Supporting the Johnson Family

Hey everyone, I’m Nicole and about a year and a half ago I was lucky enough to meet some pretty fantastic people through the Corona Chargers Football & Cheer organization. Some of those people and their families have become our closest friends and our chosen family. Erik, Rachel, Aiden and Holly Johnson are four of the most genuinely loving, caring, sweet, giving, fun people we are lucky enough to call our chosen family. They had a horrible tragedy happen where there was an accidental fire at their home and they lost a good majority of their belongings, including clothes, toys, Christmas presents, and the most heartbreaking of all: their four fur babies. Anyone who knows the Johnson family knows they would give you the shirts off their backs had this happened to any of their friends and for the last 12 hours I’ve been asking myself, “What can I do? How can we help our friends even begin to recover from this unthinkable tragedy?”... in a situation like this as an individual I feel so helpless. When my husband was a young child, he lost everything in a house fire. He wasn’t as lucky as the Johnsons because he also lost his little brother, but he knows what it feels like to have everything you own gone in an instant and anything left is so saturated with smoke that it might as well be gone too. To have this happen at any time is horrific, but to have it happen less than two weeks before Christmas is gut wrenching. It will take much more than money or material things for this sweet family to heal from this, but the only way I can come up with to help is to ask all of our friends and family and all of the friends and family of the Johnsons to give what they can during this time. Clothes, toys, money, anything will help. I know there are so many families in California going through this exact thing at the moment and if I could help every one of them, I would in a second. I pray that all of those families have the love and support of their friends and loved ones like I know the Johnsons have of theirs. If you have actual items you want to provide, I am happy to set up a time to collect them and get them to our dear friends. And if you can spare any amount of money to help them get back on their feet, I know it would mean the world to them. No kid should have to deal with this ever, and my heart is completely shattered for Erik and Rachel as parents having to be strong and supportive when all they probably want to do is break down themselves. Let’s pull together and try to wrap them all in our love and support as we know they would do for any one of us. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart and Merry Christmas. Love, Nicole Linder