Kids and Families Join the World's Largest Christmas Project

Helping Children in More than 100 Countries

Contact: Jeannine Rhoden, 770-813-0000; Todd Shearer, 770-881-4892; www.DeMossNewsPond.com/OCC

BOONE, North Carolina, Nov. 25 /Christian Newswire/ -- RIGHT NOW, local kids, families and volunteers are helping turn local warehouses into Christmas workshops where a combined 8 million gift-filled shoe boxes will be prepared for overseas shipment and hand-delivery to needy children around the world.

Operation Christmas Child, a project of international Christian relief organization Samaritan's Purse, headed by Franklin Graham, has collected and hand-delivered more than 61 million shoe box gifts to hurting kids in 130 countries since 1993. This year, 8 million children will receive shoe box gifts, for some of these children it will be the first gift they ever receive.

Event Schedule: Operation Christmas Child Shoe Box Gift Send-Off
 

• TUESDAY, December 2, at 10:30 a.m. (PT), ORANGE COUNTY PROCESSING CENTER
   
• WEDNESDAY, December 3, at 10:30 a.m. (MT), DENVER PROCESSING CENTER
   
• THURSDAY, December 4, at 10:30 a.m. (ET), CHARLOTTE PROCESSING CENTER

 
Packed with simple items such as toothpaste, soap and school supplies, these simple shoe box gifts are a reminder that they are loved and not forgotten. Operation Christmas Child will use any means necessary—trucks, trains, airplanes, boats, camels, even dog sleds—to reach suffering children around the world.

COVERAGE OPPORTUNITIES INCLUDE:

·         FRANKLIN GRAHAM, president of Samaritan's Purse and head of Operation Christmas Child

·         5:30 – 10:30 A.M. – T.V. live shots and interviews with area kids, volunteers and organizers

·         VISUALS – Thousands of festively wrapped shoe box gifts; area kid and adult volunteers working to help ensure some 8 million children in more than 100 countries suffering from natural disaster, war, terrorism, disease, poverty and famine will have a Christmas gift this year

·         HUMAN CHAIN – Kids helping in the process of moving shoe box gifts from the caring arms of residents to the waiting arms of children overseas

·         INTERVIEWS – Kids who have learned the "gift of giving" through Operation Christmas Child; volunteers who are putting the finishing touches on shoe box gifts; project organizers who have traveled the world delivering shoe box gifts to needy children, many of whom have never received a present

·         SHOE BOX GIFT RECIPIENT FROM A RUSSIAN ORPHANAGE who knows the hope a simple shoe box gift can provide. Now she packs shoe box gifts to help hurting children. Giving comes full circle