Well, since we have been too busy this past year for me to post to the blog much, here goes another try!
We provided over 4500 rides last year, and couldn't have done it without all our wonderful volunteers! We wouldn't have a program without you all...so you are much appreciated! Be on the lookout for an invitation to our Valentines celebration soon!
I am amazed each day by how much we help the seniors in our neighborhoods...they are so appreciative and wouldn't be able to stay in their own homes without our help. We are looking forward to another great year, adding more new clients and new volunteers to serve them. In 2009, we added 105 new clients, but only 45 volunteers, so let's spread the news about what a great need we have and recruit your friends to volunteer as well!
Have a wonderful January!
Carla
Friday, January 22, 2010
Monday, January 26, 2009
Our 2008 Accomplishments!
To all our volunteers - Happy New Year! We appreciate all you contributed to FIAC Northwest in 2008, and thought you might want a little overview of 2008, and a glimpse of what's coming up this year!
2008 FIAC Northwest Fast Facts:
317 senior clients received over 4000 rides from 230 volunteer drivers to medical appointments and to run errands
Volunteer drivers provided 519 rides to Senior Day Out, where many other volunteers gave 674 hours to make 2 Thursdays a month lots of fun!
Office volunteers worked 454 hours scheduling rides and helping with other office tasks
Volunteer handymen helped with 11 minor repairs
Volunteers made 283 friendly calls to our seniors
Volunteers made 145 friendly visits
All this totals up to more than 7800 volunteer hours for the year!
You are all amazing!
As we start 2009, we are faced with the same needs as last year - the need for more volunteers! We added 91 senior neighbors to our client list in 2008, and we have already enrolled 5 more just this week! If you have friends, family or neighbors that might want to join in the fun, please send them our way. We can put them to work volunteering and helping their senior neighbors.
Here are the areas that we most need volunteers:
Drivers
Office help
Senior Day Out
Also we have some short term projects that we need help with - if any of these spark your interest, please give us a call:
Inventorying and organizing our medical loan closet
Updating our database of local churches (this could be done at home on your own time)
Data entry of all our client and volunteer information
(we should have a web-based system to enter our information into in a couple of months, hopefully!)
Wishlist for our office:
Stamps
Birthday cards (we send them to all clients and volunteers)
bright colored paper
Upcoming events:
*February - be on the lookout for an invitation for our next Volunteer Appreciation event!
*May 7th - our annual Theater Fundraiser by the Way Off Broadway Community Players
*Senior Day out each 2nd and 4th Thursday of each month
Thanks for your support and your time - we appreciate each and every one of you!
Carla
2008 FIAC Northwest Fast Facts:
317 senior clients received over 4000 rides from 230 volunteer drivers to medical appointments and to run errands
Volunteer drivers provided 519 rides to Senior Day Out, where many other volunteers gave 674 hours to make 2 Thursdays a month lots of fun!
Office volunteers worked 454 hours scheduling rides and helping with other office tasks
Volunteer handymen helped with 11 minor repairs
Volunteers made 283 friendly calls to our seniors
Volunteers made 145 friendly visits
All this totals up to more than 7800 volunteer hours for the year!
You are all amazing!
As we start 2009, we are faced with the same needs as last year - the need for more volunteers! We added 91 senior neighbors to our client list in 2008, and we have already enrolled 5 more just this week! If you have friends, family or neighbors that might want to join in the fun, please send them our way. We can put them to work volunteering and helping their senior neighbors.
Here are the areas that we most need volunteers:
Drivers
Office help
Senior Day Out
Also we have some short term projects that we need help with - if any of these spark your interest, please give us a call:
Inventorying and organizing our medical loan closet
Updating our database of local churches (this could be done at home on your own time)
Data entry of all our client and volunteer information
(we should have a web-based system to enter our information into in a couple of months, hopefully!)
Wishlist for our office:
Stamps
Birthday cards (we send them to all clients and volunteers)
bright colored paper
Upcoming events:
*February - be on the lookout for an invitation for our next Volunteer Appreciation event!
*May 7th - our annual Theater Fundraiser by the Way Off Broadway Community Players
*Senior Day out each 2nd and 4th Thursday of each month
Thanks for your support and your time - we appreciate each and every one of you!
Carla
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
2009 is here!
Wow! 2009 is here already! We are off and running this week with lots of ride requests, but lots of willing volunteers to help take those rides...
Our client numbers are growing so fast - we have added 5 new clients so far in January, so we need to keep our volunteer driver numbers up as well! If you have any friends or relatives that might have a little extra time even once a month, send them our way!
We gave our volunteers 2 weeks off at Christmas, hope everyone had a great holiday and New Year's Eve. We are ready for you to start driving again. In addition to being a driver, we have several special projects for someone who doesn't really have the time to drive...and some of these can be done at home on your own time. Give us a call if you are interested.
I'll have our final 2008 accomplishments posted soon...so stay tuned!
Your happy Director,
Carla :-)
Our client numbers are growing so fast - we have added 5 new clients so far in January, so we need to keep our volunteer driver numbers up as well! If you have any friends or relatives that might have a little extra time even once a month, send them our way!
We gave our volunteers 2 weeks off at Christmas, hope everyone had a great holiday and New Year's Eve. We are ready for you to start driving again. In addition to being a driver, we have several special projects for someone who doesn't really have the time to drive...and some of these can be done at home on your own time. Give us a call if you are interested.
I'll have our final 2008 accomplishments posted soon...so stay tuned!
Your happy Director,
Carla :-)
Thursday, December 11, 2008
In Search of our Thanksgiving Newsletter...
Happy Holiday Season!
Well, we had a really fun newsletter folding party right before thanksgiving - lots of volunteers came to help, we got them done quickly and I mailed them that afternoon! BUT...some have reached their destinations and some are floating around in what the post office must refer to as the "Holiday Mail Rush"...
So if you didn't get your newsletter, please let us know and we will mail you another one...some took as long as 2 or 3 weeks to arrive...so maybe some are still on the way...I hope so, but we can sure send you another one if needed.
Some important information out of the newsletter to remember: Our office at Faith in Action Caregivers Northwest will be closed from December 20-January4, 2009. We will not be providing any rides during this time so our volunteers can enjoy a well-deserved break and enjoy time with their families. Clients are encouraged to call us now with their January appointments, so if you are a volunteer driver, it would help us if you could remind your riders this week and next to call us with any early January ride requests.
Another note from the newsletter: We have a volunteer who has offered to match any monetary donations from other volunteers (up to $500 total) from now until December 31, 2008. So if you are looking for a wonderful non profit to donate to this Christmas season, consider making a donation to Faith in Action Caregivers. Did you know that $24.96 provides a ride to a senior neighbor to the doctor or grocery store? You can donate by mailing us a check (in the envelope in the newsletter if you got one) or you may also now donate online through our paypal link on this blog and on our website at www.faithinactioncaregivers.org.
Have a very blessed and safe December!
Well, we had a really fun newsletter folding party right before thanksgiving - lots of volunteers came to help, we got them done quickly and I mailed them that afternoon! BUT...some have reached their destinations and some are floating around in what the post office must refer to as the "Holiday Mail Rush"...
So if you didn't get your newsletter, please let us know and we will mail you another one...some took as long as 2 or 3 weeks to arrive...so maybe some are still on the way...I hope so, but we can sure send you another one if needed.
Some important information out of the newsletter to remember: Our office at Faith in Action Caregivers Northwest will be closed from December 20-January4, 2009. We will not be providing any rides during this time so our volunteers can enjoy a well-deserved break and enjoy time with their families. Clients are encouraged to call us now with their January appointments, so if you are a volunteer driver, it would help us if you could remind your riders this week and next to call us with any early January ride requests.
Another note from the newsletter: We have a volunteer who has offered to match any monetary donations from other volunteers (up to $500 total) from now until December 31, 2008. So if you are looking for a wonderful non profit to donate to this Christmas season, consider making a donation to Faith in Action Caregivers. Did you know that $24.96 provides a ride to a senior neighbor to the doctor or grocery store? You can donate by mailing us a check (in the envelope in the newsletter if you got one) or you may also now donate online through our paypal link on this blog and on our website at www.faithinactioncaregivers.org.
Have a very blessed and safe December!
Thursday, December 4, 2008
It's December? Already!?
Well, now I KNOW times flies when you are having fun! It's already December! And we're still having fun!
Hope everyone has received their newsletter. The bog of "holiday mail" slowed down the newsletter delivery; we mailed them before Thanksgiving and some people just got theirs today. The newsletter has the dates that we will be closed in December but just as a reminder, our office will not be open the week of December 22 and December 29. We'll be back answering the phones, scheduling rides and searching for drivers on January 5. There will be no rides provided for our clients during these last two weeks of December, so our volunteers can spend time with their families. The only exception is we will be driving our dialysis patients, so if you happen to have a little bit of time and could provide a one way ride to someone in the Cedar Park area, please call our office.
Please take some time to slow down this holiday season and enjoy the fun parts, ignore the stresses and eat lots of chocolate...oops, that's my plan, but not a bad one! I just have a hard time with the slowing down.
Our final Senior Day Out for 2008 is December 11 at Hope Presbyterian Church. Our Caregivers Board of Directors is cooking for this one, and we will be entertained by an awesome men's quartet, Medallion (could one of those guys be a driver for caregivers?) It should be a day full of good food and fun!
Carla "trying to slow down" Young - Executive Director, FIAC Northwest
Hope everyone has received their newsletter. The bog of "holiday mail" slowed down the newsletter delivery; we mailed them before Thanksgiving and some people just got theirs today. The newsletter has the dates that we will be closed in December but just as a reminder, our office will not be open the week of December 22 and December 29. We'll be back answering the phones, scheduling rides and searching for drivers on January 5. There will be no rides provided for our clients during these last two weeks of December, so our volunteers can spend time with their families. The only exception is we will be driving our dialysis patients, so if you happen to have a little bit of time and could provide a one way ride to someone in the Cedar Park area, please call our office.
Please take some time to slow down this holiday season and enjoy the fun parts, ignore the stresses and eat lots of chocolate...oops, that's my plan, but not a bad one! I just have a hard time with the slowing down.
Our final Senior Day Out for 2008 is December 11 at Hope Presbyterian Church. Our Caregivers Board of Directors is cooking for this one, and we will be entertained by an awesome men's quartet, Medallion (could one of those guys be a driver for caregivers?) It should be a day full of good food and fun!
Carla "trying to slow down" Young - Executive Director, FIAC Northwest
Monday, November 24, 2008
Thanksgiving!
Now I am not sure what happened to October! After tomorrow, our office will be closed for the Thanksgiving holiday, and we'll be back in December! Hard to believe that Monday will be December!
We are having a fun newsletter folding party tomorrow - tacos, fun, fellowship, etc. - we couldn't get these newsletters out without the help of our volunteers! Look for your newsletter in the mail...and keep an eye out for a Christmas letter...
We had a fantastic Volunteer Appreciation Coffee a couple of weeks ago - 48 volunteers came by to enjoy some great coffee, cupcakes and to meet other volunteers. We'll make this a regular event, at least quarterly...if not more often.
I wish a happy Thanksgiving to everyone, eat lots of Turkey, Gig Em Aggies! (at least we'll win half time!) I'll miss march-in this year, signed up to help deliver thanksgiving meals from Bethany UMC to some of our Caregivers clients, but I get to watch the game on my parents giant TV in Llano on the "ranch"
Carla :-)
We are having a fun newsletter folding party tomorrow - tacos, fun, fellowship, etc. - we couldn't get these newsletters out without the help of our volunteers! Look for your newsletter in the mail...and keep an eye out for a Christmas letter...
We had a fantastic Volunteer Appreciation Coffee a couple of weeks ago - 48 volunteers came by to enjoy some great coffee, cupcakes and to meet other volunteers. We'll make this a regular event, at least quarterly...if not more often.
I wish a happy Thanksgiving to everyone, eat lots of Turkey, Gig Em Aggies! (at least we'll win half time!) I'll miss march-in this year, signed up to help deliver thanksgiving meals from Bethany UMC to some of our Caregivers clients, but I get to watch the game on my parents giant TV in Llano on the "ranch"
Carla :-)
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
What happened to October?
Wow! Time to take a deep breath! We are so blessed to have so many great volunteers (but we always need more) that have managed to get our very busy senior neighbors to all their appointments this past couple of months. We are grateful for the new volunteers that have come on board, and hope that everyone received their invitation to our next Volunteer Appreciation Coffee for November 10th. We mailed postcards and also emailed Evites, so if you didn't get either of those, please call us!
Yesterday, I got to talk to 100 6th graders at Cedar Park Middle School about the importance of volunteering and what they as kids can do to help our organization. It was fun to hear their suggestions of things they can do for our clients - they were very excited! This particular group has to do 3 hours of community service for their advanced language arts project (they are studying societies) and had several different non-profits come talk to them, so lets hope that some of them will pick Caregivers to give their time to!
I am working on a fall newsletter - hope to have that done in the next week - we'll have a newsletter folding party and I'll send out a notice about that - fun, fellowship, folding and breakfast tacos...volunteers needed!
Carla :-)
Yesterday, I got to talk to 100 6th graders at Cedar Park Middle School about the importance of volunteering and what they as kids can do to help our organization. It was fun to hear their suggestions of things they can do for our clients - they were very excited! This particular group has to do 3 hours of community service for their advanced language arts project (they are studying societies) and had several different non-profits come talk to them, so lets hope that some of them will pick Caregivers to give their time to!
I am working on a fall newsletter - hope to have that done in the next week - we'll have a newsletter folding party and I'll send out a notice about that - fun, fellowship, folding and breakfast tacos...volunteers needed!
Carla :-)
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