JFS Perspectives

Thanksgiving Day in America is a time to offer thanks, of family gatherings, and holiday meals. A time of turkeys, stuffing, and pumpkin pie. A time for Indian corn, holiday parades, and giant balloons.

There are many ways to celebrate and express thanks at Thanksgiving. Even in difficult times, there are always things for which to be grateful such as:

Please leave comments about what you are thankful for on this holiday!

Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family!

-Alaina Green and Kari Alpen, JFS Marketing Department

 

'Tis the season for food...lots and lots and lots of food! While most of us are looking forward to enjoying a nice holiday meal next week, some will have to go without. In an effort to make sure that doesn't happen for our Weinberg Food Pantry clients, we asked for your help...and you didn't let us down! We are happy to report that we met our monetary goal. Thank you to all those who contributed! This will help us distribute food for Thanksgiving meals to more than 100 families next Wednesday.

In addition, we are working hard to keep the Pantry shelves stocked through the winter holidays with some help from our volunteers. Earlier this month, 14 employees from CenturyLink spent four hours turning thousands of pears into pear sauce at the LDS Cannery for our Weinberg Food Pantry. Jessica Paul, Family Safety Net coordinator, says, "The CenturyLink employees have a day each year where they go out and volunteer, and several of them picked JFS and hope to do it next year."

 

And then this week, Cooking Matters came to demonstrate how to make pumpkin chocolate chip muffins using the pear sauce as a substitute for oil. Our Pantry clients got to sample these muffins and take a bag of the ingredients that included the recipe!

In other Food Pantry news...

Thanks to Steven and Sheila Higgins, who own a well-organized store full of tabletop games and supplies called Total Escape Games. On November 5, they hosted and helped organize a special game day and food drive for JFS, with the proceeds and canned food going to the Weinberg Food Pantry. They were able to collect 60 pounds of food and raised $372 in donations, which also included a generous personal donation.

Thanks to everyone for supporting the local community and helping us in the fight to end hunger!

-Alaina Green and Kari Alpen, JFS Marketing Department

Thank you to everyone who donated food to the Weinberg Food Pantry during our High Holy Day food drive! Congregants from the following synagogues donated nearly 12,000 pounds of food: B'nai Chaim, Beth Evergreen, Hebrew Educational Alliance (HEA), Rodef Shalom, Temple Emanuel, Temple Micah, and Temple Sinai. Your generosity is greatly appreciated by those in need!

After the food is donated, it takes a team of people to help sort it all to be placed on the Pantry shelves. With a little help from our staff, volunteers from HEA's JConnect group as well as Bar and Bat Mitzvah students and their parents, spent a Sunday morning organizing all the donations. We know it's a big (and dirty) job and we greatly appreciate the help!

 

And now that this food drive is over, we're starting to collect for Thanksgiving to help feed families who otherwise wouldn't be able to enjoy a holiday feast. If you are interested in helping this cause, please contribute any of the following items or provide a complete holiday meal for one family (the average cost is $36): Frozen turkeys, gravy mix, sweet potatoes, canned cranberry sauce, canned pumpkin pie filling, stuffing mix, canned vegetables, instant mashed potatoes, aluminum foil roasting pans, and grocery store gift cards.

Because we can stretch your dollar by purchasing items at a reduced cost, we prefer cash donations. Please donate now (indicate "Holiday Meals" in the "Tribute Text" box) or bring food donations to JFS, 3201 South Tamarac Drive in Denver, by Wednesday, November 16.

-Alaina Green and Kari Alpen, JFS Marketing Department

 

When Azteca Ranch Market recently closed its Denver location, the store owner, Hermine Blau, generously donated 9,000 pounds of food and other products to the JFS Weinberg Food Pantry!  Staff members from the Family Safety Net department took several trips to the store and spent about 24 man-hours to empty the shelves.

We received a variety of items including baby food, juice, paper products and cleaning supplies, tortillas and tortilla chips, cereal, cultural and ethnic foods, and more. To put 9,000 pounds in perspective, the Food Pantry averages about 18,000 pounds of donated food each month from  various grocery stores.

Shelly Hines, Family Safety Net director, says, “This was a very significant donation. With all of the cuts in federal and state funding, we couldn’t operate at our current level without the generosity of our donors. As the need for food has increased, we have had to think creatively about new sources for nutritious food. This donation included all the quality foods we like to put on our shelves and well as a variety of fun extras that we don’t usually have. We appreciate the generosity of the store and the abundance of the donation!” 

 

The JFS staff helped sort the items and we have already distributed more than half of the food to our Food Pantry clients. Now we are gearing up for our Thanksgiving food drive - look for more details coming soon about how you can help!

-Alaina Green and Kari Alpen, JFS Marketing Department

Thanks to the generosity of many organizations and individual donors, 250 families who otherwise would not have had a Thanksgiving meal, received a complete feast consisting of a turkey and all of the holiday fixings from the Weinberg Food Pantry last week! These 250 families represented 791 individuals -- a substantial increase over last year. We also received more than $3,250 in Thanksgiving cash donations which financed the fixings!


The line for the Pantry started early and filled the lobby


Clients picking out some food in addition to Thanksgiving fixings


Volunteers getting the turkeys ready to distribute

-Alaina Green and Kari Alpen, JFS Marketing Department

Thanksgiving is a time where we all count our blessings and think about what we're grateful for. And now we have a way for you to express your gratitude while helping others in the community by making a tribute gift to JFS. 

The Hebrew term for gratitude is hikarat hatov, which means "recognizing the good." Share your gratitude and recognize the good things in your life today with a tribute gift to JFS by contacting Jari Thymian at (303) 597.5000 x386 or donating online.

Even Oprah's celebrating gratitude! Check out her World of Gratitude!

Please leave comments about what you are thankful for this year. Happy Thanksgiving!

-Alaina Green and Kari Alpen, JFS Marketing Department

Students from Temple Sinai Preschool and Kindergarten and Stanley British Primary School, learned what it means to give back this week.



Temple Sinai held their 2nd annual Thanksgiving food drive for the JFS Weinberg Food Pantry. Each class collected a different item from a list of traditional holiday foods we requested - 530 pounds all together. Then the kindergarten teachers taught the kids who the food was helping and turned it into a math lesson by counting and sorting the items the whole school collected. When Chad Livermore, Food Pantry Operations Coordinator, went to pick up the food, the kids helped him load the food into bins and got to check out the cool Pantry truck!
 


Third, fourth, and fifth graders from Stanley British Primary School came to JFS on Wednesday to learn more about the agency and tour the Food Pantry. They bagged rice for the Pantry clients and made beautiful cards to be distributed with the Thanksgiving baskets next week. The group was very enthusiastic and enjoyed learning about how the Pantry operates, such as the fact that we do not charge clients for their food and where donations come from.



Thank you so much to all the students and teachers at Temple Sinai and Stanley British Primary for giving families something to be thankful for this Thanksgiving! 

-Alaina Green and Kari Alpen, JFS Marketing Department

Thanksgiving Day will soon be here, a time to celebrate with friends and family. However, beyond the laughter, the turkey and the trimmings, there is silence for so many in our community. There is emptiness and the inability to put food on the table, let alone a big, festive meal. 

Before you sit down for your holiday meal and give thanks for all your blessings, please help us provide Thanksgiving meals for Weinberg Food Pantry clients who might otherwise not be able to celebrate the holiday.  

Please contribute any of the items on the list below or provide a complete holiday meal for one family (the average cost is $46.71):

• Frozen turkeys
• Gravy mix 
• Canned yams or sweet potatoes
• Corn bread mix
• Canned cranberry sauce
• Canned pumpkin pie filling
• Stuffing mix
• Shelf-stable pie crust
• Instant mashed potatoes
• Evaporated milk 
• Grocery gift cards - you can even buy reloadable King Soopers gift cards from JFS!

Because we can stretch your dollar by purchasing items at a reduced cost, we prefer cash donations. Please donate money now (indicate "Holiday Meals" in the "Tribute Text" box) or bring food donations or checks to Jewish Family Service, 3201 South Tamarac Drive, Denver, CO 80231, by Wednesday, November 17th. Jewish Family Service is open Monday-Friday from 8:15 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. 

We will give Thanksgiving baskets to Pantry clients on November 24th. Thanks to your generosity last year, we distributed, in addition to regular Pantry food boxes, 180 complete Thanksgiving feasts consisting of a turkey and all of the fixings! These 180 families represented 614 individuals and we expect similar numbers this year.

Thank you in advance for your support to help others in the community have a brighter holiday!

-Alaina Green and Kari Alpen, JFS Marketing Department