Mayor’s Birthday Club

Fliers to promote the Birthday Club

You can help promote the Mayor’s Birthday Club at your School, Organization, or Church. We’ve provided two versions of the Mayor’s Birthday Club Invitation here.

Flier - Schools and Organizations

Flier - Religious Organizations

Birthday Club tips for parents

The Mayor’s Birthday Club Party Tips for ParentsDear Parents,

These “tips” are almost the same as the “Planning Tips for Young People”, with a few additions.

Many parents and children across our great country are already asking friends to donate to charities in lieu of purchasing birthday presents. Through this practice, instead of accumulating more “stuff”, our children learn a wonderful lesson about sharing with children and families less fortunate. The Mayor’s Birthday Club not only helps us teach our children about charity and citizenship, it focuses local generosity and provides a means of spreading this practice of “giving to others”. Please share information about Mayor’s Birthday Club with your friends as a way to spread the word!

Plan the Birthday Party and the Donation Process Together with your Child. Compliment your child for his/her generisoty.

Make it a Fun Party!

Organize your child’s party as you would any other birthday party: Invitations, cake and ice cream, games, decorations, etc. Make sure your child knows that it will be a “typical ” fun birthday party. If you go to a special restaurant, to a movie, or have a sleep-over as your birthday event — the same idea applies - keep the event fun. The idea is not to give up having a fun party, the idea is to make generosity part of the celebration!

About the presents:

Ask your child to think about how much stuff she/he already has, and about much he/she really uses or plays with the stuff. The idea of the Mayor’s Birthday Club is to “trade” getting the usual inexpensive birthday presents (a bunch of stuff that your child probably doesn’t really need anyway) for a donation by friends and family members to those children and families who are in great need.

Reassure your child that she/he will receive a nice present at her/his birthday party. Ask your child if she/he has a special thing that she/he has really been hoping for, and pick out that gift together. Purchase and wrap this special “family present” as you would any special gift for this occasion, and include a message about how proud you are of your child.

Help your child prepare the following:

1. Encourage your child to handwrite a note about making a donation to Crisis Nursery instead of buying a birthday present, a note to send along with the birthday invitations. A personalized letter is a great way for your child to reflect on the meaning of giving, and to share her/his own thoughts and feelings about sharing with others in need.

2. Since the parents of your child’s friends will need to be involved in the donation process, a stamped, addressed envelope to the Crisis Nursery already made out by your child will really makes it much more convenient to send their donations.

Crisis Nursery - Mayor’s Birthday Club
1309 West Hill St, Urbana, IL 61801

Here are some Address Labels to print on label paper.

3. Your child may want to include an information sheet about the Crisis Nursery along with the handwritten note and the invitation to the birthday party. You may use the information sheet included on this Web site, or go to the Crisis Nursery web site and help your child create her/his own information sheet: http://www.crisisnursery.net/. Information about Crisis Nursery may help teach how the donation really does make a difference in the lives of others.

Your child may also want to list some items that party guests could purchase as gifts for the Crisis Nursery, such as blankets, PJs, and sippee cups. To see what they need at the Crisis Nursery go see their needs list.

Birthday Club tips for young people

The Mayor’s Birthday Club Party Planning/Donation Tips

Make it a fun event:

Organize your party as you would any other birthday party: Cake and ice cream, games, decorations, etc. Make sure your friends know that it will be a “typical ” fun birthday party. If you go to a special restaurant, to a movie, or have a sleep-over as your birthday event ­­- the same idea applies - keep the event fun. The idea is not to give up having a fun party!

About the presents:

Think about how much stuff you already have, and about how much you really use or play with the stuff you have. The idea of the Mayor’s Birthday Club is to “trade” getting the usual inexpensive birthday presents (a bunch of stuff that you probably don’t really need anyway) for a donation by your friends and family members to those children and families who are in great need.

You would still receive a nice present at your Birthday party. If you have one special thing that you have really been hoping for, talk to your parents about that one special thing. Maybe just getting that one thing as a special present from your parents is enough.

Along with your birthday party invitations, you might enclose three additional items:

(1) A short handwritten letter from you asking your friends and/or family members to send a donation to the Crisis Nursery instead of buying you a present. You should write your own personalized letter. Share your own ideas and feelings about making donations to others in need.

(2) A stamped, addressed envelope to the Crisis Nursery already made out by you to:

Crisis Nursery - Mayor’s Birthday Club
1309 West Hill St, Urbana, IL 61801

This stamped, already addressed envelope makes it much more convenient for your friends to send their donations.
Here are some Address Labels to print on label paper.

(3) An information sheet about the Crisis Nursery. You may use the information sheet included on this website here, or go to the Crisis Nursery web site and create your own information sheet:
http://www.crisisnursery.net/.

You may also want to list some items that one could purchase as gifts for the Crisis Nursery, such as blankets, PJs, and sippee cups. To see what they need at the Crisis Nursery go see their needs list.

You should send that information sheet along with your invitations so that your friends may learn more about why a donation makes a difference in the lives of others.

After the party, don’t forget to thank your friends and family members for making their donations, just as you would thank them for buying you a present.

Print the membership form

The membership form for the Mayor’s Birthday Club is available here in two formats. Please choose whichever format works best for you in order to print and complete the form.

Membership Form - MS Word

Membership Form - Adobe PDF

Letter to Civic Leaders

Dear community leaders,I am writing this letter to encourage you to support a new initiative from the Mayor’s office, called the “Mayor’s Birthday Club”. The Mayor’s Birthday Club seeks to show our children how to participate in civic life in a way that benefits children and families in great need. Children participate in the Mayor’s Birthday Club by asking their friends and family members to make a donation to the Crisis Nursery instead of buying the child typical birthday presents.

We invite Champaign schools, churches, and civic organizations to promote this initiative. We ask you to encourage children and families in our community to join the Mayor’s Birthday Club by announcing this program, distributing informational materials, and following up with periodic invitations to join.

Children who sign up and participate in the Mayor’s Birthday Club will be given a Mayor’s Birthday Club Membership Certificate along with Party Planning & Donation Tips that will assist them in planning their party. The Planning Tips include creative ways of asking friends and family members to make donations to Crisis Nursery. Participating children will also be honored at an annual community event in recognition of their civic generosity. This event will be organized as a “Birthday Party” with cake and ice cream, with Certificates of Appreciation personally awarded to each child by Mayor Schweighart, along with a group photo with the Mayor.

We are proud to have the opportunity to contribute, in our own small way, to the need in our community through the Crisis Nursery, an “Island of Safety” to children whose families are in crisis due to parental stress, illness, accidents, homelessness and substance abuse, children who through no fault of their own have no other resources. We also believe that the Mayor’s Birthday Club could become a model program for other communities in the area. For more information about this program please contact the Mayor’s Office: 217/403-8720.

Thank you for your time and interest helping us launch this important initiative.

Mayor Gerald Schweighart

Birthday Club History

This initiatve was started in 2007 by a local parent and her 8 and 10 year old daughters who, like similar minded families across the nation, have been asking friends to donate to charities instead of buying birthday presents.

We thought that since so many generous families were already doing this, we might try to spread the practice further throughout our community by giving it an official name, by getting the Mayor’s office on-board, and by recognizing civic minded children through an annual event. (A Birthday Party with the Mayor, how cool is that?)

We chose the Crisis Nursery in Champaign, Illinois as the recipient of donations to the Mayor’s Birthday Club because it is such a valuable locally operated resource for helping children and families in need in our community.

Invitation to Join the Mayor’s Birthday Club

Hey Kids! You are invited to join the Mayor’s Birthday Club! To become a member of the Mayor’s Birthday Club, all you need to do is enroll! Then ask your friends to send a donation to Crisis Nursery instead of buying you the “usual party gifts” at your next birthday party.

As a member of the Mayor’s Birthday Club, you will be giving up getting those little gifts from your pals, but you will not give up the cool, fun birthday party with your friends. Also, your family will still get you a really nice present.

Steps to take to be a member of the Mayor’s Birthday Club:

1. Talk this over with your parents.
2. Fill out the Mayor’s Birthday Club Enrollment form, ask your parents to sign and mail, e-mail, or fax the enrollment form to the Mayor’s Office.
3. Include a handwritten note with your party invitations, telling your friends that you would rather have them make a donation to the Crisis Nursery instead of buying you a birthday present.
4. Include with your party invitations to friends a stamped mailing envelope for each friend to send their donation to the Crisis Nursery.
5. The mailing envelope should already be addressed to the Crisis Nursery Mayor’s Birthday Club, 1309 West Hill St, Urbana, IL 61801.
6. If you want, you can make your own mailing labels for the Mayor’s Birthday Club donations to Crisis Nursery. Print these labels onto label paper and stick the labels onto your stamped envelops.
7. Get some other Birthday Party Planning Tips here!

The Mayor’s office will send you a confirmation card, letting you know that they have received your enrollment form.

To celebrate your kindness, you will be invited to a once a year event called the Mayor’s Birthday Party. We will have cake and ice cream and other treats at the Mayor’s Birthday Club Party, and you will be individually recognized by the Mayor for your citizenship and generosity. You will be officially awarded a Mayor’s Certificate of Appreciation. You will also have your picture taken with the Mayor!

Parents who have questions may also call Peggy Wade at the Mayor’s office: 217/403-8720.

Hey Kids

You are invited to join the Mayor’s Birthday Club!

To become a member of the Mayor’s Birthday Club, all you need to do is enroll.

Then ask your friends to send a donation to Crisis Nursery instead of buying you the “usual party gifts” at your next birthday party.

As a member of the Mayor’s Birthday Club, you will be giving up getting those little gifts from your pals, but you will not give up the cool, fun birthday party with your friends. Also, your family will still get you a really nice present. Once a year, we will have a cool Mayor’s Birthday Party honoring YOU for your generosity toward others!

Best wishes,

Mayor Schweighart