Toiletries Drive

Seasons greetings SRC!
Hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday! This holiday season, our team of SRC distributes toiletries to the homeless in places like Long Beach.

Forming stations to pack hygiene items in an orderly fashion.

Firstly, we went shopping in the dollar stores where they have a supply of amenities (i.e. toothbrush, toothpaste, tissues, lotion, etc.). Together, we bought 200 items! Then the SRC team met up at Sky's house to package all of the items in a neat fashion. Each member was stationed to a toiletry item. In their stations, members opened Ziploc bags, place the item in the bag, and pass it down to the next person until all seven items are packed. Then we inspect all packages to see if any amenity was missing/broken. With a team of eight people, we manage to get over 70 bags!

Huan Le Hoang, representative of the Texas Recycle Club branch, packed lotion into toiletry bags.

On the next day, the team went to volunteer at Someone Cares Soup Kitchen, preparing delicious foods like eggs, pancakes, fruit, and yogurt. Some of the breads would be donated from the Soup Kitchen and were given to the homeless after this event.

SRC member, Brenda Saucedo, cutting fruit to put in the yogurt.

During the break, we have delicious pho (Vietnamese noodle soup) for lunch! 

Then we proceed to pack up the fresh breads in a few boxes to give to the needy.

The team inspected and packed up the fresh breads to give to the homeless.

Eventually, SRC drove all the way to Long Beach to deliver hygiene, water, and food items to the needy. Students were hard at work  lugging the ton of goodies into the center of the park. People around the park gathered in a straight line to receive water, food, and toiletries. Many of the homeless left bright smiles and signs of gratitude by saying 'Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays,' showing appreciation to the volunteers as they will have things to keep them warm for the holidays.

Getting water and hygiene items from the car to the needy

SRC giveaway items for the holidays

Have a great holiday and New Year! :)

Upcoming Sleeping Bag and Toiletry Drive!

Hello SRC and readers,
Welcome back from Thanksgiving break! Holidays are coming up really soon, which means it's a time of giving and spreading happiness all around the community! I would like to remind you all of one of our exciting events for the following weeks:

SRC and Someone Cares Soup Kitchen of Costa Mesa are partnering up to have a Sleeping Bag and Toiletry Drive starting now through December 20 at 11:45 p.m. We do this drive to help the homeless people to keep warm and prevent hypothermia and other diseases due to the cold, windy (and possibly rainy) weather. If you would like to donate, we require that you have a new and unopened toiletry items (i.e. toothbrush, toothpaste, tissue paper, etc.), and a new sleeping bag (preferably unused). For those of you who want to donate, a team from SRC will be driving to your location to pick up your donations. If you prefer other alternatives, please send your donations to our SRC meeting room (Cal State Fullerton's McCarthy Hall fourth floor/ MH 426) or give the items to Volunteer Services Center at Room 2 in the Titan Student Union (TSU) downstairs by Garden Cafe to drop off your items. We will give this to the Someone Cares Soup Kitchen, and from there they will give the sleeping bags and a bag of toiletry items to the needy people.

Currently we have boxes for you to put your donated items in the SRC meeting room. So you can give it to us anytime. :)

Here are pictures of the things we will be doing.

SRC happily collecting toiletries

Sky Pham buying a bundle of sleeping bags

If you are interested, please email us or join in this Facebook event page:

https://www.facebook.com/events/1378107812438763/

Your efforts of donating would be greatly appreciated by us, the homeless people, and the greater community!

Thank you,

SRC team

Peters Canyon Forest Restoration

Hello fellow SRC Recyclers and readers!

The season of giving thanks is approaching! SRC gives thanks to our valuable things on earth... by planting trees (and natural vegetation)! This Sunday morning at 7 a.m., our group traveled to Peters Canyon Regional Park in North Tustin, California to restore the forest to its natural habitat. The land (of 340 acres) was very dry and barren when we got there with some little green sprouts popping in the ground.

 Our friendly forest ranger taught us step-by-step how to properly plant trees.

Dig a hole of about 2 feet

Remove the plant from the pot

Place the plant in the ground

Add couple liters of water and flatten it with loose soil

Protect the plants (from hungry animals)

It may sound simple, but it is actually more strenuous when you do it, especially in the growing heat from the sun. The ground contained really hard sediments of clay and rocks. The soil was so hard that we had to crack them down numerous times with a large, thick wood. That did not stop SRC and volunteers, and we persevere with our forest planting until every plant has its spot and will grow into a beautiful forest.

Many volunteers hard at work

Soomin Woo and Suela Kong working together

Sky Pham digging a place for the baby tree

Great job SRC!!

Baby trees and plants are scattered and thriving in the crushed soil but are in dire need of water. So we went in the barren lands and quench the thirst of over 70 plants. SRC was hard at work trekking back and forth from the water truck to nourish the plants. With a great workout comes even greater benefits, which is to make the trees and plants grow in their natural ecosystem to give shade, absorb toxins in the air, and give more animals a happy and comforting home.

A tiny lizard we found climbing on a young tree

Someone Cares Soup Kitchen

Good evening SRC!
We just had our weekly volunteering in the Costa Mesa's Someone Cares Soup Kitchen on Sunday! Woke up bright, really foggy, and early morning to go to Someone Cares Soup Kitchen. This kitchen runs from 7:00 a.m. to 12 p.m. with lots of hard work put into those hours! Sky Pham, Suela Kong, Soomin Woo, Susan Luong, and I were the volunteers of that day. Here's how it broke down:

Placing breads on the table for the homeless

The crew setting up tables and chairs

7:00 a.m.-9:00a.m.: It was a hectic environment with everyone scrambling to do their work inside and outside the kitchen. First our group, along with other organizations, helped prepare the shelter by working quickly to get the nutritious breads out on the shelves/tables. We had to vacuum floors, wipe down and set the tables and chairs in a neat fashion, and clean up the serving area.

Sky Pham cracking fresh eggs

Susan Luong cooking scrambled eggs with cheese

Cutting up strawberries and other fresh fruits (front to back: Soomin Woo, Suela Kong, Jessica Lau)

9:00-12:00: This time we get to cook in the kitchen! Today's menu consisted of pancakes, sausages, oatmeal, scrambled eggs, and fruit. So in the kitchen, part of the group conjured up some sizzling eggs (with cheese to add some flavor). The rest of us hand picked and chopped up some fresh fruits (i.e. strawberries, grapes, apples, pears) to make a wonderfully tasty fruit salad and yogurt with fruit. When they are all done, we simply put them in trays, take it to the serving area, and serve it to the homeless waiting in line. Toward the end of the hour, the group took a break and enjoyed breakfast that we helped make.

Enjoying our breakfast that we helped make. Yummy!

11:00-12:00 p.m.: Clean up and packed everything up in the shelter for the next day.

Together, we all help cooked and served breakfast to more than 300 homeless people. That's a lot of mouths to feed in one day!

Vacuuming/cleaning up after breakfast

It was so much of a fast-paced environment that we hardly take long breaks! All the work is worthwhile though. Serving food to the homeless has really impacted their lives, as well as our's and the community. Feeling great and dedicated to help out. :)

Keep up with your hard work SRC!

This weekly event is great for people who are new to SRC. Good hands on experience and will definitely help and interact with the homeless. If you have time on Sunday mornings, we highly encourage you to help out in the soup kitchen!

Jessica Lau
VP-Marketing

Crafternoon Delight

Having fun with crafts!

Hello everyone! :)
Welcome to the 1st exciting edition of SRC Recyclers Weekly! We just had our creative and fun event, Crafternoon, this Saturday afternoon. Our SRC President, Sky Pham, kindly let us use his house to host this event. The purpose of Crafternoon was to make homemade crafts to the needy people who need hats, scarves, toys, and other goodies.

Samantha Melero preparing chicken dinner for potluck

Dinner is here!

With all the hard work that has to come, we had a great potluck. Mountains of food piled up on the table as we enjoyed dishes such as pineapple fried rice, tomato fried rice, homemade chicken salad, and Halloween cake. We sat down all around the living room playing ice breaker games to get to know one another and digging in to our delicious dinner. Kudos to the chefs, Samantha Melero and Truc Pham, for making scrumptious meals for the whole group!

Group works on handcraft items to donate to the needy.

SRC makes Miniature foods from clay

After filling up our bellies full of delicious and nutritious food, we got right into business. Members created colorful scarves and hats through crocheting/knitting; and miniature cakes, doughnuts, foods through sculpting clay. Since most of the members had little or no experience on craft making, Susan Luong taught us how to carefully craft each and every one of the pieces. It was a fun experience helping each other out and learning new crafts together for a good cause.

Susan Luong and Joseph Kamikihara working together with knitting

Truc Pham making miniature watermelon slices

The great thing about this event is that we have a great bonding experience with everyone. Through games, such as two truths and one lie, to working together with the knitting, we all made new friendships. With all our hard work and creative minds, SRC truly had an amazing time working together while making these thoughtful crafts to the needy people. We hope these handcrafted products make the needy people happy. :)

Great job with all of your amazing crafts SRC!!

Be sure to check out our upcoming events on our facebook page! Our meetings are on a bi weekly basis (second and last week of every month) on Tuedays in MH 426. The upcoming event will be the Trick-or-Cans event on Halloween, in which we ask for canned food donations from the Fullerton neighborhood (with costumes). All donations would go toward the local homeless shelter. Sign up if you're interested!
Have a great night!

Jessica Lau
VP- Marketing/Blog writer