Pediatric patients receive holiday cheer

KIDS GIVING TO KIDS—YMCA Trailblazer Mackenzie Jordan delivers more than 100 handmade placemats plus lots of Beanie Babies to Rosalind Gruskin at Childrens Hospital Los Angeles.

Each year at this time, the Triunfo YMCA Trailblazers, a group of boys and girls in the third, fourth and fifth grades and their fathers, perform a community service activity to benefit a worthy cause. This year the group selected Childrens Hospital Los Angeles, the country’s leading pediatric hospital, as the recipient of their efforts.

Approximately 100 Trailblazers met on Dec. 9 in the multipurpose room of the Church of the Epiphany in Oak Park to produce colorful, laminated placemats for the children at the hospital.

Each Trailblazer brought pictures, baseball trading cards, photographs, and magazine pictures and clippings which were laid out and laminated into an easy-to- clean 12-by-18-inch placemat. Young hospital patients will be able to use the placemats with their meals.

Placemat themes included sports, horses, cats and dogs, holidays and more. Many placemats included handwritten notes of encouragement and well-wishing, as well as the signature of the maker.

In addition, the Trailblazers collected and delivered more than 75 Beanie Babies and other gifts for the hospital.

Hospital representative Rosalind Gruskin accepted the gifts.

“These placemats will make hospital mealtimes much more enjoyable and interesting for many of the 11,000 children we see every year,” Gruskin said.

The placemats and gifts were delivered by Trailblazer Mackenzie Jordan and her father.

“I really had fun making these placemats,” Mackenzie said. “Going to the hospital reminded me of the time when I had my appendix out, and it was really boring during my stay. I hope these placemats will make it better for other children.”

Supplies and equipment for the placemats were donated by Jim Sylvester, general manager of Staples in Westlake Village.

The Triunfo YMCA provides child care and family programs to families in Agoura, Oak Park and Westlake Village. For more information, call Patrick Yarrow at (818) 706-0993.