Aware Central Texas hosts Christmas on the Farm Posted On: Sunday, Nov. 15 2009 05:49 AM By Jade Ortego
Killeen Daily Herald

On Saturday, middle school aged volunteers dressed as elves milled around, working booths and taking donations to prepare stockings for low-income children and children from abusive homes.

The young children stamped and stickered homemade greetings for soldiers stationed overseas for the holidays. A volunteer band played. Someone performed a puppet show. People sold food, books, jewelry, fake tattoos, makeovers, pony rides and hayrides, and the opportunity to decorate stockings and ornaments, wrap presents or play games like penny toss.

Everywhere, the crowded Bell County Expo Center typified sentiment of the season of giving; the atmosphere, while staid in its devotion to charity, was light-hearted.

Tickets to Aware Central Texas' Christmas on the Farm were 50 cents each, and most activities charged one or two tickets. Last year, this event, raised more than $6,000.

ACT is an agency that aims to prevent child abuse through awareness campaigns, parenting classes, anti-victimization programs for school-age children, and through monitoring families referred by Child Protective Services.

This is their third annual Christmas on the Farm, and the second year it was held in the Bell County Expo Center. Next year, they will rent both sides of the center to accommodate the large turnout of parents and young children. This year, as of 1:30 p.m., ACT workers estimated more than 10,000 showed for the event. Some donated tickets so the families that ACT works with could attend.

"I saw my families here today," case manager Zada Jones Collins said. "They really had a lot of fun with their children."

Collins said the agency would "adopt" 20 families this holiday season, or provide Christmas gifts for their children.

Sheila Alexander, a drama teacher at Lake Belton Middle School, encouraged students to volunteer or donate items for sale or for gifts.

She said about 160 students from her school participated.

"I try to tell them, six months from now, the gift they give today is still giving," Alexander said.

One booth charged one ticket to grind corn to make "reindeer food."

"I put glitter in it, so, when they put it out at night, it sparkles," said Kara Guyette, who was there with her children. "I tell them the reindeer can see it better."

Many booths represented other charitable causes: one group sold jewelry to raise funds to feed homeless children, representatives from the Belton Senior Center had children make cards for soldiers, workers from a Christian bookstore were signing people up to sponsor a poor child overseas.

"It's a coalition of folks. We're all on the same team," Joey Ellis, ACT's education program manager, said.

Selena Torres, 12, volunteered to take donations to make stockings for low-income children.

"We wanted to help the kids," she said. "Some here don't have Christmas."

Contact Jade Ortego at jortego@kdhnews.com or (254) 501-7553.