Gamers For Humanity has been busy, so I’ve got a report to give and a project to announce.

Over the holiday season, we had a very successful Holiday Game Drive in Iowa. From November into December, we collected over $1000 worth of games and toys for the kids and families at the Iowa City Ronald McDonald House, as well as over 300 pounds of food for the Johnson County Crisis Center (an organization that provides a wide range of services for the poor and troubled of the area).

It was a remarkable experience to see the generosity of people. We used drop boxes for this event, which was new for us. People are usually happy to donate when there’s a person standing there, but drop boxes? Well, they worked, people were generous, and the results were great.

Secondly, we have coming up next month our biggest annual project, a week-long work trip to New Orleans, rebuilding houses for people affected by hurricanes Katrina and Rita (back in 05…yep, plenty of people are still homeless over 3 years later).

Last year we brought 9 people down for the week. This year…we have TWENTY people volunteering. We are also bringing down over 11,000 pre-packaged meals, donated by Kids Against Hunger’s Iowa chapter, to be distributed to food banks in the New Orleans area. This is working up to be a great week, and I’ll post pictures and details when we’re done, so remember to check back here, or check our website at www.gamersforhumanity.org.

I have been seriously remiss in posting this update, and I apologize to everyone at Nametag, Inc. In my defense, we have just completed a very busy Holiday Game Drive, collecting hundreds of pounds of food and over $1000 worth of games and toys for Iowa City charities. So…we’ve been busy.

In August, Gamers For Humanity attended the Gen Con game convention in Indianapolis, IN–four days of games, gaming, and good people. We, however, spent a fifth day working with Habitat For Humanity, and the other four days fundraising at our booth in the Exhibitor’s Hall. We organized our first Game Drive there, collecting games and toys for the Indianapolis Ronald McDonald House, and the Wheeler Mission Ministry of Indianapolis. It was a big success, enough to make us decide to hold this recently finished drive for the holiday season.

We also collected enough donations at the convention to pay for our federal 501(c)3 application, so that status is now pending.

Nametag, Inc was gracious enough to provide us with some excellent-looking badge ribbons for the convention, and I know for a fact that those ribbons really helped us establish our presence to the gaming community in our first year of existence. Gamers love badge ribbons, and our shiny blue ribbons were coveted by a lot of people. Luckily, we had a lot to go around

We were so busy at the booth that we don’t have a lot of pictures ourselves, but here are a few. I’m waiting for more pictures to come in, and I’ll post them when they arrive.

Hardhats and Gamers!

Collections from the Game Drive:

Working with Habitat For Humanity

We were also able to use some of the leftover ribbons at a non-profit conference in October, to help spread the word about our mission. So the folks at Nametag have helped us in more ways than one.

I hope the rest of you are finding success in your missions as well. Visit us at our website, www.gamersforhumanity.org, and check back here as well for more updates on our projects.

Tom J
Gamers For Humanity