BELFAST — A display of one-of-a-kind mittens is hanging in the front windows of the Belfast Community Co-op; one mitten for every donation made to the Belfast Soup Kitchen. The Waterfall Arts Bridge Afterschool Art Club has partnered again with the Belfast Community Co-op to raise money for a local nonprofit organization that serves the community.

The Bridge Afterschool Art Club members chose to raise money this year for the Belfast Soup Kitchen. The Bridge students visited the Belfast Soup Kitchen to learn about what the organization does and learned from Community and Guest Relations Coordinator Maria Jacobs that they serve an average of 392 meals daily through a variety of distribution programs. They also provide an average of 103 supplemental food bags/boxes daily to families in the community. They recruited a team of young artists to decorate more than one hundred paper mittens that can now be found in front of the Co-op registers. Co-op shoppers and owners can “buy” a mitten by making a donation to the Belfast Soup Kitchen and the mitten will be placed in the Co-op window.

Hung in the windows, the mittens bring art into the community while raising awareness of the Belfast Soup Kitchen’s work to eliminate chronic hunger for the people and families of Waldo County, not only by offering nutritious food, but also connections to resources.

“When you shop at the Belfast Community Co-op, you are buying into a better world,” said Belfast Community Co-op Outreach Coordinator Alessandra Martinelli, in a news release. “Giving back to the community that our owners and workers live in is one of the strongest parts of our identity.”

The Belfast Soup Kitchen aims to eliminate chronic hunger for the people and families of Belfast and surrounding Waldo County communities by serving nutritious, high-quality meals 5 days a week year-round. They provide a warm environment for guests to gather for conversation and to access educational programming and connections to resources to address the root causes of hunger and poverty.  For more information, visit belfastsoupkitchen.org.

ABOUT THE WATERFALL ARTS BRIDGE AFTERSCHOOL ART CLUB

The Waterfall Arts Bridge Afterschool Art Club is a weekly program for sixth graders to connect to themselves, each other and their community through art.

ABOUT THE BELFAST CO-OP

Located in the heart of downtown Belfast, the Belfast Community Co-op has been serving our area since 1976. Everyone is welcome to shop at the Co-op: it is our mission and our pleasure to bring locally sourced, reasonably priced, organic and natural products to all. For more information, please visit belfast.coop.