The Power of Serving! Urban Surf 4 Kids & Ronald McDonald Houses

Our chapters in Miami,San Diego,and Orange County have now all served a volunteer experience with the RMH! The Ronald McDonald House provides lodging for famailies who’s children suffer a serious illness.

Our mission @ Urban Surf 4 Kids is to empower foster youth through water based activties & serving our communities!

Here is an overview of the event in Orange County!

This was Orange County’s first visit to the Ronald McDonald House. Our assignment was to make the house smell like a home by baking cookies and cupcakes. Foster Mom arrived first with her four foster children bringing ingredients for 100 cupcakes. My wife (Alicia) and I arrived about 5-10 minutes late after making a wrong turn to find the foster mom and her oldest sons already in the kitchen mixing ingredients. Her youngest boy,helped me roll cookie balls from a five pound Costco bucket of raw dough. The youngest volunteer, (6yr old girl) helped Alicia setup an arts and crafts station at one of the kitchen tables. The kids all pitched in to make “Get Well Soon” cards for the 20 families staying at the House. They all came up with creative ways of decorating their own cards. The girls added drawings of flowers and rainbows while the boys added stickers of trains and drew pictures of themselves surfing. Families began to emerge from their rooms as the smell of home cooking raised throughout the house. During the craft project Alicia was approached by a 7 year old girl ,who we later found out was a cancer patient staying at the home while in intermission from her treatment. She asked if she could draw with the other kids and Alicia told her she was more than welcome. At that point we realized the reality of the situation for those staying at the Ronald McDonald House.  After we displayed the baked goods and cards for the guest I sat down with the kids to make sure they understood why we were there. I explained that these kids and their families were going through a rough patch in their lives and what we were doing was giving them a short break from all their worries, a few moments to take their minds off their troubles. I told them it’s the same reason we go surfing, we all need moments like this to clear our heads and reset so we can move forward. The best thing we can do now is to pray for them anytime they cross our minds.  We then joined hands and said a quick prayer.

This is a great experience for Volunteers and foster kids alike. We have already booked another Serve Day for next Saturday from 12:00 – 3pm.
If this sounds like something you would be interested in please give me a call or send me an e-mail.

Best Regards,

Mark Ralph
UrbanSurf4kids-OC
Volunteer Program Director
            949-297-8598       Direct
            949-355-6337       Cell