The Gift of Pride for Christmas

NEW ALBANY, Ind. - Dec. 19, 2014 - PRLog -- It doesn’t matter if it was a bike, Baby Alive, basketball, soccer ball, or a Lego set being bought.   The gift being given the most this holiday season in Midtown is the gift of pride to our Kidtown kids!

We had the opportunity to award and shop with 5 of our Kidtown teens this week.  Jada, Tierra, Jaelyn, Kyla and Abby live less than a city block from the store. Thanks to our partners at the Walmart Foundation and Dare to Care the girls were awarded each a $100 gift card from Meijer.

Back in the fall all 5 had volunteered to work with Clean Socks Hope as part of our annual Hope Music Festival and Midtown Street Fair (http://www.cleansockshope.org/hope-music-festival/). They worked the tent for 8 hours and gave tours of the Christmas Store. 75% of the touring families shopped this year and 12 new families we’re added to our needs list. Each girl can be directly credited with that success!

We began our Christmas Store – Hope For Parents program 3 years ago.  It replaced our Adopt-a-Family program that had suburban families delivering presents to the homes of needy families. Once we saw the hurt in eyes of struggling parents as they watched others provide for their children, we knew we had to find a better way.

Our Christmas Store becomes a bustling toy store between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  Generous people from all around the city have toy parties, go toy shopping with their kids, plan toy drives at their church or business and fill the store with an amazing array of bargains, from dolls to bicycles, board games to basketballs.  Inner-city parents then experience the excitement of earning those special gifts that they know will delight their children by working as volunteers in the community that they live!

Families earn Hope Buck Credits, instead of giving toys and gift items away, we believe that our families would prefer to provide for themselves than receiving a demeaning hand out.

Thus, the donations of toys become gifts that keep on giving all year long.  What a child really needs, after all – even more than a Christmas toy is an effective and providing parent.

Give a gift that will change lives. Give 100% Pride.