The Journey Continues: Good Neighbors
My journey takes me to Redwood Baptist Church home over the past 10 years to its Good Neighbors Summer reading program and a distribution point for the San Marcos Consolidated ISD's Summer Nutrition Program led by Mike Boone. The Pandemic changed things this year.
There have been many articles appearing in print and on television about children without sufficient food due to the closing of schools which canceled Child Nutrition USDA supplemental food programs. The concern was immediate from March onward. Americans care about our children; and many parents affective by loss of income were worried. One journalist for The New York Times made a cross-country trip in her RV to verify and record the truth behind the worry.
Locally, automobiles lined up at curbside distribution points, including Redwood Baptist Church. Parents drove up parallel to a table at the church’s outdoor pavilion where volunteers Michael Johnson and Phil Walker practiced social distancing by sliding a tray with the correct number of bagged meals through the car window. During the period from March 23 to Sept. 30 a total of 25,463 breakfast and lunch meals were served.
The weekly menu* served Curbside for 2020 is as follows:
Monday: Breakfast – cereal, wholegrain toast, 1% milk, orange juice, assorted fresh fruit and Lunch – combo Burrito, corn on the cob, sliced cucumber, assorted fresh fruit, milk of choice
Tuesday: Breakfast – sausage biscuit, 1% white milk, orange juice, assorted fresh fruit and
Lunch – chicken nuggets, saltine crackers, mashed potatoes, baby carrots, assorted fresh fruit, milk of choice
Wednesday: Breakfastmini pancakes, 1% white milk, orange juice, assorted fresh fruit and
Lunch – cheeseburger, tater tots, salad, assorted fresh fruit and milk of choice
Thursday: Breakfast – honey bun, 1% white milk, orange juice, assorted fresh fruit and
Lunch – bacon sticks, chips, celery sticks, raw baby carrots, assorted fresh fruit, milk of choice.
Friday: Breakfast – tamales, 1% white milk, orange juice, assorted fresh fruit and
Lunch – steak fingers, saltine crackers, chips, steamed broccoli, sliced cucumber, assorted fresh fruit and milk of choice.
*Menu subject to change
Driving to the next curbside table students with the permission of their parents participated in a creative reading program caused by the need for social distancing. Still using American Bible Society material, the reading program was modified with take-home worksheet assignments which were to be returned the next day; however, all books were given to the students to keep due to concern about the virus. Over 10 weeks (June 8 – Aug. 21) 56 students were enrolled. Volunteers who directed the program were Carlos and Elena Estrada, missionaries from Chile, and Mrs. Sandra Nace. This summer ministry was the work of many hands to include Wanda McCoy and Pastor Robert Rodriguez, Jr.
I want to mention that Mission School Fuel also provided food for the weekends to the students..
Someday the children who participated will grow up — if they should drive down Redwood Road, they will see the church still standing and say to themselves, ‘This is where I ate and learned about Jesus’.” Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he shall not depart from it.” Proverbs 22:6.
