QAC Christmas Angels Ensures Local Children Have the Christmas Every Child Deserves
Our community is filled with amazing nonprofits and selfless volunteers. We’re highlighting these amazing volunteers and nonprofits in our Volunteer of the Month column! This month we talked to Kathy Barron and Jennifer Armes, two volunteers for QAC Christmas Angels. QAC Christmas Angels provides local children in need with the magical Christmas they deserve by pairing them with local “angels” who give them gifts based on their wish list.
QAC Christmas Angels is a local 5013c that provides Christmas for local children in need. Linda Austin, who started the organization and volunteers countless hours, said, “I just couldn’t imagine a child waking up Christmas morning and not having any gifts to open. I knew I had to do something.”
While Christmas isn’t until the end of the year, QAC Christmas Angels volunteers work year-round to ensure that Christmas magic in December. Kathy and Jennifer start sorting through the donations received in August. Many of these donations include necessities like hygiene items, blankets and clothes that these children don’t just want but truly need. Jennifer says they’ve had a couple “stand-out” people who donate large numbers of bikes and toys. Kathy says that QAC Christmas Angels helps over a thousand children every year… quite an accomplishment for a county with just 50,000 people!
A project of this magnitude takes year-round work. With money raised, QAC Christmas Angels shops year round at discounted web sites and other sales to stock their supply to fill gaps in donations and to be sure every child receives Christmas gifts. If a tag is not taken, a QAC Christmas Angel volunteer shops for that child. EVERY child receives Christmas gifts.
QAC Christmas Angels strives to have all the children adopted and items returned no later than late October, and even sooner is better. It takes a great deal of effort to pick up all the packages, match tags, sort through items, fill in gaps, deliver packages to the school and ensure pick up. Even though these are Christmas gifts, many of the items purchased are actually needs. The organization likes to have everything delivered and picked up before Thanksgiving so children that need a coat or boots for the season will have them. Plus, then volunteers will have time to enjoy their own families.
The Shore Update is honored to help with this cause and can’t thank all the volunteers and our local businesses enough for jumping in to help. The Shore Update helps to publicize QAC Christmas Angels and also to match the kids with volunteers willing to donate time, money and gifts for a memorable Christmas morning for these children. We work with the team from the moment the first child is entered into the system until the last child is adopted.
If you would like to learn more about QAC Christmas Angels or to adopt a child in need, you can email Cheri Hoffman at cheri@shoreupdate.com or Linda Austin at linda.austin@longandfoster.com! For more information, visit their facebook@QAC Christmas Angels.