Lets help each other! Important!

A few weeks back I announced that we would be collecting food and health & beauty items at our next class on November 4th to donate.   You all have been wonderful about wanting to help and I know that many of you are planning to bring your items to our class.  Nikki VanCleef who is one of our awesome coupon friends and one of our MyCouponExpert Helpers on our facebook page organized the last food drive that we did at our last class and she and I are working together to do this one as well!

Since putting out the word that there was an emergent need for food in our community pantries, I have been contacted privately by several of our coupon friends on our page that are also in need.  This made me really start thinking about things.  Although I think that it is wonderful for those that participate in world missions and larger drives, I have always felt that there are times that we are put into a specific place or position for a reason.  I feel that it is most important to reach out your hand to help those that are right in front of you if the situation calls for it and you are able to help.  Just think of the impact if the majority of people out there did just that!  If all of us were walking in our daily lives and recognized a need and took a moment to see if we were able to help with that need even in a small way and then did it, how things could change in the world!  Helping others doesn’t have to be grandiose or large, it can be a simple thing such as giving some who needs it enough food for one meal or even taking a moment to encourage someone when they are having a hard time and need a little uplifting.  I think really, it is just a change of mindset at times. 

So this brings me to our new mission that Nikki and I would like to embark on.  Keep in mind that we will just be facilitating this, we certainly can’t do it on our own and need everyone’s help to make this happen.  What we have in mind, is to collect donations for food and/or health and beauty items at our next class as planned but take those items, depending on how much there is, and distribute those items to those on our facebook page or website locally who have an emergent need for food.  I already have several who have contacted me who do have a serious need for food right now and have requested help from me.  Since we are not set up as a food bank or pantry right now, it would be very difficult for us to help a large number of people right away, but again, when you are trying to make a difference you can start with one and see where that goes.  I would like to help these families, many of which most of you have communicated with on a daily basis and had no idea of the struggle they were enduring. 

So this is what we plan to do.  At our next class on Friday, November 4th at Village View Community Church, we will be accepting donations for families with an emergent need for food.  If you can spare anything, even one can of soup, it CAN make a difference.  Nikki VanCleef has also graciously offered to pick up donations from you if you are local in Marion County.  You can also drop off the items that you have to donate to Creative Nails in Belleview on 441 right across the highway from Checkers fast food.  After all donations have been collected, we will then box up as much as possible for each family that we are aware of (and able to help) and arrange for their box to be picked up!

If you are not from our area and would like to arrange something similar in your area, I would LOVE that and would work together with you to help you do the same.  Again, you don’t have to do something HUGE to make a difference, when you are in need, anything helps.

This is about a LOT more than coupons to me.  Coupons have been a great blessing to many of us and allowed us to not have to worry about what we will feed our families tomorrow night or even several days from now.  When you are hurting for money and finding it hard to feed your family, that is a terrible feeling.  By lifting that burden it makes a huge difference.  I have seen some AMAZING transformations since I started teaching classes in 2009.  I have seen many people come to my class feeling very distraught not knowing how they were going to make it through these hard times and hoping that they really could save money to seeing the light go off when they realized that this WAS possible!  Those same people not only were able to save money and stock their own pantries but they are some of the most excited about giving to others now!  They have gone from feeling “needy” to feeling like a “giver” and their entire mindset has changed.  Isn’t that awesome?!

So lets make a difference!  Lets do this together.  If you are able to donate anything from your stockpile this week (even ONE thing would help), please consider doing so.  We will do the rest.  We can all be a part of something MUCH bigger than ourselves here.  By touching one person’s heart and letting them know that they matter you have made a big difference.

CLICK HERE for more information about our next class, you can drop off your items at the class or we can make other arrangements.  If you have taken our class in the past and would like to come for a free refresher, you can always come back as many times as you want for free, you just need to contact me at Caroline@MyCouponExpert.com so that I can verify your name and hold you a seat.

Note:  If you have an EMERGENT need for food only, please email me directly at Caroline@MyCouponExpert.com .  We will do our best to help you in any way that we can.  I have no idea how many donations we will receive at our class, but we will help as many families that are in an emergency situation as we can.  At this point, I would like to work on helping those of you that are following our blog or facebook page that are in need now.  We have all been there for each other to encourage and help each other with deals and I feel that we can also help lift each other up when one of us is having a particularly hard time too.  Please limit your requests only to those of you that are in a situation right now that you really need help and we will do everything in our power to help you.