Secret Santas Brighten Holidays for Foster Youth

Secret Santas: Jane Pineda, Lorna Prelipp (former HHSA public health nurse), Gretchen Morgan, Claudia Bell (Child Welfare Services supervisor) and Stacey Haywood ‘Secret Santas’ are at work in North County, helping ensure foster youth have a holiday to remember.

They’re from the Foster Youth Ministry at Solana Beach Presbyterian. The outreach group was begun six years ago by three Health and Human Services Agency (HHSA) employees and fellow church members.

Saturday the group is hosting its annual holiday celebration and distributing gifts to more than 100 foster youth and former foster youth.

Claudia Bell, a Child Welfare Services (CWS) supervisor in Oceanside said the group is a great way for her to meld her faith with her passion for foster youth. She became friends with fellow CWS supervisor James Largent after discovering he went to the same church and both worked for HHSA. The two social workers both understood the need and wanted to do something about it.

 “We asked, ‘What can our church - as a community - do?’” Bell said.

The answer was support foster youth and foster families.

Bell, Largent, Lorna Prelip – a since-retired HHSA public health nurse – and two other church members started the Foster Youth Ministry.

The group has been working on this year’s holiday party for a few months.

Foster parents send the group wish lists and clothing size information for the children. Each child gets two stars on a giving tree displayed at the church – one star for a fun gift or toy and the other for clothing.

Families in the congregation pick out stars and fulfill the wishes. They drop off the unwrapped gifts the two Sundays prior to the event. Then it’s time for the big party.

“There’s a wrapping room and a party room,” said Bell. “It’s a wild party – it’s pretty crazy.

“There’s cookie decorating, crafts, a ‘jumpy’ and candy apple decorating. That’s really messy, but the kids love it.”

A group of volunteers supervise the children in the party room. That frees up the foster parents who sneak off into the wrapping room with another set of volunteers to wrap the presents to take home - without the kids knowing about it.

It also gives volunteers a chance to meet and visit with foster parents.

“Part of the purpose of the ministry is to educate people in the community about foster families,” said Bell. “The party allows congregation members a chance to talk to families and get to know what being a foster parent is all about.

“For me, it’s a nice way to sit down and chat with foster parents and not have the conversation be about work things like ‘Did you get your kid to their appointment?’”

The ministry also partners with Just in Time, a non-profit that works with youth leaving the foster care system and transitioning to living on his or her own.

Each former foster youth is given a big stocking full of household gifts like gift cards, towels, sheets, etc.

The holiday party isn’t the only activity for Foster Youth Ministry.

“Our church has community service days and on those days we help four or five former foster youth move in and set up their homes through the “My First Home” project with Just in Time.

They are also involved in San Diego County’s Camp Connect – an annual four-day camp where foster children are reunited with brothers and sisters that have been placed in different foster homes.

“We have people from our church that volunteer at Camp Connect events and at the camp,” said Bell.

Ministry members Bill and Gretchen Morgan also host a one-day surf camp for Camp Connect kids in May every year.