Santa For All Seasons Seeking Donations

Local non-profit Santa For All Seasons is looking for donations to provide foster children with gifts this holiday season.

Volunteer Jodi Dennis said they work with the Department of Children’s Services to develop wish lists for children already in the custody of a foster family. Dennis said they share those lists with members of the community who then shop for the children and donate items for them to receive as presents.

“Most foster parents have their own birth children as well,” Dennis said. “So there’s usually a lot of children in the house. So anything we can do to ease the foster parents’ stresses as well as make the foster children feel like that they’re a part of something is probably one of the main reasons we do it.”

Dennis said finances are often tight in foster homes around the holidays and the current economy has made it even harder for them to afford gifts. Dennis said they have started gathering donations this early so they have time to raise awareness and receive extra donations they can use for any more foster children that come up between now and Christmas.

“We like to build a little bit of a war chest,” Dennis said. “Like I said because we do get usually at least ten to fifteen kids the week before Christmas. So when that happens we like to try and, like I will go out on the 22nd or the 23rd and be shopping to get stuff for them.”

Dennis said case workers make wish lists by asking children for three special items they want alongside their favorite color, shoe size, and clothing sizes.

“We’ve had some different corporations around town or even just a family will contact me and say, ‘Can I have one child?'” Dennis said. “Or, you know, some of the corporations ask for twenty kids and then their group goes and I send them the wish list and then they go shopping and then they drop off the toys or the presents and we have another day where the foster parents will come and pick those presents up.”

Dennis said anyone interested in getting a wish list for a child in Putnam County can contact her at (931) 261-1904.

“I do know that our (13th Judicial) district, it’s Overton, Putnam, White Clay, Cumberland, and Pickett, they are all under this umbrella,” Dennis said. “I just do Putnam. But I do know there’s Jackson and Smith County as well. So I know our whole area, there are other volunteers that also help with DCS and the community.”