Toys

Treasure map in hand, kids at the swap meet in Costa Mesa will have a chance to search out a plastic egg containing a golden ticket at the Orange County Market Place’s free Easter Festival and Treasure Hunt on April 11. Vendors and food concession stands will hand out free candy and small toys and five lucky hunters who find golden tickets will win a “special,” unspecified prize. Check-in for the hunt begins at 10 a.m. The Easter Bunny will also be on hand for photos and free face painting, and a puppet show will be presented throughout the day. Admission to the swap meet costs $2 except for kids under 12 who get in free.

In the 18 years volunteers from Someone Cares Soup Kitchen in Costa Mesa have been giving out toys at Christmas time, never was the line as long as it was Tuesday, organizers said. Nearly 1,500 parents and children lined up outside of the Costa Mesa Neighborhood Community Center on Tuesday morning to receive a gift for Christmas and take a picture with Santa and have their face painted. For many, it was their only opportunity to celebrate the holidays in these hard times. “You kind of see the kids faces and how overjoyed they are,” said Shannon Santos, executive director for Someone Cares.

They were going to “cram the cruiser,” but instead they ended up “tricking out the trolley.” Women Looking Forward, a subgroup of the Orange County United Way, jammed the back half of a holiday-themed trolley with toys, clothes, diapers and blankets at the organization’s headquarters Friday in Irvine, then drove the whole thing over to Costa Mesa-based charity Share Our Selves. The large trolley was donated for the occasion by the O.C. Cruiser company, which had originally planned to send over the VW bus for which the business is named.

First-, second- and third-graders at Harbor View Elementary didn’t just donate toys to the Spark of Love drive at a nearby fire station; instead of a plain-old holiday party, they took a field trip and walked over there together. And they didn’t just get their parents to buy toys; they had to earn the money themselves by doing chores. “I took out the trash and cleaned the garage,” said third-grader Chase Munger. It’s a growing tradition at Harbor View, brought on by a family relation: Capt.

When the Costa Mesa High School cheer squad decided to run a toy drive for the first time this year, its members didn?t realize they would get help from an Angel. The guiding spirit in this case would be the Costa Mesa-based Angels Charity, whose founder, Doug Hansen, started it to aid children with special needs, like his 6-year-old daughter. The charity?s most visible accomplishment, Angels Playground, offers disabled kids the most accessibility of any playground in the area.

The Orange County Sport and Social Club plans to score touchdowns for tots during its first “Charity Bowl” event in Huntington Beach. The club, a social network that draws people together through sporting activities, is hosting the football tournament to raise money for Toys for Tots, in the spirit of giving back to the community and the holiday season, the club’s President Gus Mundth said. “All of the proceeds will benefit the charity,” he said.

Prompted by the success of last year’s event, Costa Mesa real estate broker Weichman Associates turned the Fairview Park train station into a winter wonderland for a second time. More than 1,000 people came out Saturday afternoon to ride the train to Santa’s Village — a makeshift cluster of activities including face painting, cookie decorating and photos with Santa Claus. This year, for the first time, the event partnered with the Costa Mesa Fire Department through ABC7’s Spark of Love campaign to collect toys for needy children.

It may be the season of giving, but so far, many people aren’t. Because of hard times or perhaps because the message hasn’t gotten out, holiday toy drives throughout the city are reporting trouble in the toy box. If more people don’t donate, charity workers say needy kids might not have much of a Christmas. Costa Mesa public education specialist Brenda Emrick found only four toys inside a toy drop-off box at one Costa Mesa fire station Thursday morning. At the Newport Beach fire station next to Fashion Island, firefighters had collected just about a box full, only the size of a trash can. “It was not nearly this bad last year,” Emrick said Thursday.

Most people feel this is the most wonderful time of the year, but it can often be a pain for those trying to find something fun and unique for their little munchkins. So we thought we could help out by checking in with Lori and Mike Curtin, owners of Toy Boat Toy Boat Toy Boat in Newport Beach, to see what might appear under the tree.   Tell us about how Toy Boat began. Toy Boat has been a local toy store for more than 15 years. In the last seven years we have grown from one to four locations throughout Newport Beach.

The cheerleaders at Costa Mesa High School and the CMHS Medical Club are joining forces to collect unwrapped toys to donate this Christmas season to CHOC Hospital.  Community service and helping others is a very important part of the CMHS cheer program and they are very excited to continue their annual tradition of donating toys to children in our community in need. If you are interested in donating some toys for the cause you can drop off at Costa Mesa High School attn: Cheer Toy Drive or contact CMHScheer@aol.