Legos for Littles made a big impact recently at the Santa Fe Depot in Temple, TX for the local observance of National Train Day, sponsored by the Temple Railroad and Heritage Museum, CentraMod and Amtrak.
The Temple Daily Telegram reported, “Family activities were almost too much to keep up with. Some of the children gathered around a Lego-oriented train display. Some of them donned props and had their photo taken, and some of them played in the floor with toy trains. They could meet an Amtrak conductor, win a prize or work at one of the craft tables.”
The Lego Display took 5 1/2 hours to set up, and included an “I Spy” formatted hide and seek. “We picked out 20 different items on the display (Harry Potter, a little boy eating a pretzel, Marty Mcfly etc.) and handed out sheets of paper with them for the kids to find, said Jim Snyder of Lego for Littles. The looks on their faces as they first worked hard to dissect the display and then the joy of finding them…priceless.”
Source: Temple Daily Telegram: Jim Snyder is project manager for Legos for Littles, a nonprofit project under Toughest Kids that started in October. The idea is to provide Legos for underprivileged kids.
“All of these are part of my personal collection,” he said of the display. He got the nonprofit idea when he realized how expensive some of his sets were—and how out of reach for a lot of children.
“If we receive used Lego pieces, we use them at events like this,” he said. “The sets we donate—because most of them go to hospitals—have to be brand new.”
Child Protective Services or women’s shelters are other places where kids need Legos , he said.
“Since we’re so new, the biggest support has been friends and family,” he said. “Everybody seems to think it’s a great idea. Kids love it, and that’s important. That’s why we do it .”