Aveo Derwent Waters comes together to gift a brighter Christmas

The 2019 Christmas Assistance Program provided 670 families with food and toys for Christmas. These families are generally doing it tough and struggling to make ends meet. 

Every year, individuals, businesses and community organisations support the Christmas Assistance Program. They collect toys, donate money and volunteer time to make Christmas brighter for those in experiencing hardship in our community.

This year donors provided a total of 7,228 toys for children who would otherwise have gone without! It’s thanks to these generous donors that over 1,120 children were able to have a gift under the tree for Christmas 2019.

Aveo Derwent Waters is an independent aged living facility in Claremont. They have collected toys for the Toy Drive for the past few years.

“This is our third year in the Christmas Toy Drive”, says Kirby Cross, receptionist and organiser of the Toy Drive at Aveo Derwent Waters.

“We took part again this year and our residents were collecting toys and gifts from early in the year. With all the toys saved we couldn’t not do it!” she laughs.

Residents at Aveo Derwent Waters purchased gifts and made items for the Toy Drive. They host crochet and knitting groups throughout the year, making toys and clothing.

“As soon as the Christmas tree went up it was already full of toys and items for donation”, says Kirby. “The staff and residents are super generous, and will use the list of toys and gifts suggested by Hobart City Mission. All the residents participated in some way”.

“Christmas is a very happy time of year, but it’s also a very sad time of year for some people. It fills my heart to see how generous our residents are. It’s so good to know that we’re helping people who are living close-by in our community”.

Thank you to the residents at Aveo who provided toys to brighten Christmas for children in need.

We thank all the businesses who donated food, toys, or cash to the Christmas Appeal. Your donations helped 670 families who desperately needed your support at Christmas time.