September 23 2023
Ever wonder where all the food in our food pantry comes from? We are fortunate to have many resources to aid in filling our shelves!
Once a month the Foodbank delivers our allotment of TEFAP food (The Emergency Food Assistance program from the government.) It’s a wide range of food – non-perishables, as well as frozen and refrigerated items.
We pick up food from the Food Lion on Carolina Beach each Monday. We receive a wide variety of items – perishable and non-perishable food as well as occasional household and holiday items; the type of items vary weekly. We are especially happy when we receive meat as we never seem to have enough to serve our guests.
On Mondays, we pickup up from Apple Annie’s – a large assortment of delicious baked goods. We love sharing the treats with our guests. When we hear that one of our guests has a birthday in the family we are sometimes able to give them a beautiful birthday cake to celebrate!
On Tuesdays, we have an opportunity to send a shopper to the Food Bank to choose items. The inventory varies week to week; we use funds from the Knight’s food drives to purchase items (especially meat) and we receive free items as well.
Several times during the year our Knights of Columbus hold food drives; they’ve hosted drives on our campus, at Piggly Wiggly and Lowes. These drives provide an abundance of food for us, as well as cash donations that we use to purchase additional food. One family provides bagged lunches for us once a month, and one of my volunteers monitors our ‘homeless’ cupboard and donates what’s needed to keep it well stocked. Our school children bring in food on many occasions as well. Often times we have donors that just drop by and bring in a food donation. Of course we have several seasonal food donations: Immaculate Conception’s ‘Souper Bowl’, our Thanksgiving baskets, and Italian dinners from the Catholic Daughters at Christmas.
Several years ago, Sister Isaac started “Share Sunday” encouraging our parishioners to bring in non-perishable food to church on the first Sunday of the month and put it in the white basket in the vestibule. October 1, next weekend is Share Sunday if you’d like to participate.
Thank you to everyone that helps us share food with those in need.
Blessings,
Mary Ann