This Holiday Season was really an extraordinary one- in so many amazing ways. Starting off in November, Pepperdine C4C (Challenge for Charity) Club held a great Thanksgiving Dinner in mid-Nov for the families in our Vita Network- a gorgeous catered dinner & dessert, with adorable crafts for the kiddos! On Thanksgiving Day itself, the CLF joined forces with the House of Blues for the 19th year in a row, coordinating over 1,000 homeless friends and families for a beautiful Gospel Brunch. Our 20th Anniversary Gala Concert & Fundraiser was a great success, raising over $50,000 for our three program platforms, and sponsored by Fred Segal, Topson-Downs and Bellamici Jewelry! Hosted by Neil Giraldo & Pat Benatar, with performances by Dick Van Dyke and his wife Arlene Silver, Jonathon Forrester and Jilliane Wagner, Faith McCaffery (who wrote a holiday song in honor of her "Nonna," Maria D'Angelo!)accompanied by the great Woody Woods,  a hilarious Live Auction with friends Michael Chiklis and John Cygan, and of course- Pat and Neil themselves!!  The incomparable Suzaane Matteson, amazing Mollie Meyer and Georgia Van Cuylenburg, super Pepperdine C4C members, always-amazing Erin Finley and her great friends, the lovely Nick Kreider & lovlier Laura Jayne Johnson- and so many other extraordinary people helped make this event so truly SPECIAL for our 20th Year.(You can read more about it & see some great pictures  HERE!)  In December, fantastic Toy Drives were once again held by the great Malibu School District, where students and families from Webster, Juan Cabrillo and Pt. Dume Marine Science Elementary Schools came together, for the nineteenth year in a row- and donated wonderful, BRAND-NEW toys and gifts...JAKKS Pacific Toys donated over 1400 FANTASTIC NEW TOTS (WHOA!), David Silverstein and his extraordinary crew from Action-Agape not only donated and WRAPPED hundreds of brand new toys and gifts- many of their volunteers came to our Vita Network Holiday Party-and helped us from set-up until clean-up! Todd and his super co-workers at VISALUS hosted another great Toy Drive for us, and our new friends at Truxton's Restaurant & Sun Studio also LA held cool toy drives for us, as did Jeanette & Rudy at HULU (TWO TOY DRIVES!),  and Jenefer Palmer at OSEA Skincare donated outrageously amazing gift bags filled with lux make-up, hair and skincare products for our moms & teen girls.

A wonderful anonymous donor allowed us to give financial stipends for upwards of $500 each to our Vita Network families, as well...! Our first party was hosted by Lupe and her incredible co-workers of Topson-Downs (and thank you, Mark & Cha-Cha Weinstein!) Patrck McCaffery was our wonderful Santa at both events,  (Thank you Patrick!) where each child was treated to not just ONE gift-but...

an entire BAG full of incredible gifts and toys!

The parties were incredibly successful and fun- with delicious food, great crafts, DJ dancing and contests-and of course- their great visit with Santa...

We were Then THRILLED when our dear friend Erikk Aldridge called us up, and invited us to be honored at LA Live's, AEG's Season of Giving- (presented by Coca-Cola) and Staple Center Foundation's Ice Rink Downtown, where the CLF was featured onstage and on their Jumbo-Tron! Our Care through College students, natch, went ice-skating, too:

Sean dropped off the remaining toys downtown at Midnight Mission the week before Christmas, were they were distributed by none other than Mr. Dick Van Dyke himself, along with thousands of other gifts and articles of clothing donated by the community. All in all, it was truly an INCREDIBLE and abundant Holiday Season, and we are SO #grateful!