A giant thank you to all of you who joined as we teamed up with One Heart Ministries for our December event, delivering Christmas gifts to the disabled people in our community. I know things were a little crazy at first (finding gifts, wrapping gifts, labeling gifts....) but I think it was so worth the effort! The disabled individuals who were the receipients of the gifts were so thankful and excited to not only get some gifts, but to see the new faces of people who cared enough to bring them. Thank you to all of the drivers who drove all over the city looking for the homes to deliver the gifts to! And Co-pilots, hopefully you all did a better job of reading the maps for your driver than I did for mine!! (You rock Myra!!) And I have to admit, I was super excited to have my brother, Greg, on my list to deliver to! He was soooooo excited!!!!! For a little while, I didn't think he was going to let us leave! I even had to change a lightbulb for him before we could go!! Heehee!! But I think we need to take the time to give out one special award for this event! The award is "I'm a Trooper!!" and it goes out to Jason Hoeppner who not only showed up with three small children, let them help him wrap and organize (while showing an amazing amount of patience!) but then he had to deliver the gifts on his own with the kids!! No co-pilot!! And he did it!!! Way to go Jason!!! You have totally earned this award!! :)

One Heart Christmas Deliveries Slide Show

Help a Neighbor Day

I think everyone enjoyed joining together to help two elderly women who live in our community with their yard work. The first yard was soooo large and full of leaves...but our group jumped right in and took on the challenge. Before long, we had completely raked all of the yard and had a HUGE pile of leaves waiting by the road for pick up!! I'm just not sure if they had more fun raking the leaves or jumping in them!! I am sure that Norma appreciated our work because she sent the most lovely thank you note to our group!! Since we completed this yard so quickly, we then moved on to a second yard. Even though the yard was smaller, there was still plenty to do! And we have to give Mike Pond a special pat on the back for mowing the lawn!!! The kids had so much fun... I'm sure this is one we will be doing again!!

Juvenile Diabetes Walk

With as many as 3 million Americans suffering from type 1 diabetes, we knew this was a cause that we could support! On October 3rd, we had a great turn out for the 2 mile fun walk around Franke Park!! The weather was a little soggy, but that didn't stop us from having a lot of fun! I want to congratulate our group which raised over $600 to help in the research efforts of diabetes!! Way to go kids!!

Walk NOW for Autism

On September 12th, our group met at the Allen County Fair Grounds to help run the Walk NOW For Autism event. I want to personally thank everyone for their willingness to be flexible and work where ever we were needed. I know we were orginally signed up to serve food, but most of us ended up running the games and passing out prizes to walk participants...which I think the kids LOVED doing!! Of course, they had to try the games out themselves!! We even had a few members of our group join the walk just for fun!! A little extra exercise is always good!!