#PostCFK Buy 2 Give 1 Simple Service Project: is helping us help those in need.

In my post last week I shared with you that my kids and I were invited to take part in the Post Champions for Kids (#PostCFK) Simple Service Project whose mission it is to end childhood hunger.  As a lover of both food AND kids, we couldn't be a more fitting family!  My hope and goal in all of this was to educate my kids about the very real hunger problem and to give them a glimpse into what all too many children face everyday – that is, being hungry.

We were able to head to our local Walmart store and buy three boxes of Post cereals – 2 to keep and 1 to give. 

My son unloading all of our Walmart purchases including our donations for #PostCFK – to help fight childhood hunger.

We'd originally came up with the idea to host a lemonade stand in exchange for donations of food for a food drive to benefit our local Catholic Charities organization.  But, I must say that because of the extreme heat we've had here in our area, I came to the conclusion it wasn't such a wise idea — for now.  We will be doing something very similar when we do decide to host our lemonade stand so I am certainly excited about that!

Instead, since we were with friends over the 4th of July holiday, we decided to invite our friends to participate and bring in some extras of whatever was in their pantries so that we could use them as donations. We were all very pleased with what our guests brought over to share in honor of this project!

My kids and their friends getting ready to head out for a bike parade on 4th of July.

My kids and I were able to deliver the goods to our local Catholic Charities food pantry, which serves the community in such a big way.  They open their food pantry to thousands of people every month and that includes those who just need some basic food to get them by until their next paycheck. Many of those they serve are children.

This is the donation site where our donations were received.

Although it may look as if this pantry is well-stocked, one of the things we discovered when we visited to make our dropoff, is that this pantry gets pretty depleted every week as they begin to receive their requests.  In particular, the end of the month tends to be a very busy time since many are waiting to get paid and are challenged to stretch their food budget a little bit more to tide them over.  Also, the summer months tend to be busier as well since many kids are home from school moreso than other seasons.  This means that more families are utilizing the food pantries more often.

This project was such a great one to be a part of.  I am so grateful for Post and what they are doing to help bring awareness to such a great cause.  If you are interested in participating with your kids or just to find out more, you can visit Post on their Facebook page by clicking here or follow them on Twitter here. Additionally, Post Champions for Kids program has a Facebook page and Twitter page as well!  To see more photos of our Walmart shopping experience, visit my Google+ story album here.

I'd love to know, does your family give to charitable organizations that operate a food pantry? Do you tend to give more during the holiday season? Why or why not?

{Disclosure: I am a member of the Collective Bias™ Social Fabric® Community. This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias™ and Champions for Kids #CBias #SocialFabric”, however all thoughts and opinions expressed are my own. No one is the boss of me!}