Spend time with AAHS this summer

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Hey Smartypants!

Spend time with  AAHS this summer! Provide a meal There are a lot of days that still need meals provided in late May, June, and July.  Get your neighborhood, family, church, office, or club and pull out those cooking skills. It's an easy way to get involved in the shelter once, twice, or on a regular basis! Check out our calendar for dates that need volunteers.  Schedule a work day We've had amazing groups equip our grounds with gardens, green areas, and an awesome playground but we need help keeping it up! Schedule your group to spend a morning with us cutting grass, cleaning out gutters, and tending to our gardens . Email us if you're interested in setting up a work day at volunteer@ helpathenshomeless.org! It's time for the 2nd Annual Athens Area Homeless Shelter's Trivia Battle!  Start your summer off with some fun at Porterhouse Grill and help us send our kiddos to camp and daycare this summer!  We can't do it without you, Athens, so please get a team together and join in! Check out your competition and awesome prizes here!  Register online here or call us at 706-354-0423! Have some fun, help your community, enjoy great food and drink, and prove  you and your pals are the smartest in  the land! Donate wishlist items Help us restock our outdoor toys - we love having basketballs and kick balls for our kids and volunteers! Purchase home items for a  family moving into our Going Home program

Spring updates!

Dear Friends and Family of AAHS, Can you believe that summertime is right around the corner?  We can't!  School is out next month and things get a little nutty around the shelter, with kids of all ages running about! Kick off your summer with some fun and some new clothes, all while helping our kids here at AAHS have a great summer too!  What could be better?  See below for details. Sincerely, Shea Post Executive Director Other spring happenings at AAHS May 3 is Belk's annual charity sale - purchase a $5 ticket at AAHS to shop  store-wide sales for 20-70% off Saturday morning!  Contact tickets@helpathenshomeless.org for more information. Going Home Kits Our newest donation opportunity is to help put together furniture kits for our families moving into the Going Home program. We're hoping to turn empty rooms into homes, but can't do it without your help! Learn more about Going Home kits here: Special thanks to the 2013-2014 LEAD Athens team and to Jackson EMC for helping us start this project. Volunteer Summers are slow volunteer months here at the shelter, and we need your help to provide babysitters for our evening programs and meals for our shelter  throughout the summer! If you have a small group, family group, office, or other group of people that would like to get together and provide a meal or service opportunity at AAHS, please contact volunteer@helpathenshomeless.org or check out our volunteer opportunities here:

A winter Note

Thank you for your help this winter! Thank you to our partners! Dear family and friends of AAHS, As you might imagine, snow days at the shelter can be a bit (read a LOT) chaotic.  Fourteen kiddos running about playing, shouting, and living?  A frenzy to be sure.  And a fun one, at that.  Why so fun?  Because our kids are warm and healthy and happy.   It's a challenge to provide a nourishing and enriching environment in a transitional, group living situation.  Our families come to us at a rocky point in their lives - possibly the most rocky yet.  One part of our job is to provide a sense of safety and stability, from which they can relaunch into independence.  All of our programming at AAHS, from the shelter to our financial literacy counseling to our rapid rehousing to our employment program, is designed to launch clients into sustained independence. Today I've been here at the shelter during the snow storm.  The kids have toys to play with, hats and gloves to brave the snow in, and warm food in their bellies.  They've ransacked the play area and have grins on their faces.  Our 14 year old teenager is curled on the couch watching a movie while her mom sits next to her, working on a paper for her BA degree.  Early this morning in the bitter cold I helped a different mom scrape her car so that she could get to work despite the ice and snow.  Just a few moments ago I heard another mom mutter to herself as she navigated her third online job application of the afternoon.  The shelter smells like bacon and kids... like a home?  I think so.  Like a safe environment from which one can tackle challenges and successfully reboot.   Our families have a lot of needs.  It takes a lot to relaunch a life.   You contribute to this launch.  If you are on our email list, you have given your time and/or your money to AAHS and we value your contribution so very much.  We know that you give a little piece of your heart each time. Thank you for being a part of our family and community. Sincerely, Shea Post, ED

AAHS at a Glance

15 more days in our gift card drive and we're half way there!

		Give the gift of empowerment  and support this holiday season!  Supporting our moms at AAHS to shop for their own families strengthens the bond between parent and child while reinforcing their goals of budgeting and prioritizing needs. This empowers, rather than dictates to our families, how they will experience the holidays while living in a shelter.  Donations of gift cards to Target and Walmart from $5, $10, up to $100 will be distributed to our families for our annual holiday shopping trip We accept cash, check, and Paypal donations which we will designate for gift cards Donations towards gift card purchases can be made through our Paypal account here! If writing a check please note "Christmas Gift Card Drive" on the memo line.  Please donate gift cards by December 16th  so that we have time to organize our shopping trip. If you are more interested in donating items, please see our wish list for items needed every day.   For questions and more information, please contact volunteer@helpathenshomeless.org, or call between 10:00am and 6:00pm Monday through Friday at (706) 354-0423. Cash, check, and gift card donations can be mailed or dropped off at 620 Barber Street, Athens, GA 30606.  Staff is at the shelter 24 hours a day and donations can be dropped off any time.  AAHS provides collaborative, comprehensive services to homeless individuals and families working toward sustainable independence. Learn more: helpathenshomeless.org www.facebook.com/helpathenshomeless