READING, Pa. – As with any holiday meal prep many hands make light work.
“I’ve been volunteering my whole life,” says Sharee Maffetone, who is volunteering at the Lighthouse. “I was raised to give back.”
Dozens of volunteers came out to help serve Thanksgiving meals to people at the Hope Rescue Mission and at the Lighthouse Women and Children’s Shelter.
“This is our first time ever doing it on the holiday, so it was a really good experience, considering a lot of people here don’t have a lot of people to be surrounded by with smiles and cheer so it’s nice to be able to provide that for them,” says Talia Falcon, a volunteer at Hope Rescue Mission.
Falcon brought her siblings along with her to volunteer.
“I think it’s really important because not everyone has the same privileges, but everybody deserves the same love and food and everything on holidays like this,” says Mila Falcon.
Maffetone says while volunteering isn’t new to her, this is the first time she’s helped out at the Lighthouse.
“We are handing out this delicious meal that somebody spent a lot of time preparing and giving it out to the families, the women and children who are staying here,” says Maffetone.
“When you don’t have a family of origin, you have a family of choice, and I choose these people to be my family today.”