For all who enjoy church suppers, the men’s club of Houlton United Methodist Church will be sponsoring a Chicken Pot Pie Supper on Saturday, Sept. 13, in the church’s dining room from 4:30 – 6 p.m. The proceeds from this supper will be used to help fund the local Backpack for Kids program.
We are in our fourth year of providing meals for 45 to 50 kids every weekend for 36 weeks during the school year through the Backpacks for Kids program. In total, the program to date provides 5,400 meals each school year. Based on the current cost of the food items that we provide weekly, we will need to raise at least $13,000. When we started four years ago, there was one other town in Maine participating in this program. At present, 27 towns in Maine are participating in the program. We have also been providing between 20 and 30 families with Christmas dinners, including all the fixings, as well as gifts from our Giving Tree.
This summer, we conducted a summer feeding program for neighborhood children. During the 23-day program, we provided 345 meals to neighborhood children. We hope to be able to offer this program to area children next summer.
We are also planning a series of church suppers, the second being on Saturday, Oct. 11, featuring our famous Roast Pork Dinner with all the trimmings. We are also planning additional church suppers as well as a concert and other fundraisers. Please watch for future events.
We wish to thank everyone who has supported our Backpacks for Kids program in the past and we pray that the support will continue as the number of children facing hunger problems is growing at a fast pace. We have been greatly blessed by the generosity of the Houlton Rotary Club and County Yankee Grocery as well as many individual donors.
Anyone wishing to contribute to the program, or anyone with fundraising suggestions, is invited to contact Gerald (Moose) Karnes at 694-1545, Mike Swallow at 757-7200 or Jim Blois at 757-7054.
