2014 SEASON

This is just a note to let you know that Help-Portrait Abbotsford will not be running this year. Thank you to all our past volunteers, and to all our past guests. The last 4 years have been a blast! Please check back for future Help-Portrait Abbotsford events.

1.5 Weeks!

So, there is only about a week and a half left to go before our event. EEK! Panic mode for me!

 For those volunteers who want to know what they will be doing on the day, I will be sending out emails over the weekend to let you all know what is going on. For those who said they would be willing to call guests to arrange appointment times, this will need to be done next week, and you will all get an email with the shared Google Docs that we will be using.

For any guests who have registered and are wondering what is happening, you should receive a call sometime next week to arrange an appointment time for you on the 7th. At that time you will be able to ask any questions that you may have in regards to the upcoming event. 

We will be accepting new volunteers and new guests up until FRIDAY December 6th at 5pm, but if you could register before then, it would make our job so very much easier.

Due to the lack of volunteers this year, and due to the fact that we have two mobile teams going out, we would ask that all guests who have attended 2 or more Help-Portrait events, kindly step aside in favour of those who have not yet had a chance to attend. Thank you so much for this consideration!

Less Than a Month Left!

So there is less than a month left before our Help-Portrait day. We are trying to pull all the details together in such a short amount of time. We have begun contacting organizations who will send us guests to participate in this special day. Every year we try to look for new organizations and new people to reach, because this is about giving people a boost when they are at a low, giving them a sense of worth and value at a time when those things are hard to find. This is not simply about free portraits for those who can't afford them - in fact, many of our volunteers could not afford to have their hair and makeup done or professional portraits taken of  themselves! We are a special group of people, looking to give back to others who are special and don't really know it.

If you are this person who is at a hard place, please have your group or organization contact us to get you involved. We are in contact with many community groups and organizations, and we are always willing to add more and spread our reach.

If you feel inspired to help and to be involved, there are two ways to do this:

• Become a volunteer - trust us, there are so many, many different areas where you can help, no special skills needed! Just sign up and/or come out to one of our planning meetings.

• Donate funds or items that we need - We need everything from food, to volunteer t-shirts, to photo paper and printers. Please have a look at our list to see if there is something you are able to help with. Unfortunately, since Help-Portrait is only registered in the US as a charitable organization, we are unable to give charitable donation receipts. We are willing, though, to write an official thank you letter if that will help you for business purposes.

Please take a minute to explore our blog, and to look at the photos and videos from past events. Hopefully we captured the essence of what this day means to us!

December 7th, 2013

So we have confirmed the date! Saturday, December 7th, we will be back at Bakerview Church, as well as a few other locations with mobile teams. HOORAY!

Volunteers, please register ASAP, so that we can order shirts and know who will be helping where. We love ALL of you! You are what make this a success, time and time again. Anyone who can offer help in planning or taking leadership over specific areas would be MUCH APPRECIATED!
Send us an email: helpportraitabbotsford@gmail.com to let us know, and/or indicate what you can help with in the Volunteer Registration. Also, if you are on Facebook, please join our Help-Portrait Abbotsford 2013 Volunteers group to keep up to date with what is going on.

Guests from Best For Babies, please be advised that you will need to register through your group leader this year. This has changed from previous years. Looking forward to seeing you all on the 7th!

2013 Update

Just a quick note that we have begun planning for our 2013 event. This year, we will be expanding our reach by sending mobile teams out to a few locations and scaling back a bit on our guests at the main event. We would love to offer a unique experience to guests who have not previously visited us. We will post another update as soon as we get a firm confirmation on the date of our event. Volunteers, you may sign up as soon as you like, but be advised that the date is not 100% yet (awaiting venue confirmation)

A few more hours!

Just a quick message for our guests:

If you did not get a phone call or if you did not register, and would like to come out, we would be more than happy to accommodate you between noon and 3pm as a walk-in session. Basic hair and makeup services available. We will be at 2285 Clearbrook Rd. in Abbotsford, and we would love to have you! 

2 More Days!!!

With only a couple days left, all the last minute details are coming together. It is great to see our guest list getting longer and our appointment calendar starting to fill up. Some of our volunteers have been spending hours on the phones calling guests to arrange appointments, so if you have registered and have not yet heard from us, don't worry! We will call you. At the moment, it looks as though the afternoon is more free than the morning.

I am looking forward to the smiles and the fun we will have, and hoping that we have worked out a few more kinks from last year. It is a great thing to be a part of for both guests and volunteers alike!

Last Meeting

Thank you SO MUCH to everyone who was able to make it out to our last meeting! I hope everyone's questions were answered and you have a little better idea of what might be going on during the day. It was really great seeing a bunch of new faces, and I hope to get to know some of you more as we pull this all together. If there are any more questions or concerns, please email  - helpportraitabbotsford@gmail.com - and either Patti or I will get back to you.

For those who could not make it out - no worries! We will brief you the morning of. A few key notes to be aware of:

•  The first guests should be appearing around 9am. 
• I would really love to get a large group shot of all the volunteers who can make it, sometime between 8:30 and 9am outside the building, so please take a few minutes away from whatever you may be doing so that you can join us.
• I expect us to have all of our guests through with photos in hand by roughly 5:30pm, so that we can hopefully be packed up and on our way out by 7pm.
• Some people will be at Bakerview on Friday evening to set-up prior to the event, from about 5pm. If you plan on joining us, please let us know so that we can be sure to let you in, and to wait for you before we close up.
• This should be fun for us too, so relax and smile :-)
• Please take a minute to eat something. In the past, volunteers have been so busy that eating has been an afterthought. Since we cannot keep tabs on which volunteers have had a break and which have not, it will be up to you to take a rest and have a snack when needed.
• Anyone with really long extension cords, please bring them. Same applies for power bars.
• LABEL EVERYTHING
• Along with my nice chic volunteer t-shirt, I will be wearing superhero RED stretch pants. So will a few others who are in the know. If you have a question that cannot be answered at the sign in table - find one of us.
• Candid photographers, please remember that guests wearing black lanyards should not be photographed outside of their studio session. 
• Hair and Make-up professionals, please ensure that any guest wearing a black lanyard keeps it visible when they are at your stations.
• You are all amazing! This could not happen without you, and I am in awe, each time I do this, at how much everyone pulls together and gives such a meaningful and valuable gift of their time and talents to this cause.

See you on the 8th!!!

Getting Closer!

As our event is getting closer, we are madly contacting organizations to send us guests for our day. Next week, we will be calling guests to arrange appointment times and to answer any questions they may have. We are still looking for individuals or businesses who would be willing to provide food for both guests and volunteers. We are still looking for more general volunteers to do a variety of tasks.

We have had some great success already! A few things we are grateful for include:

•  the donation of baked goods from Thrifty Foods in Abbotsford
• roughly 20 loaves of bread from someone connected with Cobbs bread (proper donor  info yet to be confirmed)
• someone to do video for us
• a $500 donation from the TWU to help cover the cost of printing and other operating needs.
• another $ donation of around $200 from an individual, to help cover the cost of shirts for the volunteers as well as food or other needs that we have.
• a GREAT deal on our shirts thanks to Bob Johnson at Unitex in Abbotsford.
• an excellent response from photographers, make-up and hair professionals, as well as others who are willing to help make our event a success.
• make-up supplies from Brianne Marble-Arbonne Independent Consultant and some hair and make-up supplies from Avon and the Beauty Shop as well.
• a couple other promised donations to be confirmed...

We are confident that things will continue to come together as we take care of all the loose ends and small details which remain. Thanks to all of you who have contributed your time, money, and resources so far. We are SO VERY GRATEFUL!!!

Planning, Planning, Planning

So we are in the midst of planning our event again this year. It seems like it's coming up too soon! Only a month away. Currently we need some more food for the day - things like sandwiches, cheese, meat, veggies, and fruit. We also would love if there was a business willing to cover the cost of our volunteer t-shirts and the screening costs.

Otherwise, things are well under way. We have been in contact with several organizations which we have worked with in the past, as well as some new ones which will be sending us some guests. We have the cost of printing 5x7's covered for the guests, as well as some baked goods, and make-up. Looking forward to an even better event than the last two years!!!

2012 is here!

2012 is upon us and nearly done! Planning has started for our December event, and there is a lot yet to be done. For those who can join us, please come out for our first planning meeting of the year at the Wired Monk in Abbotsford. Looking forward  to getting things moving again!

SUCCESS

Finally, I can breath again! After a few months of furious planning, hundreds of texts and emails, and several phone calls…Help-Portrait day arrived with a bang. Thanks does not even begin to cover my gratefulness for the roughly 100 volunteers who sacrificed their time, sleep, equipment, and probably a little sanity to help make this day successful. We managed to photograph about 350 people from all walks of life. Though our day did not go off without a hitch (we had major problems with our printers) I am still very happy with the experience that we were able to give to our guests, as well as with the experiences that we all walked away with. It was a great day of networking, joking, and connecting with others as we worked together to serve our community. I am already making plans in my head for things that I want to change or incorporate again for this year! There were several little loose ends to tie up, which I have been doing until now, but finally everything is finished. I am so proud to see how much regular people can impact a community! If you would like to be involved in the coming year, please fire me off an email and I will let you know as soon as things get rolling!

Tamara

2 Days to Go

Well, here we are at crunch time, and here I am at 2:30am again blogging! Things are coming together slowly and quickly at the same time. We have a great base of volunteers for all areas of our day, the exception being hair and makeup in the afternoon. But I am sure that these will also come together in the 2 remaining days as we have been working on filling the spots. Laura will be at the church on Friday evening to set up a few things with those who are willing to come in and do it then. For all others, it will be a mad rush at 8am Saturday morning. Please, if at all possible, avail yourself for a group photo (or possibly a few) before we start our day. If you are one of those who are starting later in the day, please make sure you have your photo taken so that we can try to add you to the group shot afterwards. Anyone who knows anyone who is willing to bring along food, we would be very very grateful for anything. We do have quite a bit of food, but based on last year's experience, we can always use more. Savoury things like sandwiches, pizzas, veggies, meat and cheese trays, and fruit (a box of oranges would be great!) are where we are lacking more. Please also remember to label any dishes or things that you want to get back at the end of the day.

We have made a tentative schedule for the volunteers and have emailed a couple key groups of people who need to bring specific equipment. For the rest of you, if you are a photographer, please bring your cameras and flashes etc, and if you are a general volunteer you will be told where to be on the day of. Anyone who has funny hats or things to make kids laugh, bring those along, or any other props that may be useful (remembering to label everything!) When you arrive, please see Simran Bains, our volunteer coordinator, who will let you know where you need to go and what you need to do. Laura and Tamara will be everywhere at once ;-) and I'm sure things will be great!

There are probably going to be media there as well as several photographers taking candid photos for us. Be aware you may be on camera, and also please be sensitive and aware of guests who are in situations that require confidentiality. This year there are A LOT of these individuals. We have close to 100 amazing volunteers. Feel free to use the opportunity to network with each other and to learn from each other. So far we have around 300 people registered to have their photos taken, with more on the way, as well as walk-ins on the day. I am guessing we may hit close to our target of 500-600 people. The day holds great promise. Looking forward to seeing you all there!

Always a Learning Process

Last year was our first attempt at an Abbotsford Help-Portrait event. We were pleasantly surprised at the success that it was, but most of all, we had a super fast learning curve and came away with many ideas for the way we wanted this year's event to be run. Having said that, we have already encountered areas that could be changed and better managed for next year. This blog is one example. It is constantly being modified in small ways to suit our purposes and enable a more fluid event planning and execution. Today's addition is something that I will definitely include at a much earlier date next year to facilitate guest management for our event. I was going to wait to add the Guest Registration to our next year's TO DO, but then I thought, why not just do it now anyway? So here we are, scrambling to ease the craziness of the next 9 days.... If any of you know of individuals or families who would benefit from being served by us at this event, please send them to our blog to fill out a simple form to let us know who they are. Once they have filled in the form, they only have to wait for one of our great volunteers to contact them to make an appointment on the day. 9 DAYS AND COUNTING PEOPLE!!!

Guest Registration

More Great News!

So, we started out the morning with one bit of good news, and we were going to post about that on it's own, but the good news just kept coming, so we thought we'd just make one post to cover it all up to date, and to fill in any of you who were not able to make it out to our meeting this last Sunday.

First of all, thank you to all those who were able to make it! We had a huge turnout this time, bigger than we had expected, and so sorry to those who did not find a seat. It was great chance for us to meet those of you we didn't know already and for you to meet us and everyone else. Without all of you volunteers (both those at the meeting and those who couldn't be there) we would not be able to do any of this, so thanks for being so great!

So let's get to the news:

1. This morning, Rick MacDonald and his wife JoAnne, contacted us to let us know that they and their company Nutrilawn will be covering the cost of the screen printing on the volunteer's shirts this year. So this means that all those who have filled out the Volunteer Registration Form by the time we have ordered the shirts, will receive their shirts for free! We will be ordering a few extras, so others may get lucky, but the shirts will only be guaranteed for those who have registered in time. Thank you so much Rick and JoAnne for this!

2. We have a gift basket that is being donated by Shoppers Drugmart that they have made for us to raffle off to cover coupons for each guest offering them 5 more 4x6 prints (or equivalent) in addition to the 5x7 that they will receive at the event. Today we received confirmation that Great West Fitness have agreed to display the basket and sell raffle tickets for a full week to help raise money for this purpose!

3. Today we purchased 4 printers, plus enough ink and paper to allow us to print one 5X7 photo per session on Dec. 10th. And we still have funds left over from TWU's generous donation to cover other costs that come up either before or even on the day!

4. Thrifty Foods in Abbotsford have agreed to donate baked goods for our event. And Save-On Foods sumas have donated a $50 gift certificate for the store, which we are thinking of using to purchase any items we are missing a day or two before the event, or possibly some fruits and vegetables that we can cut up on trays for our guests.

Looks as though things are really beginning to come together! We are getting really excited about this year's event!

This Year's Shirt Design

So we had a few T-Shirt designs floating around, but hadn't settled on one yet. So, since time is now limited, we decided to go with a design that somewhat follows the theme on some of the HP clothing that they have for this year. Hope you all like it, and if not, we can start designing next year's shirts in January! :-)

Item Donation Form

Meeting Tonight

Just found out that our facebook group meeting link doesn't work for those without facebook accounts, so here are the details for those who still need them! Sorry!!!

When?
Today
Time7:00pm until 10:00pm
Where?
Laura's Place!!!, 35818 Eaglecrest Dr, Abbotsford, British Columbia

Volunteer Registration Form

Here is the volunteer registration form which we would love for you to have filled out by November 20th if possible. If you miss the date, please fill in the form anyway so that we still know who you are. We will be ordering T-Shirts and screen printing that week so we need as accurate info as possible by then. Some of you have received this form via email, and others have not. Please only fill the form out once per person. Thank you!!!