A Chevy Trax, My Family, and A Toy Donation #ChevyShopsforGood

Sometimes I really love my job. When Chevy asked me if I wanted to partner with them this season, I couldn’t say no. #ChevyShopsforGood is a campaign that is truly helping kids in the Chicago area with toy donations.

For our adventures with Chevy, they lent us a Chevy Trax which we got to take the Toy and Game Fair here in Chicago. It was the only weekend it was actually cold enough to snow here! (Not that I am complaining that it’s been in the 60’s here.) The coolest thing that Chevy has is an app that lets you remote start your car. I can’t tell you how much we absolutely loved that feature!!!!

We loved spending the day playing at the Toy & Game Fair.  It’s someplace you have to check out if you are ever in Chicago when it’s here.

Our stop after the Toy and Game Fair was the Hotel Palomar Chicago. This is an amazing hotel. I am hoping we can go back someday just for the bathroom! My kids were even impressed!

From there we headed to Lucky Strikes and enjoyed some amazing food and bowling.

Now, for actually the best part of my partnership with Chevy.  They gave me a gift card to go shopping with and donate the toys to a charity of my choice.  For me, it was super easy.  Bill works for Kelso-Burnett (who is an electrical engineer), and they collect toys every year for Taproots.  It is a partnership that was created several years ago.  It started that everyone just donated toys.  That first year they collected, they were in search of a charity to donate too.  Taproots had a mishap with Toys For Tots (basically, they forgot to drop off toys for Taproots clients), and were in dire need.  Pablo, who works with Bill, jumped in and donated all the toys the companies employees donated, and they have worked together ever since.  Pablo has even been allowed to when they deliver everything, and that is when they realized that some of these families needed food too.  Now, when the donating letter goes out, they ask for food, toys, and money.  They use the money to purchase both food and to purchase toys.  They make sure that each child has at least 2 toys.  If they don’t, Pablo goes and purchases extra things.

I am a savvy shopper, so I was one of the crazy people who went out Thanksgiving night so I could get the best deals.  I can honestly tell you that I struggled with what to get!  Do I get a lot of cheap toys (which looks great because it looks like a lot) or do I get a little pricier toys that these kids probably aren’t ever going to get?  I had anxiety over this!  I ended up deciding to get a mix of both!  Those two carts were full of our purchases!

I also felt like I didn’t buy enough!  However, as you can see, we filled the Chevy Trax!  When I dropped off all the toys, Pablo was beyond thankful!  He knew I was coming, but had no idea how much I was coming with!  An added bonus was that this was a considerable stack of toys that all the employees will walk by every day, so we are hoping it helps everybody remember to donate!  

I cannot thank Chevy enough for allowing my family to partner with them. We had an amazing time with this campaign. My kids and I have continued to donate this holiday season to different drives their school has had (right now, they are collecting gloves, scarves, and hats for PADS). This has really jumpstarted my kids need and want to donate to those families who aren’t as lucky as us.

How will you be helping others in need this holiday season?