Children’s Clothes Closet – Sept. 2026
The summer flew, and now we are preparing for the fall and winter season. We are closed in September to transition operations but continue to provide diapers on Wednesday mornings to clients. We now have about 1700 clients on our books, signing up around 10 new families in August.
Our biggest shortage in the fall/winter season is traditionally in boys’ pants and shirts, especially pants, sizes 6 and larger. This includes teen boys. The kids especially like athletic pants, but jeans and dress pants are also popular. We are already low in sizes 6-10. We often run short of winter gloves, all sizes, as the winter moves forward. Keep us in mind for outerwear, such as gloves, winter coats and boots.
The purchase of diapers continues to be our greatest expense, using about 72 percent of our grant and donation income. This is up from 50 percent only a year ago. Even though we cannot fulfill all a family’s diaper needs, the 2 packs per month per infant that we provide can be a week’s worth of diapers! This is not an insignificant blessing to a working poor family. And when one considers that many families have more than one child in diapers, it adds up to great expense. The cost for a year of diapers for one child can be $3,000, give or take. Multiply that by the number of children still in diapers in a family….wow! But having adequate diapers is a health as well as financial issue. Babies need clean diapers to thrive. If anyone is led to host a diaper drive with their church or community group, please know that the Children’s Clothes Closet would welcome it.
So many people in the area have stepped up to help us. We look forward to having a group of developmentally challenged people come in soon to tag clothes, another wonderful opportunity for us to serve our community while they in turn serve us. God is good!
We are so grateful for the incredibly generous gifts and service our donors provide – thank you so much! From new socks and underwear and new winter coats to the many hours of volunteer work, these gifts are helping so many people in our community to have hope and keep going another day, and to give their children a brighter future. We also appreciate your prayers for our volunteers and for our clients.