My family and I have always looked for ways to give back to the community and help those that need it. This past year, I found out about a local woman’s shelter not too far from my house and I started a collection bin of basic necessities to take to the shelter. Whenever I am able to score awesome deals with coupons or rebates, I add them to the bin knowing that every little bit helps places that work off of donations.
When I heard that Champions for Kids and Post cereals were on a mission to fight childhood hunger this summer, I knew it was a project that would be a great fit for my family. The charity that we are donating to is a woman’s and children’s shelter in my community. I feel this is the best place to donate to for this mission, because there are a lot of children at this particular shelter who may not have access to food while out of school for the summer. While my toddler is still too young to understand the world outside of her cozy home, I want to make her aware that there are children out there who don’t have things she has. When I went through my pantry and started loading up boxes, I explained to her that I was giving the food to someone who didn’t have food. She had a lot of questions as to why people wouldn’t have food and I did my best in explaining it so that a toddler would understand. It is a hard concept to grasp, even for an adult- this day in age with access to food, especially in a developed country, people should not be hungry. It makes me sick to even think of all the food that is wasted in restaurants that can go to a hungry family. The Post Bowls of Hope project is setting out to prevent childhood hunger this summer. With so many children relying on free lunches throughout the school year, doesn’t it make you wonder what happens to these kids in the summer? In my community, children are eligible for free lunches throughout the summer by visiting a local school. Not all states have this awesome policy, and it makes it difficult for a family to provide meals for their family during the summer months on a limited budget.
We headed to Walmart for basic items. I knew I wanted to check out more about the Post Bowls of Hope project, so that was the first thing on my list. Other items on my list included diapers and wipes for my newborn, snacks for my toddler, and Excedrine for mama. We also needed a few things for the house, such as sponges and steel wool for the grill. Surprisingly, our list was very short compared to our typical Walmart trip. We live in NYC, so we don’t have a Walmart in the boroughs. When we make a Walmart trip it is usually for a large haul of necessities for the home.
Our first stop was the cereals. I didn’t notice any signage regarding the #PostCFK Post Bowls of Hope program, nor was there any mention of it on the boxes of cereal we picked up. This made my mission even more important- I felt that I had to help spread the word about childhood hunger BEFORE the summer started and the schools let out. During this mission, Post has asked us to “buy 2 give 1.” This means they want us to buy 2 boxes of post cereals for ourselves and give one box away. We grabbed our favorite: Honey Bunches of Oats with Almonds, and decided to try something new, Honey Bunches of Oats with Cinnamon. I’m not a cereal eater because it usually doesn’t satisfy me, but the flavor and crunch of Honey Bunches of Oats is enough to satiate my tastebuds in the morning that crave for something a little sweet with a big crunch.
After looking for more information in the store about Post Bowls for Hope, I came up short and had to move on. I had a cranky toddler that wanted everything she saw, and a newborn that was getting ready for her next feeding. On to the rest of the list- diapers. Once I was in the diaper aisle, I realized that if the mothers in the shelter had a hard time feeding their kids, they might have a hard time diapering them too if they have really little ones. I remembered I had a lot of unopened diapers my toddler outgrew and made a note to myself that I would be including them in the donation bin. Why didn’t I think of that sooner? After I picked up diapers for my newborn, I headed to the wipes. I decided I would go with the buy 2 give 1 method and picked up 3 packages of wipes- 2 for us and 1 to donate.
We have already let our friends and family know about the project we are working on and they have all shown interest in helping. We have a BBQ set up to invite them over and asked everyone to bring dried goods to donate for this cause. This isn’t the first time we set something like this up- but it is the first time we have done a project like this in the summer. We usually donate during the holiday season. You can check out my entire shopping trip experience by visiting my Google+ story.
Want to find out more? You can visit Champions for Kids on Facebook and Twitter to find out how you can help. Also, be sure to connect with Post on Facebook and by using the hashtag #PostCFK on Twitter!
I am a member of the Collective Bias™ Social Fabric® Community. This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias™ and Champions for Kids #CBias #SocialFabric”
I can’t wait to see how your BBQ drive turns out!