Despite the rain and cooler temperatures on Saturday, hundreds gathered to volunteer their time and service for the Love Turlock event. Over 700 people — including families, college and high school sports teams and businesses — signed up to volunteer to work on 37 projects for the 14th annual event.
“In Stanislaus County today, we have over 7,000 people participating in their respective cities, which means that nearly 10% are right here in Turlock. I think we should just really celebrate that…Every year, the number of volunteers continues to grow. We’re just so amazed and so blessed and we thank each of you for dedicating your Saturday to spend with us,” said Melanie Youkhana of the Love Turlock leadership team.
Following an opening ceremony at Donnelly Park Saturday morning, the hundreds of volunteers broke off to work on projects they had signed up to help with, from making placements with encouraging words for local senior citizens, to painting projects at schools around town and picking up trash at city parks.
This was the first time that Tatiana Daniel, Natasha Pourkaldani and Nathan Makoor participated in the Love Turlock event.
“We like serving and volunteering, so with that, this would be a good opportunity to do that,” said Daniel.
The three signed up to work on projects at Medeiros Elementary School.
Nicole Sligar and Juan Magan of Turlock brought their kids, Juan Jr. and Anthony and Felix, out to the Love Turlock event. Sligar said this was the second time the family has participated in the day of service.
“It was really fun. Last time we painted rocks and got to decorate Turlock with different inspirational stuff and the kids really loved it,” she said. The family signed up to work on the Turlock Community Garden this year. “It’s better because the kids are getting older and they could give back a little more.”
It was the fourth year to participate in the Love Turlock event for Janet Blair, who was a project manager for the Teddy Bears of Love project.
The goal on Saturday was to make 100 of the small, stuffed teddy bears to give to local law enforcement to hand out during times of crisis that include children and to other organizations that serve kids like Jessica’s House.
“This teddy bear is just a real simple teddy bear, heart on his chest and a simple face, and he’s comforting because he’s soft and squishy,” said Blair. “…They’re just a little bear to give a child to comfort them through a hard time.”
