When Practice Fusion called to see what they could do for St. Anthony’s, I wasn’t sure who they were. A restaurant serving California cuisine? A martial arts school? A nuclear research facility?

All wrong. Practice Fusion hosts an electronic health record system (a medical database). It’s web-based, and licensing, hosting, and training are all included. An ad-bedecked version is free. An ad-less version comes with a reasonable fee. (If you don’t believe it, look for their website where they explain their secret.)

They called on a short lead, which often doesn’t work for St. Anthony’s, especially at holiday time. But as it happened, we had a gap they were just in time to handle. We started off with a tour of our new Free Medical Clinic, then crossed the street to the volunteer room to work on last minute preparations our service staff were glad to turn over to volunteers.

St. Anthony volunteer projects are usually booked months ahead, but it’s always worth a call. You never know.  Our new adult group coordinator is Dolores Gould: 415-592-2704. Or click over to Volunteer and fill out a group form for something in the future.

Gymboree is in the business of children’s clothing, playtime, and music, but for the last two years they’ve been packing presents for adults, here at St. Anthony Foundation.

Gymboree employees are a lot of the reason we could give a gift bag to every person who came to St. Anthony Dining Room on Christmas Day. They donated the bags, colored hats, and chocolate bars, in addition to labels they had printed with “Happy Holidays.” They collected hundreds of travel size shampoos, bath gels, and lotions. Then they came in person to label and fill the bags with the ingredients they had brought, plus socks St. Anthony’s had been collecting for weeks.

The Gymboree values statement promotes making a difference, being creative, passionate, and authentic, and acting like a family.  “We care about one another,” they say. “We have a sincere respect for one another and we foster trust and camaraderie.  We like to have a good time and celebrate success.”

Twenty-two-hundred bags. Twenty-two-hundred very low-income people whose day was brightened by a special meal at St. Anthony’s and a present. Yes it was a useful present; practical. It was also colorful, warm, and unexpected. Like the sticker that said “Happy Holidays” and the chocolate bar in among the socks and bath gels.  It was a success to celebrate.

We tell groups who help us with Christmas projects that Christmas is the hardest day of the year for our guests. On other days, you’ll see a cheerfulness and sense of community you might not expect. But on Christmas, you just hope that whatever we can do sinks in by the day after and cheers people up.

This Christmas, it seemed to me our guests on the whole were in better spirits than I’d seen since I started here. More people wished me a merry Christmas or responded to my own “Merry Christmas” with a big smile; more people thanked me for one thing or another than I remember from previous years. Gymboree reminded us that that one day of kindness and thoughtfulness can make a difference; one gift on one day of the year. And don’t forget the chocolate.

The St. Anthony Foundation provides a gateway to services for those in our community who need assistance fulfilling their basic needs. Together, our services work closely in a combined effort to meet these needs — a perfect example of which is the dental hygiene drive currently taking place among members of St. Anthony Free Medical Clinic.

Clinic Americorps volunteer Monica T. recently taught a class on oral hygiene to men at our Father Alfred Center recovery center. While explaining the value and  importance of flossing the men explained that very few in their number actually owned floss. Monica offered to bring some the next time she came, and brought a handful of her own supplies to the house this past monday. Though generous, her efforts were not enough to supplement the needs of a house of 60.

In the spirit of community health care, Monica has rallied the Clinic collect floss for the men at The Center. A donation box is now available in the Clinic, and Monica has encouraged staff and volunteers to participate.  She’ll be returning to help men at The Center “brush up” on their oral hygiene skills at the end of January. She hopes to provide the men with the supplies they need via collections from this mini-drive.

Efforts like these, whether they be staff, volunteer, or outside community driven are what build and strengthen our network of services here at St. Anthony Foundation. Find out how you can get involved by becoming a donor, volunteer, or advocate.

Not everyone who bats for the San Francisco Giants is aiming for a ball. The Giants HR department goes to bat for the the players, the business employees, and the community. Last month, they were here at St. Anthony’s decorating the event room for the holidays.

We always decorate the Dining Room for special occasions. As St. Anthony’s has grown, however, there’s more space to cover in order to throw our guests the kind of parties we really want to. The event room — the New Poverello — is where St. Anthony programs give holiday parties for the guests who use our services: the Clinic, the Tech Lab, and the Social Work Center.

We were about to haul out the sorry old plastic greens and put staff to work on it when the SF Giants Human Resources Department called. Yes, they’d like to make this room special. Yes, they’d bring new decorations themselves. And bring they did. Boxes and boxes of garlands, tinsel, Christmas tree bulbs, lights and icicles, wall decorations and hanging ornaments for both Christmas and Chanukah. There were decorations left over for the Dining Room and probably for next year.

It’s a challenge, hanging up decorations in a green building. You have to use tape that doesn’t take the unleaded paint off the walls. The group made use of lights and the enormous columns in the room. They were good natured about the Christmas tree that hadn’t arrived by the time they were finished. And someone had the bright thought of hanging tree ornaments from the light fixtures with curling ribbon: no tape needed. Even the piano looked like a New Year’s party chanteuse by the time they got through.

The Giants have a solid community service record. With an advance application, they give free tickets and make in-kind donations to some oganizations serving the very poor, promote non-profits and community organizations through their in-park matrix board messages, and host a community club house behind home plate for organizations to raise awareness and educate Giants fans about their work.

A few hundred guests saw the work the Giants HR Department did on the party room. I wish the HR Department could have seen the guests’ faces.

(The picture is about a third of the Giants staff who came in to help. )

And what a holiday donation drive it was. The Ramallah Club kicked off the giving spree on the first day with 96 turkeys.  Eighteen young people from The Joint Youth Ministry came all the way from San Jose with 26 bags of clothing which some of them spent their day sorting and bagging while others unloaded donations from people driving up to our doors with food and clothing for our guests.  We received a record 1163 turkies over the week before Thanksgiving and hundreds of deliveries of clothing and toiletries over Christmas week.

Our friends heard our cry for socks. More than 3,000 pairs, in every size, color, and pattern, with plenty of plain but very warm crew socks and work socks to fill Christmas gift bags for all the guests who came to the Dining Room. Gymboree donated hats, chocolate, bags, and labels that said “Happy Holidays” and put the bags together. The Palace Hotel came through with 2800 mineral washes for the bags and cartons of other useful gifts for St. Anthony residential programs. The Hilton and other hotels gave shampoo and lotion. And Jane and John Doe just kept giving and giving and giving.

Anything that didn’t go into a gift bag will be given to our guests for months to come, as the rains continue and the cold grows sharper. This is how the 5,000 get fed. And clothed and healed and living better, safer lives: when people of good will are not too afraid for themselves to open their hands and share what they can.

And There It Went!

Each New Year we make resolutions and renew our commitments. In times of abundance we can make casual resolutions. In times of scarcity however, we look inward and resolve to take better care of those things closest to our hearts.

At St. Anthony’s we are resolving to find new ways to make services more efficient and donations stretch farther. We are streamlining operations and purchasing in bulk.

In your commitment to do more with less there are many ways to kick off the New Year:

• Let St. Anthony’s guests benefit from your spring cleaning or hold a drive and gather clothes for the Free Clothing Program.
• Signing up for a monthly giving plan is an easy way to contribute an amount that doesn’t hurt your budget.
• Volunteering gets you directly involved in the work we do, and you can fiscally support the work and programs that you have taken part in.

You can even make last minute tax-deductible gifts online until 11:59 pm December 31st.

Let’s work together and make this new year a happier one for all San Franciscans.

At St. Anthony Dining Room we are a buzz preparing a Christmas feast for 4,000 of our friends, family and community here in the Tenderloin.

And we could not have done it with out you. Your response to our call for food and socks means that every guest who comes on Christmas will get a delicious filling meal and a gift bag with socks and other necessities. The cans of food, peanut butter and tuna are filling our pantry shelves which will help fill the cupboards of seniors and families in need.

Your support makes a difference this holiday season, and in the year to come. When you make a gift to St. Anthony’s you make a change in someone’s life. Whether it provides food that day, groceries for that month, doctor visit for an uninsured child, or life-changing recovery and job training, you can know that your support is a gift that meets real needs.

Thank you for reaching together with St. Anthony Foundation to extend this season of hope to all.

Thanks to the students of the Jefferson School for collecting 1020 pairs of brand new socks for our guests in their sock drive! Here are a few pictures from their visit.

Thanks to the Kelly family from Menlo Park, who dropped off a Suburban full of clothes from their drive on Monday. What a great way to do a drive! They emailed their friends and said:

“We’re collecting clean, gently used clothes for St. Anthony’s. If you’d like to donate men’s, women’s, or children’s clothes, just email us back, then Sunday morning leave the bag outside your front door. We’ll drive around and pick them up.”

So many people are doing drives for us. It makes such a difference to our guests, who are really struggling this year. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

“It’s like grabbing two high tension wires and being electrified with love and compassion.”

– Lama Tharchin Rinpoche, explaining how devotion and compassion work together. The more intense our devotion, the more vast our compassion, the brighter we shine.

Reno D. and friends just donated almost 8,000 pounds of turkey, along with a cash donation. Happy Holidays, Reno!

Gymboree was here on Monday to fill 2200 bags with 2200 warm hats and 2200 chocolate bars they brought for our guests. They completed 1,000 bags with socks and travel shampoo donated by others, as well. The Palace Hotel has now donated 2700 bath gels to add to each bag.

WE STILL NEED 1200 NEW SOCKS, TRAVEL SHAMPOOS AND TRAVEL LOTIONS BEFORE DECEMBER 24.

Men’s crew socks or other warm socks are the best; women can wear them, too. (But new women’s and children’s socks won’t go to waste at St. Anthony’s.) Travel shampoo and lotion should be unopened.

If you’re thinking of doing a drive, if you’ve haven’t opened the shampoo or lotion you picked up on your last trip, if you’re shopping at a drug store or chain store for something else and can buy a few travel size shampoos or lotions or a package of new socks, please bring them over to 150 Golden Gate Avenue and tell the Front Desk Guy (Eric or Darren or Jerry) that they’re for gift bags.

Or you can wait until December 19 - 23 and bring them to Curbside, our special holiday donation drive. Just drive up to 119 Golden Gate (other side of the street from the offices). Volunteers will be waiting to take them in and give you a receipt.

Sign up to work Curbside, and you may end up filling bags yourself. Contact Alina: 415-592-2737 or atrowbridge@stanthonysf.org

I only wish you could be here to see how our guests react. Thank you in advance.