Orange County Register

If you know me at all, you know I don’t like being rushed into celebrating the holidays the way advertisers and stores tend to want us to.

Like the other day when I heard Christmas music in the aisles! I almost covered my ears.

That said, barely two days after Halloween and weeks before Thanksgiving, I am going to tell you about a Christmas gift-giving opportunity — because I think it is a really good cause and because the deadline to do this is rapidly approaching.

It’s something I am doing and I thought some of you out there might want to do it, too.

My friend Susan is a Mary Kay Cosmetics beauty consultant and she told me about a project involving Mary Kay and the Council on Aging-Orange County to make Christmas cheerier for thousands of frail elders and disabled adults. It’s called The SmileMakers Project.

With the help of donations, Smile-Makers provides gifts to people in assisted living centers who might otherwise be forgotten. That’s where people like me and you and Susan come in. I’ll let Susan explain how:

We have a special program called “Adopt a Grandparent” where we give holiday gifts of personal-care items and special treats to residents of local assisted living centers.

This is a huge undertaking, since most facilities have hundreds of beds and we would hate to leave anyone out. For many of these elderly men and woman, this will be their only gift this holiday season. Many of these people have little or no visitors. They are our forgotten ones during the holidays. This is to bring a little brightness into their holidays.

We’re looking for sponsors. The sponsorship is $25 per “Grandparent” for their gift. Can I count on you to “Adopt a Grandparent,” or 2, or more? Some people pitch in at work (at $5 or so) to group-sponsor grandparents.

If you’d like to participate, you’ll need to e-mail Susan by Wednesday (Nov. 4) so she can send you a sponsorship form that needs to be returned to her by Nov. 11. Contact her at susanjacobs@marykay.com.

Since the Council on Aging is a non-profit, donations would be tax deductible.

All of my grandparents are gone now, so this was a way for me to remember them at Christmas by bringing cheer to someone else. It’s never too early to think about that, don’t you agree?

More from Blog on Board — Theresa Walker

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