
{"id":22566,"date":"2011-12-22T14:11:28","date_gmt":"2011-12-22T19:11:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/?p=22566"},"modified":"2011-12-22T14:11:28","modified_gmt":"2011-12-22T19:11:28","slug":"balloons-and-tunes-helps-bring-holiday-joy-to-local-youth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2011\/12\/22\/balloons-and-tunes-helps-bring-holiday-joy-to-local-youth\/","title":{"rendered":"Balloons and Tunes helps bring holiday joy to local youth"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure id=\"attachment_22567\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-22567\" style=\"width: 400px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/BalloonsandTunes122211.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"300\" class=\"size-full wp-image-22567\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/BalloonsandTunes122211.jpg 400w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/BalloonsandTunes122211-113x84.jpg 113w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/BalloonsandTunes122211-150x113.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/BalloonsandTunes122211-100x75.jpg 100w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/BalloonsandTunes122211-360x270.jpg 360w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-22567\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pat Garavaglia, co-owner of Balloons and Tunes, poses in front of a variety of toys and balloons on the store shelves. The local business has assisted the Orange County Department of Social Services with the Share Your Holiday Program for more than 20 years. Photo by Zach Hamilton<\/figcaption><\/figure><strong>By Zach Hamilton<\/strong><br \/>\n<em>Courtesy of the Carrboro Commons<\/em><br \/>\nThe holiday season is filled with traditions. Decorating the Christmas tree, kissing under the mistletoe and lighting the candles of the menorah are all timeless customs that evoke the excitement and wonder of the holiday season.<\/p>\n<p>Balloons and Tunes has its own holiday tradition: helping provide toys and holiday gifts to Orange County children and teenagers in need through the Share Your Holiday Program.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Honestly, I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even think what Christmas would be without this program,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Pat Garavaglia, co-owner of Balloons and Tunes. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It fills my mind for weeks. It fills my heart for weeks.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>The Share Your Holiday Program is co-sponsored by Balloons and Tunes and the Orange County Department of Social Services. Through the program, willing members of the community sponsor children and teenagers for the holidays. <\/p>\n<p>Once someone decides to sponsor a child, he or she receives the child\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s name, sizes and holiday wish list. The Orange County Department of Social Service recommends that a sponsor spend $150 to $200 per child.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re Santa Claus. You get to pick [what you buy the children]!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Garavaglia said.<\/p>\n<p>Specifically, Balloons and Tunes, also co-owned by Sharon Collins, assists the Orange County Department of Social Services in making sure every Orange County child in foster care or protective custody is completely sponsored.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Generally there are between 150 and 200 kids that are completely sponsored by this program,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Garavaglia said.<\/p>\n<p>Balloons and Tunes has been assisting DSS with this program for more than 20 years, and Garavaglia said the outpouring of love and support from the community makes Balloons and Tunes\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 participation in the Share Your Holiday Program worthwhile.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I run into so many wonderful people that sponsor kids, that give money,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Garavaglia said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153People help in all kinds of ways. There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s some people that don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have enough money to help buy things, so they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll shop for us. We have people that just do deliveries for us. We have people that just assemble bicycles for us.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Because the children are in protective custody and foster care, the sponsors do not actually deliver the gifts in person. The toys and gifts are deposited at designated toy drop sites, and then social workers deliver the gifts to the children. <\/p>\n<p>But Garavaglia said she does not think this is necessarily a bad thing.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The whole thing just gets to play out in your own head,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Garavaglia said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s about the magic and the mystery of the season and caring for someone that you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll never meet [which] is a very swell thing.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Once Balloons and Tunes has helped set up sponsors for every Orange County child in foster care and protective custody, it then turns its attention to assisting the Toy Chest, another holiday program sponsored by DSS. <\/p>\n<p>According to an Orange County Department of Social Services press release, there are 7,000 Orange County children in low-income households. The Toy Chest program collects toys and allows parents from these low-income households to choose two or three gifts to give to their children for the holidays.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s meant to be a supplement, hoping that the parents can buy them something [too],\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Garavaglia said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s meant to supplement Christmas for them because these are very hard times.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>More than 20 years ago, Balloons and Tunes responded to a DSS advertisement in the newspaper calling for holiday sponsorships for children, and that is how the business began its assistance with the program, Garavaglia said. <\/p>\n<p>She said two or three years later, Balloons and Tunes was sponsoring 10 to 15 children, and friends and community members wanted to help, so Balloons and Tunes would help them find children to sponsor as well.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153And it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just grown in that way,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Garavaglia said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hardly anybody that does it doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t do it the next year because it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really fun for them. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It makes me very happy. I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t imagine Christmas without it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p><em>Zach Hamilton is a UNC student writing for the Carrboro Commons, a bi-weekly online lab newspaper for Jock Lauterer\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Community Journalism class at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication.<br \/>\n<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The holiday season is filled with traditions. Decorating the Christmas tree, kissing under the mistletoe and lighting the candles of the menorah are all timeless customs that evoke the excitement and wonder of the holiday season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":22567,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22566"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22566\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22568,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22566\/revisions\/22568"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22567"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}