Every year Walmart is very generous at the holiday time. Not only do they sponsor their “12 Days of Giving” Facebook campaign with $1.5 million in grants to 140 nonprofits–but they gave each of us in the Walmart Mom program a chance to do some holiday giving on their behalf in our own communities.
That’s right, they gave us carte blanche to spend $100 at Walmart and give it to the charity of our choice for Christmas! While there are tons of fantastic charities out there worth supporting, at the holidays I especially like to know that I’m heping folks in my own small community. I was hoping to choose items off of my church’s angel tree–but wouldn’t you know this year they decided to support the community through the Rotary Basket campaign instead of running a separate program. So instead I called the church and asked if there were any specific needs in the community that needed to be filled. They said yes indeed–there were two families in particular that would benefit from a holiday food basket.
Off to Walmart I went! I had a $100 budget, so that was $50 per family. Here is what I purchased:
For each family I included: A spiral cut ham (approx 10 lbs), 2 boxes of “3 cheese au gratin potatoes”, hot cocoa, coffee, 10lbs of rice, sparkling cider, bacon, ham bullion, a summer sausage, a bag of 15 bean soup mix, a bag of split peas and a chocolate cream pie kit.
Here was my thought process. A ham is easy to prepare–just warm and eat–so low fuss. With rice or the potatoes, a vegetable from their own cupboard, the chocolate pie and the sparkling cider they can have a festive holiday meal. With the leftover ham and ham bone (and the ham bullion if they need to) they can make pea soup and 15 bean soup–and if they want they can serve that with more of the rice. With 10 lbs they should have rice for a while! The soups give them a couple more days of healthy, tasty, filling meals. The bacon, coffee and hot cocoa can be a nice start on a Christmas morning breakfast–I always like to include coffee because it’s the small luxury I’d miss the most if I had to severely cut my budget. The summer sausage, paired with crackers from their own cupboard, can be a munchie snack or something to serve guests–or they can save the sparkling cider and summer sausage and use them to have a bit of a New Years Eve party.
I’ve dropped all the items off at the church office, and someone will deliver them soon. I want to thank Walmart from the bottom of my heart for being generous enough to provide the funds for these holiday dinners!
****This is a sponsored post****
Disclosure: This is a sponsored post I am participating in with the Walmart Moms. Walmart has provided me with compensation for this post. My participation is voluntary and opinions, as always are my own.
It’s nice that they give money away to random people but I think you should know that their “generosity” does not extend to their associates. The extent of a holiday gift is to give their associate a 20% off of one item coupon unless you’ve been with them over 8 years.
I guess they never learned that charity is supposed to begin at home.