Project Night Night Helps Children Feel Valued and Safe

Last year I came across an organization that melted my heart.  It is called Project Night Night and was started by Kendra Robins in 2005 because she saw a need to provide some comfort for children who are displaced out of their home into shelters due to domestic violence or financial reasons. Surprisingly, 1 in 50 American children will face homelessness in her or his lifetime. Together with volunteers across the country they have provided over 30,000 tote bags to over 700 shelters that are filled with a stuffed animal, an age-appropriate book and a soft blanket to help ease the fear and worry they might have. I had a chance to speak to Kendra about their organization and how others can help out this year as well.  I think you will fall in love with the Project Night Night organization and the important work they are doing!

Why did you decide to start Project Night Night?

 Before I founded Project Night Night in 2005, I was a corporate attorney.  I had created many nonprofits for others, but had never seriously considered starting one myself until a confluence of events made it impossible for me to prolong what was very clearly becoming my destiny.  My husband elected to get his M.B.A. a little later in life.  We were both in our 30’s when he was accepted into the M.B.A. program at the University of Michigan.  Unfortunately, we lived with our young son, in San Francisco at the time, and I was not licensed to practice law in Michigan.  But we did move to Ann Arbor, and I found myself unemployed and home with my 18^th month old in the middle of a Michigan winter.  My husband was off at school and “networking.”  I was lost and a bit lonely.  I found respite in those few hours after my son went to bed but before I did.  Getting Cole to sleep became a crucial part of my evening.  I relied on a consistent routine that included a network of comfort items.  Cole loved his blanket, his books, and his stuffed animal.  With those items in his crib, with a familiar book read to him at night, he would fall asleep peacefully and easily.  And I would exhale and regroup.

One evening, I began to think about the victims of domestic violence.  These are women who are often forced to flee in the middle of the night – lucky to escape with their child let alone their child’s favorite stuffed toy.  When they arrive at the shelter, the shelter is at best noisy and unfamiliar, and at worst frightening and dark.  The child has no blanket to which to cling, no stuffed animal to squeeze, and no books to pull at their imagination.  Everything is amplified.  Everything is worse.

“That’s it,” I thought.  “I can help them.”  The next day, as my son and I played in his room, I gathered some of his extra blankets, books, and stuffed animals.  I tied them up in little packages with a ribbon and took them off to a local domestic violence center.  They loved them and requested more.  I shook down friends and family for their excess inventory, but when the phone continued to ring with new shelter orders, I realized that this was the nonprofit I needed to start. 

I had no funding, no inventory, no website, and no idea what I was doing.  What I did know was how to get my idea approved by the IRS.  A few weeks later, with the blessing of the IRS, I was in the nonprofit business.  That first year, 2005, I assembled and distributed 1,200 Night Night packages from my living room floor.  Supplies were cribbed together from discount stores, local thrift shops, knitting clubs, and garage sales.  It was truly grassroots.

I applied for grants but I kept getting turned down.  “Has anyone else backed your project?” Foundation Directors would ask?  “No!” I said full of pride believing that Foundations would not want to have competition when they funded a program.  “Denied” then regret letter would say.  I would later learn that Foundations never want to be the first to put money in.  They want to see that other foundations support you and then they will offer their financial support as well.  Who knew?  About 6 months’ later, one Foundation took a chance on me – The Safeway Foundation.  They sent me a check for $5,000.  In 2005, that was an unbelievably large amount of money for Project Night Night.  I spent that money so carefully and so wisely.  After Safeway came in, others soon followed.  By 2006, I had distributed 8,000 Night Night packages and had a full-time volunteer named Jessica.  She would later become my Deputy Director.  A year later, Project Night Night’s distribution soared to 15,000 Night Night packages annually.  Today, 7 years later, we distribute 30,000 Night Night packages each year to 700 shelters nationwide.

 How can people get involved with the project and help?

 Project Night Night (PNN) is an award-winning nonprofit organization that equips children across the country living in homeless or low income situations with the basic nighttime essentials they need to feel safe, warm, ready to learn and valued. While meeting the immediate needs of disadvantaged children, PNN also sets a foundation for lasting change by providing meaningful, hands-on volunteer opportunities to thousands of individuals and hundreds of organizations each year.  There are a variety of ways to help:

 1. Donate $20 at www.ProjectNightNight.org to underwrite the cost of a Night Night Package.  You can do this in your own name or in honor of another.  A great holiday gift!

 2. Participate in our Adopt a Night Night Package program (https://www.projectnightnight.org/AaNNP.html) where you fill our tote bags with a new blanket, book, and stuffed animal and then deliver them to a local shelter.

 3. Spread the word!  The more folks who know about us, the more homeless children we can help.  Join us on Facebook and Twitter.

 What have been some of the more rewarding moments for you?

 By far the most rewarding part of Project Night Night is receiving photos, drawings, and stories for the children who receive our Night Night Packages.  I am a soft touch when it comes to children and many of the stories simply bring me to tears.  One little boy refused to remove the tags from the blanket we gave him because, as he explained, “If I take-off the tags, my blanket won’t be new anymore, and I’ve never had anything new before.”  Another little boy talked to the teddy bear he received from us.  He told the bear his “secret” – that the boy’s mother was an alcoholic, but that the little boy assured his bear that he would keep the bear safe when the mother drank. 

In 2011, a woman wrote to me to thank Project Night Night for the Night Night Packages that her children received.  “The day before Christmas Eve, my husband went crazy and tried to kill me and our three children,” she explained.  “Thankfully, we made it out alive.  Last night, the kids received the sweetest bags from Project Night Night, and it made them SO happy.  They haven’t smiled so big in awhile, and it sure was great to see them like that.  When I am working again and can afford to, I look forward to giving back to your organization.”

 Project Night Night does not provide food or shelter – those items are crucial for homeless adults.  Instead, we provide a way to comfort and to reduce fear in homeless children.  We remind them that they are important, and we help them fall asleep with sweet dreams and with real comfort.

 Do you have any news you want to share with our dandelion moms?

 Project Night Night is there for children to help reduce emotional trauma. We are also there when Mother Nature strikes.

 Project Night Night distributed almost 1,000 Night Night packages to children who lost everything in superstorm Sandy.  When Hurricanes Irene and Ike landed, we fielded shelter calls from Texas to Vermont to aid the children in their care.  Seven years ago hundreds of children clung to our Night Night Packages as they dealt with the destruction of Hurricane Katrina.  Through our work with Red Cross agencies, fire departments, shelters, and places of worship, we responded quickly and efficiently when Mother Nature fails us.

 We also respond when emotional storms strike.  Throughout the year, we serve tens of thousands of homeless children who find themselves in shelters.  We are proud to provide high-quality items carefully tailored to reduce trauma and to provide access to educational materials.

 At Project Night Night, we are always preparing for the next storm and will continue to offer our services whenever they are needed.  There are many unknowns for 2013, and we need to be ready for all of them.

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Thank you Kendra for the important work you are all doing there at Project Night Night!

Last year, with the help of some friends, we were able to gather blankets that were provided by local sewing groups, stuffed animals that were donated by the company bla bla dolls, along with Penelope the Purple Pirate books to fill 50 tote bags.  My daughter and I dropped them off at a local shelter that housed women and children coming from domestic abuse situations.  It was one of the more humbling and special moments for us last year.  Humbling in that when we came up to the drop-off center we had to be wait for them to unlock the door so we could come inside.  It hit me that there were women and children in the shelter that literally had run for their lives from a domestic situation. The significance of what a Project Night Night tote provides for a child coming from this situation is pretty powerful! I look forward to helping out again this year in honor of dandelion moms!

To learn more about Project Night Night go here: www.ProjectNightNight.org

To make a $20 donation that will provide a tote for a child go to: https://projectnightnight.org/Donate.html