18 November, 2010
The holiday season is a busy time at Project Just Because. Volunteers are busy trying to fill requests from Hopkinton families for Thanksgiving meals, but are coming up short on special items such as turkey gift certificates and other favorites such as stuffing and cranberry sauce.
According to President Cherylann Lambert-Walsh, 453 families in Hopkinton, each with between one and seven members, have requested Thanksgiving meals. While the recent food drive completed by Hopkinton Scouts has helped to stock the food pantry will staples, speical items are needed for the Thanksgiving requests. Gift certificates for turkeys, stuffing, cranberry sauce and other Thanksgiving favoritres are still needed.
A three wish holiday program is also underway and Lambert-Walsh has received over 15,000 requests to provide children with items for the holidays. Each gift bag is supposed to contain one warm item such as a blanket, one warm article of clothing such as a jacket or gloves, and one fun item.
"The requests for this program are about 10% higher than last year," said Lambert-Walsh. "We really could use some help."
Project Just Because hopes to be able to distribute the gift bags during the third week of December, but there are over 11,000 bags still waiting to be filled.
"We'll be here until the last child is taken care of," said Lambert-Walsh.
Donations can be dropped off at their 86 South Street location. For more information about drop off locations and times, please visit the Project Just Because website at http://projectjustbecause.org.
