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Show Pleasant Grove Club Provides Christmas For Many Kids An added number of smiles will be on children's faces this Christmas morning, thanks to Christmas For Kids, a year-long program sponsored by The Independent In-dependent Order of Odd Fellows Fel-lows and Rebekah and Pleasant Grove businesses. Christmas For Kids volunteers volun-teers have been collecting toys, fundraising and shopping all year long to provide a complete Christmas for 50 to 75 local children and their families. The families are chosen from a list of interviewed applicants based on situation and economic challenges. chal-lenges. "We want to provide help for these families, get them over the hump and give them a little financial relief," explained Dan Turner, of Odd Fellows and Rebekah. Re-bekah. "Hopefully, by the next year, they are able to help others. oth-ers. It is a 'pay-it-forward' situation." situ-ation." Selected farrulies receive a generous meal for Christmas dinner including turkeys supplied sup-plied by Pleasant Grove Upholstery. Uphol-stery. The children, age newborn to sixteen, receive a complete Christmas, including toys, needed need-ed clothing and a special, handmade hand-made quilt donated by a local school of challenged teens. "The quilts are a special gift to the children. It is a 'win-win' 'win-win' situation for both the teens and the children," said Turner. Each family is assigned a designated, shopper that attempts at-tempts to fill the children's Christmas wish list. They select se-lect a shopping day and seek for bargains to give the children as much as possible with the funds provided. They also select from a storage room full of items collected col-lected throughout the year. After shopping all day, they meet together to wrap the gifts and deliver them to the grateful families. "This shopping and wrapping day gets everyone in a holiday mood," said Turner. Volunteers come from Odd Fellows and Rebekah as well as from past Christmas For Kids recipients. Generous donations are also received from local city leaders and businesses. Christmas For Kids relies on donations from the local businesses and generous citizens citi-zens to provide a happy Christmas Christ-mas for the families. Donation boxes are available for new, unwrapped toys at Pleasant Grove Upholstery, Allred's Ace Hardware, Pleasant Grove City Hall and other local businesses. Monetary donations are also appreciated ap-preciated and can be donated at Pleasant Grove Upholstery, 10 West Center, Pleasant Grove during business hours. Donations will be accepted until December 18,2010. ' "Everyone deserves a good Christmas," said Turner. "Please donate all you can. We do this for the kids. We are going to put a smile on a lot of kids' faces." Donations are also accepted at the upcoming Pleasant Grove Chamber of Commerce Holiday Party on December 12,2010. To donate to Christmas For Kids, please bring a new, unwrapped toy to the party and receive $2 off the price of lunch. |