By Caroline Chiara and Erica Brooks
White Pony General Store hosted a boutique as part of the Mt. Diablo Unified School District Baypoint Barbeque Eggstravaganza.
This boutique focused on serving children under the age of 13. The General Store gave away 5,074 items of books, toys, shoes, and clothing. Nearly 660 books were given away!
At this event, we welcomed 472 children and 264 adults. This event was truly a partnership – Mt. Diablo High School student volunteers arrived early to unload the WPE truck, volunteered during the boutique, and stayed late to assist with loading up after the boutique.
We passed out WPE reusable blue cloth bags as a way to ‘advertise’ we were in the gym in addition to making signage and balloons to direct families to the boutique which was the only indoor activity of the day.
One of the special touches of the boutique were the adorable “sock trees” that Jim and Bridget Kirkpatrick built to maximize space. So cute…and efficient! Check out the photo in the gallery below.
Our friends at the Contra Costa Crisis Center 2-1-1 were also able to join in the event and provide information about County resources. We spoke with Scott Chavez, their Outreach and Training Leader, who was delighted to have 2-1-1 be a part of the festivities.
The larger event offered children an Easter Egg Hunt, Cupcake walk, freshly prepared chicken lunch, live musical performances, Moon bounce, basketball tournament, and a car show. Students and their families from the entire Mt. Diablo Unified Schools District were invited to this event.
Over 160 high school volunteers spent the day bringing joy to the families in their community. The lead coordinators were Lynnea Hughes, school social worker for Mt. Diablo High School and Lori Chalifoux, Recreation Coordinator for the Ambrose Center. Lynnea works full time for the school district and organized this event on her “free time”.
Also on-hand to make the day a success were WPE board member Cindy Gershen, a chef/teacher at MDUSD, Loren Barbosa, principal of the school and MDUSD board member, Mae Torlakson.
It was a true privilege to spend this Easter weekend sharing the abundance all around us. Scroll through some of the happy images from the day below!