Kids Give Back with Coat Drives

Dec. 15, 2008— -- Daisy troop 64126 of Wolcott, Conn., has just completed our first coat drive. In just five days, we collected over 200 coats to be distributed to local people in need.

The idea came from our leader who had seen the Warm Coats & Warm Hearts drive on "Good Morning America" last year. We had a week-long collection box available in all Wolcott schools for teachers, students, staff and families. We also had a one-night drive for the rest of the community, which coincided with a tea party for all of the town girl scouts.

The girls were very enthusiastic about the project, and we look forward to more service projects where we can all learn other ways to give back to our community!
-- Dayna Zynda

Skyler holding up one of the coats she has collected.

Skyler Lee got started from watching "Good Morning America" last year during your coat drive. She could not believe that there were children who did have coats and some who had never owned a coat. So, we went out and bought two coats to give away, and found in our town there were no really active coat drives.

In checking around, we found that the Salvation Army was really in need of coats. So, we contacted them and went to their Christmas Store. Beverly, who volunteers to take on the project every year, showed Skyler the Christmas Store and explained to her how it worked.

She was hooked. All she could talk about was starting our own coat drive. So, in January, we started with Canterbury Park, Stella Lutheran Church and Polly's Day Care. She collected 125 coats and the Daily News did an article on her.

From then on, out we received calls, and coats came in from everywhere. We took the summer off but had at least 75 more coats by the end of summer.

We started again in September and have collected 100 or so coats. We are probably at around 350 for this year. We have drives at Canterbury Park, Franz Bakery, Delaware Plaza, Stella Lutheran Church and Evergreen Dance Center. And we are going to add more.
-- Alissa Lee, Skyler's mom