Our thanks to Manna Food Center, Montgomery County Health and Human Services – MD, and Montgomery County Food Council for their mini-grant in support of our Kokua Foods Program. We enjoyed meeting members of your team and the other recipients of your mini-grants at your Food Rescue Happy Hour yesterday.
Thank you friends! Last night TPES parent Remington Stone donated a freezer to us! It is now sitting happily at the TPSS Co-op thanks to Community Engagement Manager Leandra Nichola. Thanks also to Jen Sermoneta and Spencer Clark for their generous monetary donations that will be used to purchase additional foods such as eggs when donations are low. #kindness#freezerdonation
Small Things Matter Kokua Foods distributed over 7000lbs of fresh produce, grocery, dairy, bread, frozen foods, canned goods and other nonperishable items to 150 local Takoma Park families in need in October 2019. Our members also shared new books and read to the younger children at the distributions. We are grateful to our partners at Wegmans, Wegmans, Imperfect Foods, KOL Foods, and the TPSS Co-op for their generous donations of fresh produce, grocery, dairy, bread, frozen foods including chicken, and healthy snacks, generous student donor Katherine and her family for their contribution of nonperishable foods on a weekly basis, and Difference Makers for being a recipient distribution group with our program. Our thanks to our fantastic adult volunteers (Bryan Goehring, Seth Grimes, Amber Cameron, Stephen Whitney, Wei Li, Leandra Nichola, Aurelie Bush , Doris Duarte, Kevin Buchanan, Wendy Kent, Kia Robinson, Tyrone Robinson, Margaret Sutton, Doug Disrud, Jeff Diamant, John Anderson, and Roxanne Yamashita) and great student volunteers (Carter, Sam, Sam, Zach, Jacinto, Vaylor, Abigail, Lana, Yacouba, Precious, and Hadrian) for their dedication and hard work.
We would love to have additional volunteers for our food recovery efforts. If you are interested please contact us! www.smallthingsmatter.org
We had a wonderful day at the Friends of the Takoma Park Maryland Library Used Book Sale on October 19, 2019. Thanks to everyone who stopped by to make a “Be Your Own Author” book with us. It was wonderful seeing the enthusiasm of the children as they wrote their books. We can’t wait to share them in the Takoma Park Maryland Library this winter where others will get to read and enjoy them. Our thanks to Karen MacPherson, Children’s & Youth Services Coordinator at Takoma Park Maryland Library for partnering with us and to our wonderful members Eric, Jacob, and Lana.
We had an amazing time at the Baltimore Comic-Con 2019. We met lots of amazing comic book folks including Jon/Beyond Comics who donated 500 comics to us last year, John Tomlinson and Harry/Fandata Bargain Comics who donated comics to us onsite, and Richard/Welcome Back Comics and Steve/J&S Collectibles who said they’d be glad to donate to us in the future. We get many requests for comic books from students and we are grateful for their generosity!
Donations of in-kind items of books, toiletries, canned foods, etc. are vital to our small non-profit. Our thanks today to student William for collecting toiletries and to Mona Sharma for sewing monster stuffie blanks for us. We truly appreciate your kindness and support!
Our thanks to Stephen Whitney/HOOPOE BOOKS, Share Literacy, Books for Afghanistan, Books for Pakistan for their generous donation of 75 brand new books for our literacy program on October 13, 2019. It is so wonderful to have a partner that is equally committed to encouraging children to read. Thank you!
STM had a wonderful time making monster stuffies with the families at Washington Episcopal School as part of their First Friday Night dedicated to community service on October 4, 2019. The stuffies will be donated to Adventist HealthCare Shady Grove Medical Center Pediatrics once they are stuffed and sewn up.
Our thanks to Head of School Danny Vogelman and Tiffney Brockway for the kind invite and to our wonderful members Lana, Brigitte, and Koji for leading the activities.
STM had a fantastic time vending shave ice at 2nd “Onoversary” Luau Party at Ono Brewing Company on September 28, 2019. The day was filled with Hawaiian music and hula, artisans, ono food, and lots of laughter. Mahalo and Congratulations Cyndi and Scott/ Ono Brewing Company and thanks to Koji, Lana, and Mylene for working so hard!
STM had a great time on September 27, 2019 giving students grades preK to 5th a brand new book of their choice at Rolling Terrace ES, a Title I school in Takoma Park. We gave out 984 books and handmade bookmarks! We are so grateful for everyone’s support: in-kind donations, book drives, monetary donations, fundraising (shave ice and lemonade) that made this possible. Our thanks to all of you and to our wonderful members for all their hard work! #kindness