New Day for Food Security

5K Jingle Bell run to benefit Friendship Trays, honor 2 longtime volunteers

Honoring Jimmie and Margaret

In 2004, when Lawrence Mahool and Marcus Nance were starting out, two of the industry professionals they looked up to the most were Jimmie Basinger and Margaret Morrison.

These two were tireless sponsors and volunteers for Friendship Trays, taking time each week from their busy schedules to deliver meals
to those in need. ”

They taught the importance of service to our community as a pillar of the responsibilities we have as Realtors.

This year’s event and all donations raised will be in their honor!

Click on the flier or here to learn how to donate to honor Jimmie and Margaret and to register for prizes.

2020 Holiday Appeal

Dec. 10, 2020

California Closets to match customers’ donations to Friendship Trays

Dec. 4, 2020

California Closets in Charlotte is offering its customers a matching gift opportunity as its way of supporting Friendship Trays:

Make a purchase, and then, when you make a donation at the Friendship Trays website between now and Dec. 25, your donation will be matched by California Closets. The company will match donations until their total match reaches $2,500. Please note: Only the donations of California Closets’ customers will be matched.

The East Boulevard showroom is open only by appointment during the pandemic, so call ahead at 704-527-5505 to arrange an appointment. There is also a appointment scheduling request box on the company’s website here. Below, from California Closets, are the details about donations:

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Forging ahead, despite the uncertainties

July 17, 2020

Here we are, still in the throes of a pandemic and with ever increasing uncertainty about what lies ahead for our community and beyond.

The good news here at Friendship Trays is, we are forging ahead.

  • We are operating with still limited capacity, but continue to feed our most vulnerable clients.
  • We are continuing to gradually add back some of our recipients we were not serving earlier, as well as adding some new people who are in critical need.
  • We are very fortunate to have a corps of first responders helping us deliver and we have called a few volunteers back into service.
  • We are practicing very strict protocols to protect our recipients, our delivery drivers, and each other. All of our deliveries continue to be no-contact deliveries.
  • We are serving two reopened day care centers, one for children and one for adults.
    We are thankful to be able to serve the community.
  • Our food continues to be well-planned and of high quality. Special thanks to Lani Lawrence, Kelly Vass, and our core kitchen staff who work hard to keep it so!
  • We are thankful for Dirk Taylor with Performance Food Group, who manages our account professionally and with care and compassion for those we serve.
  • Special thanks to Kathy Nichols, who organizes the meals each day for delivery. She is one of a kind, a very special and dedicated volunteer!
  • A huge thanks to the gardens whose tenders bring fresh produce to incorporate into our meals. Jean Siers with The Society of St. Andrew enabled us recently to serve the delicious blueberry cobbler shown in the lower left corner of the picture.
  • Thanks to the special people who make cards, placemats, and heart-felt, handwritten wishes to share with our recipients. Our folks look forward to receiving these loving touches.

We are so very thankful for the financial support we continue to receive from across the community from individuals, foundations, corporations, houses of worship, and others who recognize the need for a service like ours. Many of these donors support us all the time, but their gifts are so incredibly important now. As I have continued to think and say, our recipients live lives that are always at a social distance.

What can you do to help get nutritious food to your neighbors most in need? Our shelf-stable supply stock can always use replenishing. The reason is that we continue to send canned goods, snacks, etc. to our recipients. Please see our Amazon “wish list” here.

Finally, a huge thank you to Muddy River Distillery of Belmont in Gaston County for the generous donation of hand sanitizer.

One more bit of good news from us here on Distribution Street:

We are developing a more defined and formal telephoning system to keep in touch with our recipients. Stay tuned! Plans are under way.

– Lucy Bush Carter, Executive Director
704-333-2112

Another way you can help

July 1, 2020

We need your help building during this pandemic

June 11, 2020

We are grateful for your support to serve those in our community in need of home-delivered meals. As we increase the number of recipients served during COVID-19, we are slowly adding a few volunteer drivers to support our operations. These volunteers are following strict safety procedures and we continue to make no-contact deliveries by leaving meals in coolers with no person-to-person contact. We are providing delivered meals to about 200 of our 500 regular recipients. Our goal is to increase the number served to 300. To reach these 300 individuals, we continue to need your support.

Our current Wish List item most in demand is rubber bands, found at this link. Your financial support would be gratefully received here.

We encourage you to order these items from Amazon or even Costco or Wal-Mart and have them shipped directly to us at 2401-A Distribution Street, Charlotte NC 28203.

Your financial support and donations of items on our wish list helps Friendship Trays as we continue to serve our neighbors in need of home-delivered meals.

Martha Cochrane, Volunteer Coordinator
704-333-9229

Click here for earlier Coronavirus Updates

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Kids with a cause have been busy

Gardeners of all ages: Show us what’s growing

May 3, 2020

While the Friendship Trays kitchen is inaccessible to volunteers’ cameras, we’re featuring on this website photos from area gardens. And we’d love for you to send us pictures that you’ve taken in your garden this year. When the sun is bright and you see something delightful, pull out your phone and send us a picture. It’s that simple. Here are a few things to keep in mind:

GUIDELINES FOR GARDEN PHOTOS

– Sunshine is really helpful. The early morning after rain produces pictures featuring lovely droplets. Pictures taken when little bugs are about can be great fun.

– Watch the slideshow on the website. Note that the pictures we are using don’t show gardens; they show details: parts of plants, or veggies, or critters. And the photos are cropped VERY horizontally. Keep that in mind, and take pictures holding the phone horizontally, not vertically.

– Do not allow into the background of your photo anything that would allow people to easily identify the location where your photo was taken. No people, please. No cars. No neighbors’ houses. The best tactic is to point the camera into the plant, so plants and ground become the background. If something identifable is in the picture, it will either be cropped out, or the picture will not be used.

– If you can control the file size of the pictures your camera takes, specify the biggest file size possible – 1 Mg or larger. Before sending your photo, do not crop it. Do not edit it in any way. You do not need to give the photo file a new name or date.

– Share your photos one at a time, using e-mail. Send here, to communications@friendshiptrays.org. On iPhone, go to Photos, find your photo, tap share, use the e-mail address above and then, when Photos asks what size file to send, choose the maximum pixel size possible. Do not send photos by message because the photo file actually sent with the message is too small to be used on the website.

– By way of thanks for your voluntary participation in this project and as sole remuneration for your work and your agreement to allow Friendship Trays to publish as outlined above the photos you send, we will place your initials in the bottom right corner of any picture published. When you send your first picture, let us know your preference on the listing of your initials. If you do not specify, we will use the initials of your first and last names. If you so request, we will leave off your initials.

This project is open to all, of any and every age. Enjoy. And thank you for your continuing interest in Friendship Trays.

NovatusEnergy supports Friendship Trays

April 17, 2020