Hundreds of volunteers providing Thanksgiving meals to needy

Hundreds of persons are volunteering on Thanksgiving morning to assemble hot homemade meals and deliver them with groceries to more than 1,200 people through the United Prayer Movement’s project.

Pleasant Green Baptist Church, 340 David L. Gray Drive, Kansas City, Kan., is the hub for this effort.

Volunteers signed up in advance and will assemble meals for home delivery, and deliver them this morning. Deliveries are made throughout Greater Kansas City.

This program, the effort of many churches and synagogues, also will provide the same meal effort on Christmas.

In 2013, the program provided 2,635 dinners, 391 bags of groceries to 953 families, including 245 seniors, 1753 other adults and 667 children.

There were 543 volunteers and 57 churches and synagogues involved in the effort in 2013.

For more information about this program and how to get involved, visit www.unitedprayermovement.org.

Top 20 things to be thankful for

Window on the West
by Mary Rupert

It’s Thanksgiving, so it helps to express gratitude for whatever we feel thankful for today. Those who can be in a Thanksgiving state of mind throughout the year are very fortunate.

Here’s my top 20 list.

I am thankful for:

1. Life and health.
2. Friends and family.
3. Sunrise and sunset.
4. Teachers.
5. Our readers.
6. The hundred daily kindnesses we run across without even thinking about them.
7. Laughter.
8. The ability to think.
9. A nice Thanksgiving feast.
10. Our freedoms.
11. Those who help make sure that we keep our freedoms.
12. All of those people in our career fields and in our lives who have gone before us and made a way for us.
13. The ability of the body to repair itself.
14. The beautiful landscapes that may be discovered on earth.
15. A good book.
16. Music.
17. Modern technology and innovation.
18. A good game of Scrabble.
19. Creativity.
20. For nice weather and many other things, too numerous to mention.

If you have a list you want to share with our readers, send it to [email protected].

To reach Mary Rupert, editor, email [email protected].

2-year-old in critical condition at KU Hospital

Two-year-old Eduardo Lopez Martinez is in critical condition at the University of Kansas Hospital following a hit-and-run accident Nov. 24.  Police are asking for the public's help in finding out information about the accident. (Photo from KU Hospital)
Two-year-old Eduardo Lopez Martinez is in critical condition at the University of Kansas Hospital following a hit-and-run accident Nov. 24. Police are asking for the public’s help in finding out information about the accident. (Photo from KU Hospital)

Two-year-old Eduardo Lopez Martinez of Kansas City, Kan., is in critical condition at the University of Kansas Hospital after a hit-and-run accident Nov. 24.

The driver of an older white four-door Chrysler drove away from the scene of the accident, at 1127 N. 32nd St., police stated.

Since the accident, the victim’s condition has improved, and he remains at KU Hospital, the police spokesman said.

Police asked anyone with information to assist them. The accident remains under investigation by the Kansas City, Kan., Police Department’s Traffic Support Unit-Critical Collision Response Team, which is encouraging anyone with information to call the TIPS hotline at 816-474-TIPS.