United Church volunteers hold some of the 200+ bags of Christmas toys for immigrants in Ciudad Juarez. Courtesy photo

BY GEORGIA STRICKFADEN
United Church of Los Alamos

Nine volunteers gathered December 10 at the United Church to packed 217 colorful homemade fabric bags with toys for immigrant children in Ciudad Juarez.  The bags will be distributed to facilities that house immigrants waiting for their asylum hearings.  These are mainly immigrants from Central America who are seeking asylum in the US because of life threatening conditions in their homeland.  Among the asylum seekers in Juarez are many nationalities including those fleeing the Ukraine.

The toys included small stuffed animals, cars and trucks, crayons with small coloring book, stickers, a snack-size baggie with a child’s mask, and band aids, also a Christmas card and candy cane.  The bags were sewn by a number of volunteers including Sandy Charles, Terry Fitzpatrick, Carole Watanabe, Nancy Lemons and Carol Hess, a friend of a friend, living in Imperial, Nebraska!  Many of the toys were collected at the United Church Thrift Shop.

This completes the Dignity Mission projects for 2022.  In total we assembled 1200 dignity kits, containing a dozen hygiene products, 96 student backpacks with school supplies and the Christmas bags.  We look forward to continuing this hands-on, all volunteer mission work again during 2023.

For more information about helping with the Dignity Mission, coordinator Nina Thayer may be contacted through The United Church of Los Alamos, www.unitedchurchla.org.