Kids at Children's Hospital loved your gifts!
Thank you for showering the kids at Children’s Hospital Oakland with gifts this past holiday season.
Local children, families, businesses, school organizations, groups of friends, and intrepid individuals all pitched in to organize toy and donation drives in their neighborhoods — bringing smiles and hope to patients at Children’s Hospital Oakland.
You sent more than 1,000 holiday cards to kids in the hospital, wishing them well. And you donated more than 5,000 toys, books and art supplies, making our patient’s holidays brighter.
Each one of your heart-felt donations has made a difference to a child receiving treatment at Children’s Hospital Oakland. Thank you!
U.S. Coast Guard reservists from Alameda delivered a literal boat-load of toys to Children’s one afternoon. They partnered with Toys “R” Us in Pinole to sponsor the incredibly successful toy drive.
Rowan, 4, proudly displays the holiday card she received. She was recovering from a minor surgical procedure, and the card brightened her day.
Local radio station KRZZ 93.3 La Raza, sponsor of Children’s first Spanish-language radiophone this past August, came to Children’s again in December to give away a mountain of toys to patients.
Jenna, 13, from Moraga, and her mom Wendy had to make two separate trips to Children’s in order to drop off the mountains of neatly packaged toys that filled the family’s home. Jenna celebrated her Bat Mitzvah earlier in the year, and asked guests to bring a toy for Children’s patients to mark the occasion.
Members of Boy Scouts Troop 482 from Fairfield dropped off 220 pounds of books and 40 pounds of Hot Wheels cars that they collected from the community. The scouts spent six months putting up flyers in the neighborhood, visiting local Cub Scout packs and collecting and sorting donations.
Members of the Student Government at the Moreau Catholic High School in Hayward organized a toy drive for patients at Children’s.
Teens for Kids involves young people from high schools all around the Bay Area in activities to support patients at Children's Hospital Oakland. For the holidays, they outfitted Children's Specialty Care Walnut Creek's Christmas tree with hand-made decorations in Children's logo colors, and they played games with patients during the Oncology Department's annual holiday party. Former Children's patient and active Teens for Kids member Adriana Aboumrad is dressed as the snowman.
CHORI CARES is a group of Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute staff members who raise money for families at the hospital. This year, CHORI CARES broke all previous fundraising records. Their popular holiday gift basket raffle and pizza and bake sale fundraising events throughout the year made more than $5,000 in total. Karen Catanese, staff assistant and CHORI CARES committee chair, and Phillip Bollinger, CHORI senior systems analyst, watch over the gift baskets being raffled during the December holiday party.
