This month, ChAngels discovered a new favorite charity called Riley's Place. Riley's Place is a small farm for sick children to go to to play with animals which helps take their mind off their sickness. Riley's Place also takes animals to hospitals to cheer children up.

Riley's Place was founded because a girl named Riley got sick with a brain tumor and a month before she died, her friends brought a miniature horse to her house. When Riley saw the horse, her face lit up. Three years after Riley died, a group of people started Riley's Place in her honor and to help others like her.

ChAngels went to Riley's Place and learned how to be volunteers so we can go back and help with the animals. We learened how to walk the goats and how to take the miniature horses out to run around. We also learned how to feed the guinea pigs and bunnies, and to clean the animal stalls.

We thought that Riley's Place was a perfect project because we love to do hands on work and we love animals. We also love how they are helping children. Riley's Place was a happy place, and it is fun to spend time there. ChAngels enjoyed helping with the animals and we plan to go back regularly.

We also made a $125 donation to help them with supplies.

3rd Annual Persimmon & Baked Goods Sale

In November, ChAngels had a great time hosting our 3rd Annual Persimmon Sale. Many of our friends and neighbors stopped by to support our persimmon and baked goods sale, and we especially thank our return customers! Along with lots of persimmons, all of our tea loaves were sold, so we plan to bake even more next year.

We give 100% of the money raised to charity. Thanks for helping us reach our goal!

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month

In honor of Breast Cancer Awareness month, ChAngels repeated the breast cancer walk that we did last year: some things are worth doing twice! We looped around the Stanford Dish with Poised, a personal training group, who organizes a walk called The Sisterhood of the Traveling Scarves. The Poised staff raises money from the walk to purchase head scarves for cancer patients that have lost their hair from chemotherapy.

Before walking we each thought of a breast cancer survivor that we know to honor on our walk. With the name of that woman stored in our head or tucked in our shoe, we walked in awareness and with hope. We thank Yvonne and Jill at Poised for sponsoring such a wonderful event and for providing the sparkly pink visors and fluffy pink boas that made it so festive!

San Bruno Fire

In September, ChAngels had a planning meeting to set our agenda for the year. We have so many great new ideas that we are all looking foward to.

However, pressing on our minds at our first meeting was the San Bruno fire: so tragic and so close to home. We made an immediate decision to donate $200 to the Red Cross Fund for San Bruno victims. We also send them our prayers.

Summer-Time Fun!

The ChAngles took a break over the summer for the most part, but we had a little fun raising a little change at two lemonade stand fundraisers. It was fun to keep the ChAngels spirit alive and thanks to all our thirsty friends that stopped by!

Two weeks ago, ChAngels went to an adult emergency shelter for homeless men and women. We prepared and served dinner for the people who were currently living there. It was so great to see them taking the food, smiling and saying "God bless you" or "thank you for doing this." You could see hope light up on their faces at the delight of having a home-cooked meal. We all felt great that we had really helped someone that needed it.

A special thanks to our honorary ChAngel, Madhavi, for helping us with this project!

ChAngels Goes Green

While discussing project ideas, ChAngles decided it wanted to do something green. In March, ChAngels went to pick weeds and mulch with an environmental group called Magic. We helped Magic by pulling out the non-native plants by hand and covering other areas with cardboard and mulch, which they hoped, in time, would kill all the weeds underneath. Magic plans these projects to help preserve the natural and native habitat of the Stanford Foothills. We are thankful to Magic for letting us help them with one of their programs. Now, every time we walk the Dish, we'll have a sense of accomplishment for having helped.