Wednesday, February 8, 2012

February Volunteering

Today, I went to Cradles to Crayons for their monthly Young Friends volunteering. Cradles to Crayons collects new and like new clothes, shoes, books, toys and school supplies and gives them to low income kids in the area. They have offices in Boston and Philly. Go here for more information.

This month for volunteering, they were packing kid packs and counting puzzle pieces. I find packing kid packs to be stressful because I don't know the children who are getting the packs, so I can't make informed decisions on what they want. I don't know their style, or what kinds of books they like, or what games they like to play. So, clearly, I picked counting puzzles.  (Full disclosure: I would have counted puzzle pieces anyway.) I really like puzzles and kind of wished I could do them instead of counting them. Could I have started with a 24 piece puzzle and stuck to puzzles of 100 pieces or less? Yes. Did I? Clearly not. I started with a 500, did another 500, then did some smaller ones, then 1,000. That's how I spent two hours today. And I enjoyed it. Even if I left feeling a bit cross-eyed.

Side note: if you ever want to volunteer, or have any new or gently used kids items you want to donate, let me know.

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