Blog; Ukrainian Children’s Christmas Present Campaign

The conflict in Ukraine may have slipped from the headlines, in the shadow of the troubles in the Middle East, but the war is far from over. Millions of people in Ukraine are still suffering from the terror of daily bombardment and shortages of their most basic needs like power, food and medical facilities.

As the Christmas season draws close, it’s time to show the children of Ukraine that they have not been forgotten. The Plant & Hire Aid Alliance aims to bring a seasonal smile to tens of thousands of children and let them know that they’re here for them in these terrible times.

For the past two years, the Plant & Hire Aid Alliance has arranged Christmas gifts for the children of Ukraine. They sent 30,000 presents in 2022 and 15,000 presents in 2023. These gifts were distributed across Ukraine by friends in the Rotary Club in Ukraine, even reaching Russian-occupied Mariupol.

This year they’re hoping to send even more as they run the appeal once again, and they need your help to make it happen. The Alliance needs both Christmas gift donations and a host of festive volunteers to wrap them, and every little helps.

The campaigners need gifts for boys and girls of all ages, to give them something to open on Christmas morning so that they can forget about the conflict, even for just a few hours. They welcome gifts of all sizes, from a single present to a corporate or charity gift of multiple items.

It would be helpful if contrbutors could wrap their gift in Christmas paper and attach a removable label stating what the gift is, whether it is for a boy or girl and the age range for the gift.

Please send all gifts to Ardent Hire Solutions, 289 Felixstowe Road, Ipswich, IP3 9BS.

The Alliance is delighted to announce that it has already had 25,000 gifts donated for the children of Ukraine. Hopefully there will be lots more to come, and they all need wrapping before they’re dispatched.

To get this mammoth task done, they’re holding three epic wrapathons; one in Ipswich, and two more in Swindon and Bath, in partnership with Friends of Oleksandriya and Swindon Humanitarian Aid Partnership (SHAP). These events take just a few hours of your time and they’re enormously fun and fulfilling, so please get involved if you can.

Around 100 volunteers are needed at each location, with a choice of two shifts, 8am until 12.30pm and 12.30pm until 5pm (or volunteers can stay for both if they want!)

Wrapping paper, sticky tape, labels and pens will be provided but volunteers are asked to bring their own scissors. To sign up for any of the three wrapathons, please visit the Aid Alliance website.

Once wrapped, the gifts will be loaded on to lorries on the 12th December, to be transported to Kosice in Slovakia. From there they’ll be taken by Ukraine Sunflower Aid and the Rotary Club to cities across the country, including Kharkiv, Sumy, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipro, Chuhuiv, Odessa and more.

The Plant & Hire Aid Alliance has had an amazing response to its Christmas gifts for Ukraine campaigns in the last two years, with hundreds of photographs of heart-warming smiles that show just how much joy these presents bring to the children, and to their parents.

This is what Christmas is all about; the joy of giving. But these gifts mean so much more than that. They show solidarity, they show that the world still cares, and above all they show that there is hope for the future for these traumatised children.

These gifts might not seem like much but they mean the world to these children. The Alliance urges people to get involved in whatever way they can, whether that means giving a gift, or giving their time to help wrap the mountain of gifts given by others.

On behalf of all the children of Ukraine, the Plant & Hire Aid Alliance thanks you for your generosity in this season of giving. You can be sure that every gift will be hugely appreciated.