2006 Marblehead Chamber of Commerce
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2007 Backpack & School Supply Drive
2007 Holiday Stocking Drive
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Community of Friends would like to thank everyone who helped us with our 2007 Holiday Stocking Drive. Over 500 children received beautifully handcrafted and decorated holiday stockings filled with generous and loving gifts. So many individuals, families, organizations and businesses helped us help these underserved children. Whether you cut fabric into stockings, sewed sweaters for teddy bears, held a stocking decoration party or filled a stocking, we truly appreciate your support!

5th Annual Stocking Drive Is Underway!

Click here to download the informational brochure
that includes the suggested gift list and stocking guidelines
(in pdf format)

As of Thursday, December 6th, we are down to our final 20 unsponsored children. Please help us reach our goal.
You can pick up a tag and stocking at Mud Puddle Toys (1 Pleasant Street, Marblehead).

All filled stockings and gifts are due back by December 13th.
If all of the gifts do not fit in the stocking, place the stocking and gifts in a larger bag.
Please do not wrap the gifts, but donating giftwrapping paper is quite acceptable.

Click here for a list of drop-off locations

This holiday season, Community of Friends has committed to filling 500 stockings for local area children-in-need. We are looking for help from our community to SPONSOR a child or two. We would provide you with a handmade stocking and a tag that has the child's first name, age, gender and possibly clothing sizes and a suggested gift. You (and your family) are then responsible for filling the stocking with appropriate gifts.

This year we are asking that the value of the filled stocking be approximately $65. We are suggesting this value so each child receives close to the same amount of presents. If you were planning on spending less than $65, you could team up with a friend or sibling to sponsor a child. We know of many lady friends who will sponsor one child and have a wonderful time shopping for this child. If you were planning on spending much more, you may want to sponsor more than one child. You could also buy extra gifts that Community of Friends would use to fill un-sponsored stockings. If Community of Friends feels a stocking contains too many gifts, we reserve the right to remove some of the items and put them into other less-filled stockings.

At this time, Community of Friends would like to THANK all of our stocking cutters and sewers who are making the stockings from donated fabric! They look wonderful and the children will be thrilled when they see them!!! We could not continue to help so many children without your dedicated cutting and sewing skills. You are certainly our unsung heros!
 

When an individual or family shops for a specific "sponsored" child, a heartfelt bond is often made, despite the fact that the child remains anonymous. This stocking drive is a fantastic way to teach our children about the joys and rewards of philanthropy.

If you want to sponsor a child, we would provide you with a stocking and a tag for a specific child. To sign up, visit us at one of the upcoming events, or contact us directly. Community of Friends will have a table at the following upcoming holiday fairs:

  • Junior Aid Society Holiday Shop, Tedesco Golf Course Clubhouse, Marblehead.
    • Thursday, November 15th, 6 p.m. - 9 p.m. ($15 donation to benefit Jr. Aid Society)
    • Friday, November 16th, 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. ($2 donation to benefit Jr. Aid Society)
    • Saturday, November 17th, 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. ($2 donation to benefit Jr. Aid Society)

  • Artisans' Holiday Marketplace, Abbot Hall, Marblehead.
    • Saturday, December 1, 10 a.m. - 5 p.m.: Look for us at the top of the stairs on the lefthand side.
    • Sunday, December 2, 10 a.m. - 4 p.m.: Same location.

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All filled stockings are due by Thursday, December 13, so we may deliver them in time for Christmas.

Drop-off locations include:

  • Mud Puddle Toys, corner of Pleasant & Washington St, Marblehead
  • Raveis Real Estate, 123 Pleasant Street, Marblehead
  • Grossman's Delicatessen, 252 Humphrey Street, Marblehead
  • Marblehead Athletic Club, 46 Tioga Way, Marblehead
  • A Dancer's Dream Studio, 222 Beacon Street, Marblehead

  • Community of Friends' Stocking Drop-off Party, St. Michael's Church, Pleasant Street, Marblehead
    • Thursday, December 13th, 4 p.m. - 7 p.m.: Look for us in the Parish Hall.

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Who we help:

Community of Friends expects to fill approximately 500 stockings for children-in-need mostly from the Lynn and Salem communities. This year, we will also be helping the METCO children who live in the Boston area but attend Marblehead public schools. The names of the children are given to Community of Friends by known social service organizations. These include:

Lynn DSS (approximately 90 children)
Through Lynn DSS, Community of Friends has teamed up with two internal charities, Cherish the Children and SAIL, to provide the children with holiday stockings and school backpacks filled with supplies for the new school year.

Cherish the Children is a charity started a few years ago by a Lynn DSS administrative assistant who wanted to provide a little extra for "her" children. 75 children received filled backpacks in 2007.

SAIL is a program sponsored by Lynn DSS that fosters an independent living environment for local teenagers. These young adults live in a group home, attend school, have their own bank account, cook their own meals, and work at part-time jobs. Eleven SAIL teens received backpacks in 2007.

Lynn's Serving People In Need, Inc. (SPIN) (approximately 90 children)
Community of Friends works with SPIN's Scattered Site Family Emergency Shelter (SSFES) that provides temporary, transitional and permanent housing, coupled with support services for young mothers, low income, homeless and at risk individuals and families. Most of these children have been homeless within the past 12 months. Community of Friends provided SSFES with 94 school backpacks filled with school supplies in 2007 and sponsored 90 children for stockings and holiday gifts in 2006. SPIN offices are located above the My Brother's Table soup kitchen in downtown Lynn.

Salem's St. Joseph's Food Pantry / Friends of Mary Jane Lee Park (200 children)
In the heart of South Salem between Lafayette Street and the Salem Harbor, there is a neighborhood referred to as the Point that consists of rows of tenant and three-decker homes containing hundreds of low income and minority families. There are over 500 children within this neighborhood that need our assistance. This year, Community of Friends provided backpacks and school supplies to 215 of these children. We are hoping to provide between 200 filled stockings to these same children.

Community of Friends works with a grass-roots organization that is centrally located in this neighborhood and responsible for the local park called the Mary Jane Lee Park. This organization, The Friends of Mary Jane Lee Park, is located in the basement of one of the two family homes and has programs year round for the children including: after-school programs, Halloween party, Christmas party, Easter Egg Hunt, and a summer park program that serves lunch to the children. This group is affiliated with the St. Joseph's Food Pantry and desperately needs outside assistance to keep these children active in safe programs and away from the drug environment.

Lynn's Cornerstone HIV Wellness Center children (14 children)
Community of Friends is teaming up once again with Lynn's Cornerstone HIV Wellness Center to provide stockings to children who have been diagnosed as HIV positive who have one or two parents that are HIV positive. The fourteen children are from six families and come from four North Shore communities.

Lynn's KIPP Academy (31 children)
KIPP Academy is a charter school in Lynn for 5th through 8th graders that is modeled after the nationally recognized, tested, and proven Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP). KIPP is all about getting these children ready for a college prepratory-high school in order to advance to college. These children must be dedicated and put the time and effort into it. Their school day starts at 7 a.m. and finishes at 5 p.m., which does not include the mandatory two hours of nightly homework. 80% of the children are from minority families and 100% live in Lynn. To learn more about KIPP Academy, visit www.kipplynn.org.

Marblehead's children-in-need
Community of Friends has learned that Marblehead's underserved children are receiving holiday gifts through two local charities: Making Ends Meet Foundation and Someone Else's Child Foundation, 781-639-8740.

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Community of Friends
P.O. Box 836, Marblehead, MA 01945
phone: 781-639-3664
email: info @ communityoffriends.org (no spaces)