Lovely day today, nice and busy, with all operations rolling along smoothly. The morning was very busy with incoming groceries and pantry item deliveries. Thank you! The afternoon was a very steady flow of families coming. Love that! The weather was quite warm, especially out away from the building. We did a quick BBQ on the patio in between AM and PM shifts, which is always great.

Groceries today came from St. Louise, Bellevue Presbyterian, Bellevue Christian Reformed, and Highland Covenant churches, as well as the Jubilee Friends group. A total of 128 orders came in and all went out to families today, including a few as food boxes carried over from yesterday. Thank you to everyone who participated today!

The market area was still full of food boxes today, so we did a semi-market again in the exit line.

Lots of extras came in today from the Neighbors Feeding Neighbors group, the Master Gardeners group, the QFC Crossroads, and the groceries.

Available today were apples, onions, potatoes, fresh basil, fresh beans, fresh cucumber, strawberries, baguettes, frozen meat, dairy products, and more.

Thank you to everyone who stocked this pantry to well.

It has become a full-time job to keep the tables well-stocked, just to all the inventory gets out to families. 😊

Today was the last day for personal hygiene items to be offered. The lobby has been flipped now to be ready to offer bulk ingredient foods tomorrow. Thank you to everyone who stocked the pantry this week.

A quick shout out to those continuing to supply dog food, cat food, and cat litter.

These items are offered daily, and those with pets are very, very important. As they say, pets are people too, you know! Thank you to all of you who support this area of the program so well.

An update from Ken:

Many of you are following along the running story of the wife whose husband receiving treatment for brain tumor. Today she was here and seemed very sad. Asked how she was doing, all she said was “keep praying”. I’m very worried. Please do pray for their family and for healing. The last chemo should be done in two weeks. Then comes the MRI scan, which will show whether the tumor has been impacted. If anyone would like to bring her/them a card of encouragement, please drop it off to me at Jubilee.

An email from a family and a program update:

As you’ve been reading, two weeks ago about 85 families departed the program and another 15 or so last week. So far this week, there have been 17 who have returned. Most have simply shown up in person and asked to come back into the program. Here’s an email from one man last Friday to Daniel:

“Hi Daniel, I was hoping that you would allow me to continue receiving food from jubilee during this time. I thought that I didn't need it, but my family is doing good because of this program. Please let me know if we can come back, thank you.”

This is a typical reasoning. As families departed, they thought they could be self-supporting. Now, one or two weeks later, they are finding it isn’t possible. There’s not enough work yet. Work shifts are unreliable. Money doesn’t stretch far enough.

Of course, all have been reinstated immediately back into the program. We have plans to call other families who left recently to check on how they are doing. There may be others who are now suffering, who aren’t reaching back out.

As you read yesterday, families from the waiting list were called to enter the program. Twenty-six came yesterday. Another 10 came today. About 15 no longer needed the help or the contact info was wrong. There are still about 19 who we haven’t yet reached.

With the returning families and additions from the waiting list, there are now about 483 families in the program, up from 430 on Monday. We are confident with this adjustment and are trusting food will be available for those who come daily. If you have friends who are not connected to a partner church and would like to bring groceries, they can do so through the Jubilee Friends link: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/60b0b49a5aa2ba3fd0-jubilee. Feel free to post this on your social media and spread the word.

Please continue to pray for these families. Thank you for all the actions you are taking to support them. It all matters and is exactly where we should all be.

What a lovely evening it is out there. May you be enjoying it somewhere nice.

Ken Carpenter
Service Coordinator, Jubilee REACH
On behalf of the Jubilee family

Groceries for Families: Week 20 - Day 3

Groceries for Families: Week 20 - Day 4

Groceries for Families: Week 20 - Day 2