Holiday Treat: Helping Others : SAN CLEMENTE : Couple Fill Needy Family’s Holiday List

Five year-old Shawnette Randle lives in a small trailer off an unpaved road in the Mississippi Delta with her two brothers and 21-year-old mother.

Shawnette and her family are too poor to buy food sometimes, much less presents.

But this Christmas will be a special one. Through the Box Project, an organization pairing needy families with sponsors from all over the country, the Randles have exchanged letters with Ian and Doris Doyle, owners of a San Clemente photo lab.

“The Christmas list we’ve received from this family makes us realize how much we take for granted in our lives,” Ian Doyle said.

The Randles’ list includes socks, bedding, stuffing mix, chili beans, juice, curtains for their trailer, seeds for the spring garden and a few toys for the children.

In addition to the things the family specified, the Doyles will send some extra gifts and food for a special Christmas dinner.

Annie, the young mother, asked for nothing for herself, which is typical, said Doris Doyle, reflecting on the wish lists they’ve received from other families.

Nancy Normen, executive director at the Box Project’s headquarters in Plainville, Conn., concurs.

“The mothers ask for household items and things for the children, rarely anything for themselves. It seems like the most precious gift the parent can receive is something to give to their child at Christmastime,” she said.

For the Doyles, the project helps teach 5-year-old Chelsea that not every little girl has a room full of toys and a good dinner each night.

“We are teaching Chelsea how to give this way,” Doris said. Since the Doyles began filing wish lists a few years ago, Chelsea has helped Doris shop for and pack the Christmas box.

“She gets so excited,” Doris Doyle said. “We talk about the children we’re buying for, and what she thinks they would like. This year it is especially nice that our Box Project family has a little girl Chelsea’s age.”

For the recipients, Normen said: “The goods help, but it is the caring that is key, the idea that someone that they’ve never seen, probably never will see, will do this for them that they cherish and appreciate.”

To find out more about sponsoring a needy family at Christmas or on a monthly basis, send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to the Box Project, Dept T, Box 435, Plainville Conn., 06062 or call (203) 747-8182.