UNICEF

Did you know that they’ve started up “Trick or Treat for UNICEF” again? I didn’t. Nobody else did. But Hannah did. When I was a kid, they gave us a little orange milk carton, and just about every kid in the school went out right after school on Halloween and collected pennies in the carton. Mostly we got pennies. Not that they weren’t worth more than they are today, but they were still just pennies. Plus, with all the kids from the neighborhood school out collecting (we did it BEFORE the actual trick or treating), the haul wasn’t usually impressive. Maybe somebody dropped in a dime or even a quarter every now and then.

Well, they’re doing it again. Hannah went out last night with new orange boxes that look like disposable cameras and with the very noble intention of not asking for candy, just for UNICEF money. But then she gave in and got candy, too. But every house, save one, gave her some money (and most were as surprised to hear of UNICEF again as I was). Many gave loose coins, which I thought was in the spirit of the thing, but many gave dollars, and in the end, I think she raised about $14 million dollars just going two blocks around our house. Not bad. And Rebekah even memorized “United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund.”

We used to take our milk cartons back to school, and never really knew how much we’d collected. Now we’re to take them to a Coinstar machine and enter the UNICEF code 5555 to donate. If you walk by a Coinstar machine, drop them a dime or two.