At Thanksgiving, we count our blessings and reflect upon how to reach out to and participate in our communities. We have so much for which we are grateful: our health, our families, our school, our economic well-being, and the list goes on. We are so fortunate and this engenders in us a desire to help others.
Traditionally, James River holds a canned food drive just before Thanksgiving that culminates in a feast where we celebrate together and share our food donations with area emergency food organizations. This canned food drive and Thanksgiving meal are known collectively as Thankful Hearts. It is an exciting and happy time of year. Though Thankful Hearts has passed for this year, it leaves memories filled with warmth and gratitude in its wake.
The Thankful Hearts Canned Food Drive, ran for two weeks and collected more than 10,024 cans, well over our goal of 7,000 cans and a school record! About 5,000 donated cans came in the last day of the drive to put us over our goal and set the record. Our Parents' Association volunteers, students, staff, and faculty gave, gathered, and tallied all this non-perishable food to assist area families in two ways. We gave the food service sized items to The Daily Bread and The Salvation Army, helping them provide warm meals. The smaller cans/packages were divided among three area food pantries: Rivermont Area Emergency Food Pantry, Amherst Food Pantry, and Holy Cross Food Pantry. Oh, the stacks of food! These donations will help these civic-minded organizations meet the needs of families in our area during the coming holiday season. That's something for which we can be quite thankful.
With an attendance exceeding 550, our annual Thankful Hearts Feast was blessed with friends and family, filling us all with a bountiful meal indeed. We enjoyed the traditional turkey dinner with the trimmings (including a vegetarian entree for those who preferred it) and performances by the Third and Fourth Grade Chorus, the Middle School Choir, and the kindergarten and first grade students. The music was wonderful, touching, and in the case of the kindergarteners and first graders, quite adorable - particularly because they were dressed for the First Thanksgiving as pilgrims and Native Americans.
The Thankful Hearts Feast and Canned Food Drive are always a highlight of the school year. Thank you to all those who made them possible! Your contributions will help many families in need over the holidays. Please keep the area food banks and food pantries in mind and support them at other times of the year - hunger is a year-round need.