and encouragement too.  We've had helpers come and make bags with us, which is always fun!  Thank you to everyone who checks in with us, encourages us, and helps us.  Your support keeps us going!

During the last school year Sarah continued to accompany me when we dropped off bags.  The food closet closes at 2:00 and Danny didn't get out of school until 2:15 so he wasn't able to come with us.  This year, Sarah also gets out at 2:15 so  I've dropped bags off a few times without them.  I really miss having them with me and Sarah mentioned that she misses delivering the bags so I'm going to check into dropping bags off on Saturdays during the school year so we can all go together again.  One of the things the kids enjoyed about summer vacation was being able to drop off bags at the food closet.

We wish everyone a happy and healthy 2006 Holiday Season!  I am really looking forward to the January clearance sales so we can stock up on birthday gifts for 2007.  Doug and I have given up about 1/4 of our closet space to store all of our wonderful supplies and we're willing to give up even more if we need to!  As always, please watch for those bargains and let me know when you find them so I can go stock up or next time you see a great deal, pick up a few things for us.  It really is fun to give a child a birthday surprise!

All our best,

Cheri

Delivered 8 More Bags

Hi All. Sarah and I delivered another 8 birthday bags to the food closet this afternoon. Shirley was happy to see us because they had passed out all of the bags from last month.  We had some really cute gifts this month and as usual we had fun putting them together.

The kids and I are pretty excited because we have now delivered 56 bags. When we first came up with the idea we hoped to donate 50 bags the first year and we've beaten that goal in 6 months. At this rate we'll touch the lives of more than 100 children in our first year. Thank you to everyone who has helped and encouraged us. We couldn't have done as much without you.
I hope everyone has a wonderful October!

Another 10 Birthday Bags

Great news. Our Birthday Bag program continues to gain momentum and we donated another 10 Birthday Bags in June. We’ve provided special birthdays to 30 children whose families have hit hard times. That is so many more than we thought we’d do in three months. Danny and Sarah had a lot of fun again putting the bags together and this month Sarah matched candle and cake colors as best she could. Good thing I found some strawberry cake mix to go with the pink candles. Danny’s favorite gift was a Bionicle, no surprise there. Hopefully there’s another little boy out there that loves Bionicles as much as he does.

Shirley shared another story with us when we dropped the bags off at the Auburn Food Closet. One of their clients came in and asked Shirley if the food closet had any cake mixes because her young daughter was having a birthday. Shirley told her she had something better and offered the mother a birthday bag. The mother appreciated receiving the goodies and was excited that she would be able to bake and decorate the cake herself as well as wrap the gift before she gave it to her daughter. I was really glad Shirley shared this story with us. One of my goals in making the Birthday Bags was to provide parents with items they need to give their child a special birthday but allow the parent the joy of baking the cake and wrapping the gift. I know how much fun I have baking and decorating birthday cakes with Danny and Sarah and how much I enjoy wrapping their present and then watching them open the gift. The fact that this mom got what I was trying to do made me really happy.

Shirley also shared with us that when a family registers with the food bank they list children with birth dates. When a family comes in the volunteers can see if a child in the family is having a birthday and can offer one of our bags. Shirley said the staff really enjoys having something colorful and fun to offer these families and that it brightens everyone’s day.

A special thanks to Bob and Della and to Angela for helping us with our bags this month. We really appreciate it.  I hope everyone has a wonderful July!   Thank you all for your support.