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During the weekend before Thanksgiving Cupertino De Anza Lions Club held their 40th Annual Thanksgiving Food Drive.
This year the beneficiaries were 220 needy families with students in Trace, Hughes, Rosemary, and Empire Gardens Elementary Schools, YWCA, Second Harvest Food Bank and Farmworkers in the Watsonville area.
Prior to the event we published on social media, requesting donations and food.
We were delighted with the response that generated a significant amount of cash donations and many bags of food (see photo below)
Over the weekend and for delivery on Monday, November 22nd, a total of over 50 volunteers spent an estimated 400 hours soliciting donations, counting, packing, shopping, and delivering the food. In total we collected over $6,500.00 in cash and estimate we collected $14,000.00 in food donations.
The featured image at the top gives a visual of the size of the task.
One of the major benefits of this event is that we introduce non-Lions of all ages to experience the fun and satisfaction of public service.
Special thanks to the West San Jose-Campbell Lions Club, all volunteers and generous community donors who helped make this event such a success.

   

 

The event took place with a limited amount of people – lots learned for next year’s event

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BREAKING NEWS!

Our DeAnza Lions Club received a lovely “Certificate of Appreciation” from Project Linus for our contributions to this wonderful cause!

Project Linus Fall 2020

During this time of isolation, time seems to have come to a slow crawl. It was sad watching the calendar change while our Lion community was able to do less and less service. Trying to come up with a way to get us together and to serve, an idea came. Maybe we could try a Project Linus Zoom event. It could be a chance for us to see each other via Zoom outside of “a Club Meeting” where we could chat and make a blanket for children in need. Community and community service! Most of our Club members have seen and participated in a Blanketeering evening at least once over the last ten years so it seemed a comfortable and natural way to go.

The process was old and new. We gathered the fleece during a Labor Day 60% sale and got a teacher to Joann Fabrics with her ID so our discount could be even greater. We were able to purchase 73 fleeces within our budget. We figured out a way to make a kit filled with almost all the necessary items to send home to participants, observing the COVID 19 recommendations of no contact. Then things changed dramatically! A Club member and Girl Scout Troop leader reached out to her troop, another troop and her elementary school and invited them to join us in this community service project. All organizations said yes. When the sign-up deadline arrived, we had 60 new people signed up to participate with us. We had to go back to Joann’s to buy 40 more pieces of fleece in order to fit the need. (Expenses were covered by the other organizations so DAL could stay within our annual budget.)

Event day arrived on September 19th. More than twenty onlookers were signed on (14 of whom were Scouts and students!) as we proceeded to make our blankets. Lion Leslye tried to provide some guidance and answer questions as we all followed the instructions provided by Project Linus. Then Blanketeers began announcing that they had completed their blankets!! With every announcement, the cowbell was rung to keep up the DAL tradition set by young, future-Lion, Eli Erickson a few years back. (I don’t know if online participants could hear it but it was pretty noisy at the house as the bell rang recognizing everyone’s success.) We were online for about two hours and we got great, positive feedback from those who completed the survey we sent out (what a huge relief!).

The greatest news is that we delivered 114 blankets to Project Linus! We should all be so excited. This is the most Cupertino DAL has ever donated after one Blanketeering event and it is all because of you all for having trust in the vision and wanting to be a part of community service once more. We also have to give a special shout-out to Lion Claire who had the foresight to reach out and include the perfect organizations to partner with us in this project. By the way, our blankets will most likely be going to local fire victims so we should also be proud knowing we might have been able to help our little neighbors in need if only with a warm, fuzzy blanket.

 

Dear Fellow Lions –

The “Canine Companions for Independence” (CCI) Gold Classic tournament took place on Friday, September 4th, 2020 – at the Cinnabar Hills Golf Club in San Jose!

Lion Les was busy participating at the online auction, but was sadly out-bid in the items she was interested in. We are waiting for a full report from the event.

In the meantime a speaker for CCI will join our PM zoom meeting on October 7. Details will be communicated via email

 

Student Speakers Contest Finals August 21 at 6:00pm
This is the time reserved to hear all 4 finalists in the MD-4 Governors Scholarship contest. The time reserved is for 6:00 pm on Friday. Several of the students may be on the zoom meeting as well.
The winner will be announced on Sunday when the winning video is played. PDG Kevin Patel has arranged this video presentation for us. Thank you Kevin! I hope you all can make this zoom meeting.
This post will be updated when the results are available

 

 

 

As usual Lion Bill (soon to be 94 years old) led the way to our work party on Friday and Saturday, May 15 and 16 at the “Via West Campus”. On Friday, he arrived early in his big truck, accompanied by his son Patrick and lugging 2 lawn movers, starting work even before anybody else showed up. By 9:00AM a handful of other DeAnza Lions arrived and received instructions from Rick, the leader at the Camp. Lions Joan and Dagi focused on pulling weeds around Building 11 and the 4 huge flower boxes in front of the house. Lion Bill and his son, Lions Al, Ray and Ron went through a lot of meadows, cutting grass, trying to avoid huge rocks hidden underneath.
On Saturday Lion Prez Jeff joined the grass cutting team in the hills, also clearing a fallen tree from the road to the upper areas, while Lions Joan and Dagi continued clearing the weeds around another abode, also planting some lilies and succulent plants Lion Joan had brought from her own garden.
The team finished the day by moving chemical barrels into the hazmat storage area.
Lion Prez Jeff summed it up: “A few Lions, a few hours, a couple days, good work once again”.                          
National Wreaths Across America Day was on December 14th, 2019

Each December on National Wreaths Across America Day, our mission to Remember, Honor and Teach is carried out by coordinating wreath-laying ceremonies at Arlington National Cemetery, as well as at more than 1,600 additional locations in all 50 U.S. states, at sea and abroad.

Lion’s Mort, Eli, Ann Harris, Ray and Ron attended the ceremony. After the ceremony we participated in laying wreaths on the veterans’ graves.

A Shout Out to Lions Claire, Jen and Jeff who organized and managed our 40th year of the Cupertino De Anza Charity Food Drive. This year we provided 2 weeks worth of food to over 170 families in need and sent several trucks/SUV’s full of food to local charities.

Omar’s Dream Run is in its 7th year, and like in the past few years, it was held at Hellyer Park in South San Jose. Our club provided extra tables and support for financial transactions. Lions Eli, Ron, Jeff and Mike looked after the hauling back and forth of tables and chairs, while Lion Al and Barb took care of the financial side. Lion Claire participated with her two girls, and all 3 got a medal! Way to go!

As usual the event was amazingly well organized with dozens of young students volunteering with the elaborate set up. Lion Al estimates that around $ 50k were donated to the cause – which will provide learning tools, like computers, to young hospitalized students who can follow their classes from their hospital beds.  As last year, Lion Claire’s friend Portia sent a little note and posted a few photos, too:

Hello! Here are some pictures of my niece and her classmate Coral, who Omar’s Dream sponsored after we connected them after the run last year! She is in remission 🎉❤️ and receiving maintenance chemo treatment. Her parents are both active military and they are being transferred to Columbus, OH soon, so we were so lucky to get to run with her this year!

More details to come