Lighted Christmas Balls Workshop and Neighborhood Party

Lighted Christmas Balls Workshop and Neighborhood Party

Please join us for

Neighborhood Block Party and Dinner to kick off another 

Lighted Christmas Ball Season.
Ridgeway Drive between Madison Ave and West Market Street
November 24th 2-5 (rain date 12/1)

Bring 2 strings of 100 of mini lights for your ball and
we will have some chicken wire for purchase at our cost.
Also bring covered dish to share and drinks

The lights are magical but simply set the stage for Shine the Light on Hunger food drive

Over the last 16 years

The amazingly generous folks from Greensboro and beyond have 

contributed $398,643

dropped off 114,490 pounds of food

 to provide 2,847,750 meals.

2018 Shine the Light on Hunger Campaign

Thanks to all of you who came to the Lighted Christmas Balls (LCB) workshop, put up LCB, helped other neighbors put up LCB, who helped light up the park, walked or walked or helped with the Running of the Balls,  dropped food and dollars off for the Shine The Light on Hunger food drive and those tireless volunteers who sorted packed and drove the 5 tons of food to the food pantries.  

We will leave the trailer up at the corner of Madison Ave and Ridgeway through this week so if you have been meaning to clean out your pantries or swing by Costco to get some canned food to add to the trailer, we still have room for it.  

Thanks - we love living in this neighborhood just because of neighbors like you.

Anne and Jonathan Smith

Our totals so far for 2018:

$73,964.06 

10,329 pounds of food

Lighted Christmas Balls Workshop and Neighborhood Party

Please join us for

Neighborhood Block Party and Dinner to kick off another 

Lighted Christmas Ball Season.

If you have not received an EVITE

Click this link to see all the details and RSVP

The lights are magical but simply set the stage for Shine the Light on Hunger food drive

Over the last 16 years

The amazingly generous folks from Greensboro and beyond have 

contributed $324,680

dropped off 103,561 pounds of food

 to provide 2,324,537 meals.

Lighted Ball Workshop and Party Update

We had a great time at the Lighted Christmas Ball Workshop and Party.

We used up all 340 squares of chicken wire.  We made a lot of balls and sent home some squares of wire for craft time at home.  Best of all we met a lot of new neighbors and friends from all around.

We got a nice start on our food collection for Greensboro Urban ministry and $1600 for the food drive at Greensboro Urban Ministry and $1700 for Second Harvest Food Bank. 

Mike Davis of Sherrill Tree donated a sling shot for the Sunset Hills neighborhood and for a donation to one of the food banks the sling shot is available for 4 hour time slots throughout the season.

Another neighbor Nichole Naviglia had a wonderful idea to start a google word doc so we could share ideas.  Here is a link to that doc.  Feel free to post there.  She lays out some suggestions for how it should and could be used.  I like her spirit.  There is no wrong or right way to do this thing.  It is just for fun and community and as an added bonus the whole effort simply

Shines the Light on Hunger   

Izzy, Anne, Lorraine, and Jason 

November Update Twenty-one years ago, we hung our first Lighted Christmas Ball in Greensboro, NC. Since then, countless neighbors and friends have picked up the torch and run with it. Today there are hundreds of yards lit up with thousands of homemade lighted balls. We’ve been fortunate to tell the story everywhere from the TEDx stage to The Today Show. But what is most fun is that neighbors are still getting together every year to build community and help those who need it most. To date, through our community's generous donations and countless hours from volunteers, the Lighted Christmas Ball display has raised over $250,000 and 90,000 lbs of food; the equivalent of 1,790,000 meals for our homeless and hungry friends. To that end, we’d like to invite you to THREE Lighted Christmas Ball related events in the coming weeks. See below for details and links to RSVP!

Sunset Hills 15th Annual Lighted Christmas Ball Making Block Party THIS SUNDAY 11/19 2:00-5:00pm (Outside) The Home of Jonathan & Anne Smith More Details and RSVP here Hamilton Forest 2nd Annual Lighted Christmas Ball Making Block Party SUNDAY AFTER THANKSGIVING 11/26 2:00-5:00pm (Outside) The Home of Justin & Millie Smith More Details and RSVP here The Running of The Balls 5k Race: 12/9 6:00-8:00pm The amazing event (drone video to prove it) is sold out to the general public. Even if you aren't running, you should still come out to see the lights, music and hot chocolate. More info here.

Summer Update:

We never did get down all of our lighted balls at least on the side of the yard facing Ridgeway.  We re-purposed some lighted balls which were on the blink to clear lights and randomly placed them around the back yard here and at the lake for light and just to enjoy.  Instead of hanging them up high like we do at Christmas we opted to put them lower and we are enjoying them.

We hope you are having a wonderful summer.  We are enjoying our lighted balls in the back yard and look forward to putting up all the balls in the front and side yard soon.  We plan for the lighted ball workshop for Sunset Hills to be that Sunday before Thanksgiving with a rain date of the Sunday after Thanksgiving.  It will be here before you know it.

The cumulative totals from the Shine the Light on Hunger efforts since 2007 is $249,415.25 in donations and 89,757 pounds of food dropped off in trailers scattered around the neighborhood.  Last year we calculated that the effort provided 478,825 meals from the 2016 effort alone.
                     

That is pretty amazing.  It is worth the hard work of the neighbors to make it happen paired with the generosity of the good people who drive, bike, walk and run by the food trailers.  A lot of you have asked me for the links to all the media attention  - just scroll down a couple of posts until you see the snoopy photo.  All the links are there or in the side bar to the right of the blog.  

It continues to give us great joy to share this with other neighborhoods, communities, towns, and cities across the country and the world.  With all the politics and craziness this does seem to be one thing we can agree on, the lighted balls bring us joy and bring food to a lot of hungry people in our community and beyond.

Nick Loflin and his crew at Running of the Balls are already rounding up sponsors for this year's event.  The walk/run is a BIG part of the success of the Shine the Light On Hunger effort.  If you or someone you know would like to be a sponsor, contact Nick.

I look forward to seeing those first ones go up in the neighborhood.  Enjoy the summer as it is surely slipping away.
  

Lighted Christmas Balls visit Green Thumb Garden Club

The Green Thumb Garden Club invited Justin and Jonathan to Greensboro Country Club to present their Christmas Program on December 9, 2016. The club, founded in 1944, is among Greensboro's oldest garden clubs.

Following a hearty prosecco wine get-together and a delightful lunch, the boys heard a brief Q&A session on ensuring blooms on the Christmas Amaryllis and few other gardening tips. Club members were as eager to learn Lighted Christmas Ball history as the Smiths were to share to share the story. In no time, the gardeners-turned-LCB-makers dove in to bending, fastening and shaping 27 pre-cut sections of Chicken Wire into neat, uniquely shaped globes.

If there were ever fast and nimble learners, these gardeners were they. Here are a few pictures from the event; if any members took any pictures, please email and we'll be glad to add them.

Thanks Green Thumb Garden Club for extending the right hand of fellowship and for your generous donations for North Carolina Food Banks. P.S. A downloadable how-to instruction sheet may be accessed by clicking on the Lighted Christmas Ball drawing beneath "How To Make" in the sidebar.

Many lights are now up - donations collection spots

New Canned goods Drop off location on Berkley. We have also moved the trailer out front at 2205 Madison Ave. I'm sure the trailer at Rolling and East Greenway will be out soon. We will put the tent up at 2205 today to shield the food donations from the weather.  If you have $$ donations, you can make checks out to Second Harvest and mail them to us at 2205 Madison Ave Greensboro NC 27403 or drop them off in our mail slot.  We will make sure they get to the food bank right away.  

If you live in Sunset Hills and need wire or help, please let us know.