How You Can Help Open Table Help Your Neighbors This Holiday Season

'Tis the season when many folks think about helping others.

Being thankful for what they have this Thanksgiving, many will give a little bit of their love, of their time and of their shopping lists to local food pantries and anti-hunger organizations that provide food and serve dinners to the less fortunate. 

This year, Hanukkah begins on Thanksgiving. (Yes really, and you can read all about Thanksgivukkah here.) And Christmas comes next month. But the shoppers are already rushing home with their treasures, which means many are also rushing to Toys for Tots drop-offs and other donation collection locations across the area to share gently used and unwrapped gifts. 

If you want to lend a hand this holiday season, there are plenty of ways to pitch in around Concord.  

Jeanine Calabria, president of Open Table, shared a few ways that people could help her organization help local families:

• Drive guests to the Concord Thanksgiving Dinner at 5 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day (These are guests who live in Maynard or Acton).  Contact Lisa Richards for driving needs at Abolishpoverty1@gmail.com
• Drive guests home from the dinner at 7 p.m. Contact Lisa Richards for driving needs at Abolishpoverty1@gmail.com
• Help unload the GBFB truck of the 6,000 lbs of food on Monday at Open Table in Maynard. This includes all the turkeys for families.
• Donate and Drop off 12 lb. turkeys to the Maynard Open Table Pantry on Monday, Nov. 25 between noon and 5 p.m. (Clock tower Place building 8)
• Donate movie vouchers to put in our guests’ holiday gift bags. Please mail them to the Concord Open Table address: P.O. Box 42, Concord, MA 01742. Deadline for receipt is Dec. 10.
• As always donate food to our pantries: Drop-offs at Crosby Market in Concord and Maynard Middlesex Bank on Powder Mill Road
• Make a financial donation to Open Table, mailed to P.O. Box 42, Concord MA 01742