For Rachel Valdez and her daughters Danyelle and Daija, Love Turlock has become an annual community service tradition. Saturday was the family’s third year of participating in the event. Each year they pick a different activity and this year they chose to help make blankets and toys for shelter dogs.

They were visibly excited to be participating in the event during the morning rally on Saturday at Donnelly Park.

“We just like helping the community and it’s really fun,” said Daija Valdez.

The Valdez family were just a few of the hundreds of volunteers who showed up to paint, clean, inspire and do good during the annual Love Turlock event on Saturday.

“As I look out here, I see all the youth, all the way up to college athletes, and it makes our job so easy to lead this community when you’re here doing these things for our community,” said Mayor Amy Bublak.

It’s not just families who come out year after year to make a difference in the community. Amazon Turlock had a crew out for the fourth year in a row. This year Turlock's MCE1 fulfillment center team signed up to refresh the basketball court at a local park.

“We love the Turlock community. The Turlock community has been absolutely amazing to us. We’re a large employer, obviously, and we owe it to our community to give back to where we operate and where the residents of this great town give so much to us,” said general manager Craig Norris.

“This day reminds us of something really powerful — when people show up with open hands and open hearts, a city gets changed and today all of you showed up,” said Love Turlock organizer Lindsay Plett during the morning rally at Donnelly Park on Saturday.

“…today guys, we get to love our neighbors. There are 800 people registered for all of our 40 different projects, and they’re going to be stepping up and serving all across our city.”