The Food Pantry

🥫
Patty, Julie and I helped at the local Food Pantry last week.
We were asked to fill bags with two cans from each of five bins, tie the bags, tally them as they went in a bag bin, and notify the manager when we had 50 bags in the bin.
Then start on the next 50 bags.

At first we just started filling bags.
Then we realized that it would be more efficient to put the empty bags at the front of the line, stack the full bags on a cart in front of the bag bin, then put them into the bin in tens instead of one-by-one.

Patty manned the box cutter and opened up new boxes of canned goods.
Julie kept track of where we were in counting the 50 bags.
I separated the plastic from the cardboard for recycling.
We all moved like a well-oiled machine as we filled 200 bags and then separated donated food into bins for the next volunteers.

Serving is awesome.
But I’m a systems girl. I like purpose and clarity and being effective.
So, figuring out a system while serving was even more awesome!

We found out that they take small groups of volunteers from age 8 and up (kids with supervision).
I told Coleman that we’ll go back on a Friday since there’s no in-person school in our district on Fridays.
We’ll set a goal of the number of bags we want to fill.
And continue the system that Patty, Julie and I worked out . . . 12-year-old style.

I can’t wait.💙✊🏻