A Year of TAY Events: What have we been up to?
“Clients often have a hard time socializing in a healthy way, and don’t have good role models in their lives. Monthly community events allow them to practice making friends, help reduce loneliness, expose them to new activities, and new, safe people in our community.”
Since February, our incredible transition-age youth team in collaboration with our community outreach coordinator have planned monthly events for our TAY youth to gather, socialize, and grow in ways outside of the therapeutic environment.
As the year ends, we reflect on all these joy-filled events, the staff, volunteers, and donors who made them possible, and the amazing youth who joined us each month.
February 2022
Our sweet friends from Alliance of Therapy Dogs accompanied us at our first TAY event and have joined us for many of our outdoor events since. They always bring a calming presence and give our youth something to bond over - plus they’re just adorable!
March 2022
Peggy Fleming of Alamo Women’s Club met us at the park to teach our youth how to make acrylic paint pour-art! Therapy dogs joined us once again and White Pony Express generously provided food and snacks for us to enjoy.
April 2022
Youth gathered at our Antioch office to collaboratively paint a beautiful canvas that would later be auctioned off at our Picnic in the Park event in June.
May 2022
Love + Chocolate invited us to do a private chocolate tasting at their shop in Walnut Creek - our most delicious event to date! To make it even more special, each youth got to choose their favorite piece of chocolate to go in a Youth Homes curated box being sold in the shop and online this holiday season. Grab yours today - all proceeds benefit our critical mental health programs!
June 2022
Master fisherman and our friend Larry joined us at the Lafayette Reservoir to teach our youth how to fish. We were reunited with the Alliance of Therapy Dogs and spent the afternoon hanging out under the summer sun.
July 2022
No summer would be complete without a BBQ, so we gathered at Contra Loma Park to have a delicious grilled lunch and play some outdoor games. Some of our TBS youth joined us, and we even had a pinata to end our afternoon with sweet treats!
August 2022
As the summer days came to an end, we took one more opportunity to hang outside at Heather Farms while our youth enjoyed snacks and goodie bags generously donated by Alamo Women’s Club.
September 2022
Our fabulous next-door neighbors at the Thrift Shop, I Heart Art, kindly allowed us to use their studio space to work on this giant, awesome canvas for our end of summer sale! Youth also worked on their own creations, and then we all went back to the Thrift Shop for pizza and shopping.
October 2022
Ghosts, goblins, and our team of superheroes gathered at the park to paint Halloween-themed pumpkins supplied by Alamo Women’s Club. David L. Brothers of Cosmetic & Family Dentistry provided delicious pizza and Cakes4Kids brought spook-tacular sweet treats to snack on while we painted.
November 2022
Through the extremely generous sponsorship of Roche Diagnostics USA, we were able to host a beautiful Friendsgiving brunch at Lone Tree Golf Course. The holidays can be a tough time of year for the youth in our programs, so there is nothing more special than seeing our community partners go the extra mile to ensure they feel a little extra magic during this season.
December 2022
Though it hasn’t happened yet, our wonderful partners in the Alamo Women’s Club are hosting an annual holiday bowling party for our transition-age youth and staff complete with treats, gifts, and warm winter accessories. Festivities like these give our youth a strong sense of community during the holidays that they might not have otherwise. Check out the photos below from last year’s event!
Thank you to everyone who supported our TAY events this year. Even beyond the joy you can see, you are helping youth build trust and confidence that will touch so many areas of their lives.