Here is a short introduction to our charity....
Build A Bag for Foster Children is a small group of volunteers who want to help children newly placed into foster care,
by providing them with backpacks filled with new essentials. We are based in the Kitchener, Ontario area.
Build A Bag For Kids was started in 2016, by a local mom, Dondra McKeegan, who
"Just wanted to do something nice for foster kids at Christmas." Working with her family,
and a small group of friends, they collected new clothing & toiletries and stuffed them into
new school backpacks to be given to children newly placed into foster homes at Christmas.
She decided to make it an annual event, and got more organized for 2017, with a Facebook Event,
and then a web site. The group grew, word spread, and the charity assembled over three times
as many bags as the first year ! Other charities, like the Toronto Firefighters, helped out
with generous donations of warm clothing and stuffed toys.
Everyone is very grateful for all of the help and donations from the Build A Bag Angels !
Build A Bag for Foster Children continued - the 2018 Christmas Campaign was
a HUGE SUCCESS, after two great donation-raising events in the summer -
A Poker Run and a Charity Concert. 103 full backpacks were donated !
The 2019 Christmas Campaign was another record breaker, as our goal of
150 backpacks was surpassed ! We donated 156 backpacks this year !
The Build A Bag Angels also completed 24 back-to-school backpacks for
our Christmas in July Campaign, and our annual Benefit Concert in September
raised over $3,000.00 for the charity !
The 2020 Christmas Campaign set new records, in spite of
the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic. We had to change our approach a bit,
and, Thanks to the overwhelming support of our Angels near and far, still succeeded:
We were able to adopt 22 families in our community, do a toy drive for
Children and Family Services services, build 100 care bags and gifts for teens
in foster care, and bring toys for our own 22 adoptive families !
The 2021 Christmas Campaign again set new records, in spite of
the challenges of the pandemic. We again changed our approach,
and, Thanks to the wonderful support of our Angels near and far, still succeeded:
We were able to build 130 care bags and gifts for teens
in foster care, and 172 backpacks for teens !
We also adopted a young family in our community this Christmas.
We are proud to support Family and Children's Services of Waterloo,
and Healing of the Seven Generation Indigenous Youth and Children's Program.
We thank everyone for their continuous support of our little charity.
The 2022 Christmas Campaign was another record breaker, as our goals
were surpassed !
Thank you all for your continued support of the Build A Bag Angels !
The 2023 Christmas Campaign again set records. We changed our approach a bit,
and, Thanks to the overwhelming support of our Angels, we succeeded,
passing our goals once again !
Thank you all, Angels !
The 2024 Christmas Campaign is off to a running start,
and we accept donations all year round.
Donations are coming in steadily - watch the NEWS !
Here is a small video that tells our story !
Click picture to watch video
An amazing student at Conestoga College named Sheryl Madakkai made this video
as a school project about The Build A Bag Angels. We are so honoured.
I'm so happy this also shines some light on the amazing people
and groups that helps us out too. ❤
Please help us to help the children !
All you have to do is donate an item of new clothing or toiletry !
Check out About the Bags by clicking here.
Pick up and drop off can be arranged - Email: Angels@BuildABag4Kids.ca
Volunteer Wanted
Volunteer Webmaster, to work on this site, all raw HTML code.
Skilled with open source tools - vim/vi, filezilla, gimp, seamonkey,
firefox, httcopy, etc. , plus Facebook, in a Linux environment.
-------------
OK - that skill set is rare - so we will now happily talk to anyone
who is willing to take on the project. You can re-create it
any way you want, even using WordPress !
Please email: webmaster@BuildABag4kids.ca
