A Wagon of Cereal
One day last week the most adorable young brothers, Cash and Brock Alarcon, showed up at Dixon Family Services. They pulled a wagon filled with boxes of cereal to donate to our food pantry so that other children in Dixon could have cereal.
The story is that Brock and his family decided that at his first birthday party boxes of cereal would be requested by guests instead of gifts. Mom Karissa explained that since the boys were close in age that all the things Brock needed or wanted were supplied from Brother Cash, 3.5 years old. She went on to say that everything he (Cash) went through was gently used and passed down to Brock.
So it made perfect sense to the entire family to use Brock’s first birthday as an opportunity to do a selfless and generous deed. So that’s how these two boys ended up at DFS with a wagon load of cereal.
The staff members who were at Dixon Family Services that morning were all so impressed with the gesture of giving by the family. The boys were so cute! We offered to help transfer the cereal from their wagon to one of our pantry carts but they really wanted to do it themselves so we all just watched in awe with lots of smiles and praises.
Later on that day I received a lovely email message from Brock’s mom. She said,
“We are so thankful for all you do in the community to help families in need or who have fallen on hard times. Often times we know your job can be thankless and so we want to make sure we extend our gratitude to you and your staff. As parents, we are trying to teach our children to live life with kind hearts and be compassionate, grateful and giving. So we are working on instilling those values early and we thank you for helping us with these life lessons!! Sincerely, The Alarcon family”
So thank you very much to Brock and Cash Alarcon for such an outstanding plan to do something for others less fortunate. Thank you also to Mom Karissa, Dad Derek and Grandma, Dawn too.
We at Dixon Family Services hope this act of kindness may spark ideas in other households as well. There are many ways that people can make a difference in people’s lives and they do not require a social work degree.
Hines Gowers Does it Again!
You may remember last fall we had a big landscape make over. We took out the bumpy, drying lawn and replaced it with drought-friendly plants, trees and mulch.
It might not have been the optimal time of year for planting but the project took a bit longer than expected and so the plants were finally put into the ground on a rainy day in December.
Thankfully most of them took root and this spring provided such beautiful colorful blooms. But alas, some plants did not survive and left several areas looking a bit sad.
As you may also remember the entire project was done with very little expense. Generous community volunteers did the bulk of the work, CA Water donated the two dogwood trees, Dixon Landscape provided the mulch and Hines Growers in Winters supplied dozens of drought-tolerant plants.
In looking at the empty spots we made a list of replacement plants we would need to “fill in”. Before heading to a nursery to buy them, I thought I’d mention it to our friends at Hines and yet again the response was a wonderful generous “Tell us what you need!”
Plants were delivered by Pat McGoveney and they are going in the ground soon. Come by and check out how pretty our front yard looks next time you are in the neighborhood. A big THANK YOU to everyone at Hines!
I just have to say that I see a lot of generosity working at Dixon Family Services, and it warms my heart each and every time.