2022 has two dates for all of us – the 1st of January with hopes, plans and dreams, and 24th of February, which is still going on – shattered dreams and plans, but strong people and sealed hopes. It was a hard trial for the team of “Kids to Kids” Foundation, as well as for many other Ukrainians, but we coped with it, became stronger and continued to work every day. Summing up the year, we want to share our personal story and our achievements thanks to the team’s cohesive work and the support of our partners.
The shock of February morning lasted a few days, but the foundation team knew we had to send monthly aid to children with disabilities until the 10th of March as we do each month constantly. We also had to protect our own children.
How? Who? It didn’t matter – we had to do it, because we don’t leave in trouble the once we care about. The team was on call 24/7. Online life is much harder, but possible and sometimes even more effective. We held working ZOOM meetings of the foundation’s team members, held broadcasts for the families participating in the “Happiness for Every Family” project with psychologists and rehabilitologists to support each other and continue to help. Meanwhile, supply disruptions began, the lack of necessary medicines, the inability to leave, send or receive a parcel because of shelling and bombing…
Fortunately, many people responded in the first months and helped with the purchase and shipment of charity care to participants of the project “Happiness for Every Family”, delivered a large amount of humanitarian aid to Novoborovsky Orphanage in Zhytomyr region for girls with mental disabilities. Friends, relatives and benefactors who have known and supported the Foundation for many years have been with us.
Powerful support in finding medicines, diapers and special baby food sent by “Nova Poshta” was from young volunteers from Uzhgorod, Dnipro, Kyiv, who between air-raid alarms were collecting from pharmacies and stores medicines, diapers and food. Sometimes it happened so that at the time of sending the addressee’s post office was closed and we had to quickly find another one, where the recipient could get to. And our recipients are most often mothers who are raising a child with disabilities on their own and need help in collecting our aid. We are proud of the younger generation, that they supported us throughout such hard times!
Having recovered from the first shock of the war, we realized that, given martial law and the departure abroad of a large number of people, the charitable contributions would be much lower and the costs would be higher, and the co-founders of the foundation decided to increase the amount of personal monthly contributions to the fund. In order to protect children with disabilities from low-income families in the war zone, co-founders used their own funds to organize their evacuation. Out of 28 families, 17 families were evacuated to safer cities in Ukraine and countries in Europe: Poland, Germany, Portugal, Switzerland, and Sweden. here.
Please read about the stories of evacuations here:
Children from specialized boarding schools, rehabilitation centers and orphanages also had to evacuate. Children from the Toretsk social rehabilitation center were evacuated to the Carpathians first and then sheltered in the capital of Ukraine (please read here). Residents of the Berdichev special boarding school left for Prague when it was no longer possible to stay. We were in constant communication with the directors of the institutions, providing support if needed using available funds received from our donors and partners. We have decided to take under our support one more orphanage from the city of Gorodnya, Chernigov region. Unfortunately, we could not prevent the deportation of children from Oleshki in the Kherson region which is still occupied. And we hope that the government of Ukraine will be able to bring back all the children one day.
Recently two kids, three-year old Mark and baby Alyonka, who was born weighing 600 grams only, joined our monthly project “Happiness for Every Family”. Given the severity of the overall situation, the team decided to also help families affected by war, and the military.
We teamed up with other charity foundations to support each other and help even more people. In order to widen the circle of benefactors, we have paid more attention to the foundation’s website, publishing news about our activities in three languages. Given the desire of Europeans and our compatriots, who temporarily left Ukraine, to support the Foundation, we joined the payment system PayPal, which provides an opportunity to receive funds instantly. On our site you can now find the actual details of the fund by clicking the “Donate”.
For this year the total amount of help accounted to 2755741 UAH
✔️ Of this amount, to low-income families raising children with disabilities 1161190, hygiene products – 208600, special equipment – 99244, payment for rehabilitation – 101205, medicines and special food – 199440.
✔️ Specialized boarding schools and orphanages 553251
✔️ Two light generators for orphanages 111774
✔️ Repair of a bomb shelter of one orphanage 149848
✔️ Aid to soldiers at the front 30833
Together with our partners – the women’s business club “The One in a Million” , the humanitarian mission UFamily, the company “DOM.ria”, “Alena Vinnitskaya”, “LAPSl”, the public organization “Medical Front”, the media partners “Best People Club” and “Linken.ua” we organized many good initiatives:
⭐ Charity exhibition and sale of children’s drawings “The world around me”, Kyiv. We collected 100,000 UAH and spent it on purchasing equipment for bomb shelters in Berdichevsky special school and Novoborovsky orphanage in Zhytomyr regional council.
⭐ 2 charity auctions in Vienna. 154500 UAH were collected, which were spent on purchasing vital necessities and special equipment for girls from Novoborovsky orphanage of Zhytomyr regional council and buying special equipment for children with special needs as a part of the project “Happiness for Every Family” Sasha Oleynik and Damir Tsegelnik.
⭐Visits to orphanages in Udaitsy, Berdichev, Kyiv.
⭐ Meeting of the Director of “Kids to Kids” foundation with Ukrainian children in Germany and holding a charity workshop (please read here).
⭐ Participation in the charity project #GivingTuesday. We raised 61,350 UAH for two boys from the project “Happiness for Every Family”. The amount was spent on a special wheelchair for Nikita Kaliberda and a rehabilitation course for Mark Marchenko.
⭐ “Kids to Kids” Foundation received Gratitude from the charity project “Light amidst Darkness … Beauty in the midst of war” for volunteer help, active citizenship and contribution to the victory of Ukraine. Thank you for the honorary award!
Partners who supported us in the most difficult times:
Women’s Business Club Community The One In a Million and
Media partner Linken.ua
Foundation “Alyona Vinnitskaya”.
UFamily Humanitarian Mission
Media partner Best People Club
DOM.ru company
Omnia Trade Company
Public Organization “Medical Front”
Art Ramus
Globus shopping mall
We are very grateful to all our partners, friends and a huge number of incredible people for the powerful support of children with disabilities, orphans and children affected by war!
Thanks to the Ukrainian stars, who have now become volunteers and with their creativity inspire and support all Ukrainians!
Very soon the February 2022 year will end …
– What are we waiting for in 2023?
– Victory!
– What are we dreaming about?
– A return and a happy life in our own homes.
– Do we have plans?
– Of course we do! We will continue our work.
– What are we going to do?
– Our projects:
⭐ Monthly assistance to children with disabilities “Happiness for Every Family” – providing medicines, diapers, baby food, special equipment and rehabilitation.
⭐ Annual “Road to Life” projects – support for orphanage graduates before they finish schools.
⭐ “Christmas Miracle” – greeting children from orphanages, boarding schools and low-income families with Christmas and upcoming holidays (collecting and delivering presents, arranging events for Christmas and New Year).
⭐ “Happy Picnic” – a family holiday for low-income families raising children with disabilities.
⭐ “Marathon of Kindness” – guest visits to orphanages and special boarding schools with the support of parents with children who want to develop sympathy and tolerant attitude to special kids. Before every visit we raise funds to fulfill immediate needs of these orphanages and boarding schools.
We wish everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
❤️️ We wish all of you peace in your hearts, health and prosperity!
With love,
Your team “Children to Children”
Author of the article: Elena Momot
Co-founder of the CO “ CF “KIDS TO KIDS”
