Last year, 415 children from low-income families in the Cortez area got presents through Christmas for Kids. This year, as of Tuesday, 528 children were set to have presents delivered to them on Christmas Eve. Families in need applied through the Piñon Project to receive Christmas presents donated from the community, and individuals and businesses have been signing up since late November to sponsor children by donating gifts to them.
Volunteers will be busy all week wrapping presents in the Piñon Project basement. Although people who signed up to sponsor a specific child were asked to wrap their own presents, many community members have also been donating unwrapped items, and the Piñon Project itself always sponsors between 60 and 150 children, whose presents still need to be sorted and wrapped. About 12 volunteers came to help on Tuesday, and youth program director Kelli Jackson said they plan to keep working until Friday, when the presents should be ready for delivery.
Piñon staff attribute the increase in Christmas for Kids participation to “word of mouth” publicity. Josh Price, who volunteered to wrap presents Tuesday, said he hadn’t heard of the event until Piñon helped him get presents for his daughter.
“They’ve done a lot of very nice things for me,” Price said. “Giving back a little bit is the least I can do.”
Although Christmas for Kids now has a sponsor for every child in the program, volunteers are welcome for the last few days leading up to Christmas. As always, the Piñon Project is also in need of more gifts for teens, the hardest age group to shop for.
But Jackson said the community has been generous. In addition to the many people who have sponsored individual children, Piñon has received a steady stream of donated money and gifts. Several local organizations, like the American Legion, have held toy drives to benefit Christmas for Kids, while some people have opted for a “do-it-yourself” approach.
“People have knitted hats and gloves, they’ve brought in blankets that they’ve made,” Jackson said.
Anyone can volunteer to help sort and wrap gifts between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. through Friday, and gifts can be dropped off at the Piñon Project annex building.