Federal Way group seeks volunteers to serve 1,200 low-income students for the holidays

Published 6:00 am Tuesday, November 24, 2015

The holiday season is a fun, yet stressful time of year for many people. Finding the right gifts or the perfect food for a family dinner and braving the traffic and lines at crowded venues can take a toll on anyone.

For others, such as Federal Way resident Katie Lang, the reality is a bit different. Simply knowing that they will have any gifts to give and dinner to provide for their family is a struggle.

She has four children, all of them boys. The eldest son is 12-years-old and currently attends Lakota Middle School. There are also a pair of 9-year-old twins and a 5-year-old, who currently attend Lake Grove Elementary.

Lang’s family lives off the commission that her husband Christian earns from his job at a moving company.

“It gets really tight around this time of year,” Lang said. “People mostly move during the summer, not the winter. It really slows down.”

Four years ago, Lang was contacted by a counselor at Lake Grove Elementary who informed her of the Adopt-a-Family program, which was run by the Federal Way Police Department. The program was created to help low-income families to provide gifts for their children. It also provides Thanksgiving dinner to families.

Lang has participated in the program for three of the last four years.

“It’s just awesome help some years when you need it,” Lang said. “It alleviates a lot of stress. Sometimes you don’t know where the Thanksgiving dinner will come from or where the Christmas will come from.

“It makes you sad when you can’t provide more things for your family. I was excited to know that we could receive these blessings. We’re in the holiday spirit now and we’re not stressing out.”

Lang says that when they last participated in 2013, they were able to get a full dinner for Thanksgiving and plenty of gifts for the children on Christmas. The kids were also able to go make gifts for the parents while the parents selected other gifts.

“That year, my youngest was into farm stuff, so we got him a lot of farm animals,” Lang said. “We got the older boys ninja stuff because that’s what they were into at the time. They also wrap the gift for you. We didn’t even have to worry about wrapping them.”

She has also seen the joy the event has brought to other families. Many of them have looked both excited and relieved because of the gifts they are able to give and receive.

The Adopt-a-Family program has increased this year and is set to serve 1,200 Federal Way students and their families this year. At the beginning of this year, the Federal Way Police Department, South King Fire and Rescue, Grace Church and Communities in Schools headed the program.

It was there that they formed a new coalition, Federal Way Cares For Kids, and were joined by Multi-Service Center, Heritage Bank, Life and Health Chiropractic, St. Francis Hospital, Alaska Airlines and Americorp.

School counselors worked to find the families that were most in need of a helping hand for the holidays.

Once again, the children will go off to make gifts for their parents while the parents choose unwrapped gifts for their children. They will be able to take a family photo with Santa and will also be given a Christmas ham.

“It means so much that they can give my kids a real Christmas,” Lang said. “I really don’t have the words to express it properly.”

Federal Way Cares For Kids is hoping for contributions and volunteers from the community for the event. They hope at least 300 volunteers will come out and help during their Holiday Family Support program on Dec. 18 and 19.

They are also accepting monetary donations online, new and unwrapped toys and $20 Walmart gift card donations at the Federal Way police station, City Hall, The Commons mall and any South King Fire and Rescue station.

To find out more about Federal Way Cares For Kids, visit www.fwcaresforkids.org.