A Christmas for Storm Children

My dear friends,

Many families in Puerto Rico, some with very young children, were left devastated by Hurricane Maria.  Many were left with no place to live and were forced to move to shelters, having lost everything in the storm.  My friend Myrna has been volunteering at one of these shelters in San Juan, PR and has been telling me of the five children that live in a particular shelter.  These kids were identified by the social workers at the shelter, as the ones in most dire need of additional support.  You can see the pictures of these five children above.  The 1st pic is of Joenielys, age 7; the 2nd pic is of the brothers Luis and Raymond, 4 and 6 years old; the 3rd is Francisco, only 2 years old; and the last pic is of Osvaldo, 13 years old.  There are also some pictures of the remains of their homes after Hurricane Maria hit.  These children, some with only a single parent, are being relocated this month to apartment projects as a more long term solution.  They are being moved into small empty apartments with only cots to sleep on and what little clothes and furniture that they have been able to scrounge up or has been donated.  Fortunately, water is finally running again in San Juan, PR, so they will have potable water, but electricity is still out in many places.  In short, these children will be provided enough food and water to survive but won't have much more than that for quite some time.  Several of my friends and I are donating $10 for each child for a total of $50 each in an effort to raise funds to buy these kids bedding and some clothes, shoes and mabye a bicycle for Christmas.  My goal is to raise $300 for each of the kids for a total of $1500 by the 10th of December in order to have enough time to acquire everthing needed in time for Christmas.  We will probably purchase bedding for all of the kids as soon as we have at least a few hundred dollars raised and worry about the shoes, clothes and other Christmas presents later.  If you would like to donate $10 for a particular kid or $50 for all of them or any amount at all, Myrna and I will ensure that every cent goes toward providing for these kids and will provide receipts for everything that is purchased for these kids as well as pictures of them receiving your gifts of generousity.  Maybe we can't help everyone, but at least we can maybe make this Christmas a little more bright for these five children.