Now in her event’s ninth year, Southeastern Louisiana University (SLU) junior Amber Dillenkoffer, organizer of Amber’s Reason for the Season Toy Drive, held her annual gift giving event on Saturday, Dec. 16 at the St. Charles Parish Professional Learning Center on US-90 in Luling.
The program, sponsored by local nonprofit Dad Dad’s Club, featured free food, arts and crafts and a visit from Santa for guests attending the event. No sign-up process was required for children to attend the Dec. 16 toy gifting event; her organization only required a parent or guardian to attend with their child. Toys supplied at the event were given to infant children, local teenagers and all other ages in between.
“The event went amazing,” Dillenkoffer said of this year’s Christmas toy giveaway. “We usually have hundreds of toys left over after the event is over, but this year we actually had more than twice as many children come through – we had over 550 kids take out a toy – and we [gave away] all 1100 toys by 2:30 on Saturday.”
Starting with modest beginnings nine years ago – an event Dillenkoffer first organized at age 12 – the event has grown over the years from collecting and doling out 123 toys in its first run in 2015 to an impressive 1,092 toy donation count this year, which slightly beat her 2023 goal and improved on her toy roundup in 2022.
“This year, life threw me a lot of curve balls both in my personal life and in regards to the toy drive,” Dillenkoffer, an SLU Elementary Education major, said on Dec. 15 after reaching her 2023 collection goal. “Nonetheless, my amazing community came together once again to celebrate the reason for the season.”
Dillenkoffer began the toy drive in 2015 as a middle school student and pageant contestant. First partnering up with various local charities like Toys for Tots, Access Health and others, Dillenkoffer eventually graduated to organizing the event on her own with financial assistance from Dat Dad’s Club, which she has done each of the last three years.
“I love doing my own event, because I really get to make it what I want it to be,” Dillenkoffer said. “The second I see the first kid line up, it makes everything that I do – all of November and December – immediately worth it.”
Her organization relied on both financial donations from locals as well as a small network of toy drop-off collection boxes the SLU student set up at six different locations throughout St. Charles and St. James parishes, on both sides of the Mississippi River. This year Dillenkoffer was able to recruit around 35 volunteers who assisted her in pulling off her ninth toy give way in St. Charles Parish.
“I am absolutely overwhelmed and overjoyed by the support I received from [toy drive supporters] over the past month and a half,” Dillenkoffer wrote in a recent social media post. “I am in awe each year, [the community] never ceases to amaze me with…generosity. My heart is truly so full!”
For more information on Amber’s Reason for the Season Toy Drive or to donate for next year’s event, visit the organization’s official Facebook page under the same name.
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