HANDS

Holiday Dinner

Now in our 18th year, we help to provide a non-denominational meal delivery throughout Chittenden County on Christmas Day. We partner with Age Well, Burlington School Food Project, Penny Cluse Café, and Temple Sinai as well as hundreds of volunteers and businesses to make the magic happen. Despite the pandemic and rain, we delivered over 1,000 meals and giftbags last year! 

Very special thanks to our “A Team” that includes Holly Cluse, Doug Davis and his family, Mitzy Foy and her family, Tina & Tim Gibbo, Jess Hyman & Sean Melinn, Mark Larson & Amy Livingston, Chris Moldovan, Tim Palmer, Charles Reeves, Jeff Solomon & Linda Retchin, and Mara & Spencer Welton. We couldn’t possibly do it without their guidance, logistics planning during COVID, volunteer management, food prep, and all of the details in-between.  

Almost 200 volunteers donated 700 hours of their time during the holiday season. And 90 drivers delivered meals and giftbags. Each of you made someone’s day more special and we’re so grateful for that!

From November 29-December 17, Age Well will take meal reservations at 865-0360 for anyone 50 years or older who would like to have dinner delivered on Christmas in Chittenden County. 

Our History

Some years ago, Age Well (formerly Champlain Valley Agency on Aging) requested that we take over their Christmas Day meal delivery program. We’ve increased numbers ever since. From the first year when we provided 20 hot meals, we delivered 1,000 in 2020.

We depend on volunteers and businesses to provide donations for the meals and giftbags, wrap gifts, make the meals, donate money, and deliver meals. On behalf of older Vermonters, of whom 7,800 experience some form of food insecurity according to 2013 Hunger Free Vermont statistics, thank you so much for your generosity in lending a hand!

How to Get Involved

Please Provide Donations for Giftbags

Every Christmas, we provide a giftbag with our meal delivery—Shhh, please don’t tell the seniors! We delivered 1,000 meals and giftbags last year so we’d appreciate lots of giftbag donations, please!

We try to stick with helpful basics and are always seeking:

• Financial contributions in any amount
• Canned goods & food items (soup, vegetables, canned tuna, meals in a can), jars of peanut butter, packages of peanut butter and crackers, healthy granola bars, jars of unsweetened applesauce, and large boxes of raisins
• Toiletries (toothpaste, individual toothbrushes, soap, large boxes of tissues, hand lotion, hand sanitizer, hand wipes, shampoo, shaving cream, etc.)
• Hats, gloves, or scarves for both men and women
• Art supplies (colored pencils, drawing paper, adult coloring books)
• Crossword puzzle books
• Small LED flashlights with batteries
• Energy efficient lightbulbs
• $20 Hannaford grocery giftcards
• Please, NO candles or sugar candy

Not sure what to give? Please check our Donation Tracker to see what items are most needed. Thank you!

If you would like to donate items, please contact Jess Hyman at jessicahymanvt@gmail.com. Thank you so much!

Volunteer

As part of the changes this year, we won’t be able to gather and giftwrap which is really sad. So, what would help out the most in this peculiar year is for you to donate a larger number of just one item from our wish list. That will make it so much easier for us to manage.

If you’re interested in just giftwrapping, please contact Jess Hyman at jessicahymanvt@gmail.com. If you’d like to purchase a number of the same items and giftwrap them yourself, that’s also great—please just make sure you stick a label on the whole batch so we know what it is. We have paper and tape if you’d like to pick that up in Burlington.