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It's so much fun to do something kind for someone else that it's almost impossible to stay depressed. The activities can be simple and fun or they can be emotional and sobering. One of my favorites was wheeling sweet, little old ladies through Disneyland! You can find volunteer opportunities in churches, newspapers, charities, at work, or make up your own. Please click on an example activity: | Love Stinks Valentine's Day Walk | Parties for Children's Homes | Parties at Retirement Homes | Baby Showers at Crisis Pregnancy Centers | Special Olympics | Mary's Kitchen | Thank You Notes to Those That Have Made a Difference | Love Stinks Valentine's Day Walk - A great singles activity! One year, when I was a Sierra Club leader, I had just broken up with a fellow leader. We had a very playful, fun relationship but it just didn't work out. When Valentine's Day rolled around, I still really missed him AND I couldn't resist the chance to take a little, no-too-subtle jab at him. I lead the first annual "Love Stinks Valentine's Day" walk for the Sierra Club 20's and 30's Singles. On our walk, my friends and I handed out penny Valentine's with conversation hearts and Hershey's kisses (I promised that everyone would get kisses - Hershey). We had a large, pizza-sized, decorated chocolate chip cookie and gave away a box of Valentine's chocolates as a door prize. We did our walk in Marina Del Rey, handed out all the goodies and then went for pizza. It was great. This walk became very popular and in subsequent years, there were always over a hundred people on the walk. Out of my sadness came something that was a lot of fun for me and my friends, and was fun for people who may have also been sad and lonely. Parties for Children's Homes This is fun and easy. Get a group of your friends to help. Centering the party around a holiday (i.e. Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Fourth of July, Easter, etc) gives you an instant theme and makes decorating easy. After we did a few of these parties, we pretty much got it down to a science. Here's our party formula: Serve a snack Cookies and milk and gummy worms. A fun snack is individual "Mud and Worms Pudding". Use see-through plastic cups. Put in instant chocolate pudding, top with Oreo cookie crumbs, top with gummy worms. Next a craft activity (choose one or more) Headbands Cut 2" strips of white poster board, long enough to go around their heads, leave enough for overlap and stapling. This is the headband. Make two antennae for each band. Intertwine two pipe cleaners, in holiday colors, for each antenna. Top each antenna with a heart, or shamrocks, etc.          or For Easter, make bunny ears. Cut out an ellipse from white poster board. Draw a smaller pink ellipse in glitter on the inside. Let the kids write their names in glue on the headbands. Then sprinkle the headband with glitter. Warning: this is messy! Have paper underneath to catch the glitter and supervise. Decorate/make cards. Make Easter baskets (Decorate Chinese food cartons, using crayons, stickers, etc. Fill with Easter Grass. Follow with an Easter egg hunt). The kids love these so much you can do them at any season and rename them. Third a dance activity, if you know one Chicken dance, Raisin dance, or a light, fun, aerobic dancy thing (hip-hop?). If you really get into it, start with a warm-up (very light song), do a couple light-medium songs and end with a cool down (very light song). The goal is to have no injuries. The Grand Finale -- Face Painting This may seem intimidating at first. But once you realize that a five year old really can't tell that that big green blob you just put on their face isn't Godzilla, it's a piece of cake! You'll need face paint and stencils. Buy them after Halloween, they're cheaper. Or you could use lipsticks, eye pencils - not your good ones. You can use stencils or freehand it. You can paint flowers, happy faces, suns, rainbows, cat noses and whiskers, etc. The following examples demonstrate my point that "talent is optional!" Flower, Happy Face, Heart, Cat Nose and Whiskers Parties at Retirement Homes Take a group of friends. Gather all the retirees in a room. Clowning for the Ladies OOPS! A Photography 101 Shot! Entertainers and Entertainees Some ideas: Sing. If you have someone that can play a musical instrument, it helps. Keep in mind the basic tenet that due to the fact that these precious people are so bored and so happy to have any diversion, they will barely notice if you have no talent. Lead a dance that they can do sitting with just their arms and hands. Have a reason to go up to each one of them and give them individual attention. You can gently shake their hand and look in their eyes and greet them. You can give them each a $.10 "Pass It On" card from the Christian bookstores. You can give them each a snack. The real goal of the entire trip is to take some of their loneliness away. Take nail polish and hand lotion and do manicures. (Leave a bottle of nail polish remover with the person in charge). Make Kleenex flower corsages for each lady. Take two Kleenex and fan fold (approx. 3/4" folds). This is a little long so you may need to cut off an inch or so to shorten it. Staple fan-folded kleenex in center. Cut 1" slits on the tips of folds. Start pulling each separate layer towards the center, making it looking like a fluffy flower. Put a little greenery or Baby's Breath behind the flower. Tie off with a little ribbon. Serve snacks. If it's all women, serve pretty "lady" snacks, pastel cake and tea? Take some diabetic candy and ask the person in charge if the diabetics can have the candy. Find out who they are. We had a diabetic lady "helping" us with the cake, wolfing it down like crazy. When I found out she was a serious diabetic, I was horrified. Bring a Fourth of July picnic lunch or BBQ for them. Make Fourth of July (red, white and blue) headbands for them like we made for the children's home. Don't force the headbands on anyone. Some of them will put them on just to humor you. But the idea may be just crazy enough to be fun for them! This is something you can do alone or with another person. Ask the person in charge for permission. If you have a really well behaved dog, take the dog in to be petted. Again don't force the dog on anyone, give a wide berth to anyone who appears to be uncomfortable or afraid. Some of the people love animals so much that it is really a treat. Baby Showers at Crisis Pregnancy Centers Wouldn't it be fun to get some friends together and give baby showers at a crisis pregnancy center (for the expectant moms-to-be that are having an especially hard time)? You could knit or crochet booties or a baby blanket*. You could make something, or buy something - maybe a couple of inexpensive gifts. Add some refreshments, decorations, and maybe even a shower game. A Fun Shower/party Game: wrap up a couple of inexpensive gifts and maybe even a "white elephant" gift. The game is the most fun when one gift may be great and another may be a "dud." Have two identical sets of numbers enough so each person gets at least two numbers. Pass out one set of numbers to the group. You call the number with the duplicate set of numbers. The person who has the number gets to pick a gift. The person with the next number can pick from the unclaimed gifts or take someone else's away. The person who's gift has been taken away, gets to pick a new one or someone else's (not the one that she just lost). This goes until everyone's numbers are gone. It's fun. My boss used to have a Christmas party and do this with unwrapped Christmas ornaments. One local center is Pregnancy Help Clinic of Glendale and Hollywood . Pregnancy Help Clinic of Glendale, 1911 West Glenoaks Boulevard, Suite A, Glendale, California 91201. Office - (818) 843-0423. FAX: (818) 843-0495, E-mail: info@phc.org . Pregnancy Help Clinic of Hollywood, 1131 North Vermont Avenue, Suite 107, Hollywood, California 90029. Office - (213) 913-2066. "The Special Olympics is a nonprofit, international organization that provides a year-round program of sports training and competition for children and adults with mental retardation." The athletes work hard and are an inspiration! The time I saw an athlete come in on a gurney, it made me ashamed about all the times I complained to God about how hard MY life was. The Southern California Summer Games are in June. (They used to be at UCLA but I think they have moved to Cal State Long Beach.) It is fun to go to the Opening Ceremonies on Friday night and cheer on the athletes. The Opening Ceremonies are a really good introduction to the Special Olympics. If you would like to become more involved there are an endless number of great volunteer opportunities. You can help by serving meals to the athletes, cheering them on, timing the events, etc., etc. Mary's Kitchen      Mary McAnnena is a little 95 year-old Irish woman. If I remember the story right, in her eighties, Mary couldn't understand how in a country with so much wealth and abundance, there were people going hungry. So she decided if nobody else was going to feed the homeless, she would! She started getting donations, cooking meals in her kitchen and then delivering them to the homeless in the park. Mary took an interest in their lives. She would get them toiletries, clothes, and tried to get them jobs. I had the privilege of meeting her and helping out one day. I felt like I was talking to Mother Theresa. She was incredible. The whole experience touched me deeply. I'll never forget the little old man who set up, carried the heavy pans, and did the dishes. He came up to me and said, "I'm one of the workers. We get extra food. Could you just give me a little extra food, I'm so hungry." I cried all the way home. It's been years and I can still see his face. I still cry when I think of him. God forgive me for the times that I've judged the homeless as being lazy. He wasn't lazy, merely a victim of circumstance, and my heart broke for him. I recently found out that the city has given her a temporary building in Orange, CA at Battavia and (517) W. Struck, where she feeds the homeless. This used to be a weekday (only) operation. The phone number on the sign is 714 633-0444. I contacted Holy Family Church in Orange to find out about her. Write Thank You Notes to People Who Have Made a Difference in Your Life The title says it all. A great idea that I heard on Christian radio. Sorry I don't remember the originator of the idea. Back    Top    Home    Great Links    Products    Ordering Info    Copyright © foodieWalks.com 2003