How can you help us help others? Here's a list of ideas.

Food drives: We need canned and boxed goods. We also need frozen meat including turkeys, hams, chicken and hamburger.

A back to basics food drive: We need, but rarely receive, basic items like salt, pepper, vinegar, oil, mustard, ketchup, pancake mix, syrup, peanut butter and jelly.

Cereal drive: Annie West of the Calumet Township Senior Center collects boxes of cereal.

Baby drive: We need diapers, baby food, wipes, etc.

Christmas stockings: We provide hand decorated Christmas stockings for every child on our list, including teenagers. We need stocking stuffers. We also help the CEDA school in Blue Island. We need stocking stuffers, like large crayons, coloring books, bubbles, candy, stuffed animals, and small, but safe toys for preschoolers.

We need school supplies. We try to provide each child on our Christmas list with a backpack full of supplies.

Toy drive: We need toys for children of all ages.

Hats, scarves and mittens: We try to provide each member of our families with hats, mittens and scarves, and if necessary coats. We want to provide hats, mittens and scarves for the children at the CEDA school. These are all preschoolers.

Non-food drive: This includes household cleaners like laundry or dish detergent, bleach, etc. And we need toilet paper, tissue, paper towels, health and beauty items, etc.

Penny jars: We have jars with our name on them. Many businesses place them on counters where customers can throw their change.

Gift certificates drives: We are looking for gift cards from stores like Jewel, Food 4 Less, and Dominics. We would also gratefully accept cards from Walgreens, CVS, Cosco, Speedway, Marathon, Thorton's and Citgo.

Adoption: Families or groups can have a chance to play Santa by adopting individual families. We ask for Christmas dinner and gifts for each member of our families.

We invited our donor to use their imagination. In other years, we've been the recipients of sock drives, shoebox drives, etc.