Whole Foods is hosting Chocolate Fest, a store-wide tasting event, tomorrow, Thursday, February 11 from 5 to 7 p.m. at three of its Seattle locations, including the Interbay store, at 2001 15th Ave W. Interested parties can purchase passports to explore the store full of chocolate concoctions for $5. All proceeds from the event will be going to Heroes for Homeless, a local non-profit dedicated to assisting homeless people living on the streets of Seattle find safe and organized shelter.

Before joining their friends and family to watch the Superbowl on Sunday, Queen Anne parents, teachers and students volunteered their time running the Help for Haiti Rummage Sale, raising just shy of $20,000 for post-earthquake aide.

This is the second time Coe Elementary, John Hay and McClure Middle School have gotten together to run a major sale event for charity. The three schools first teamed up in 2005, just after the tsunami, and successfully raised $10,000. When the earthquake hit Haiti, the organizers decided to run the event again. This time they raised $19,200.

“The same group all came together and decided to do it again,” said organizers and former John Hay parent Mimi Gan. Their goal was to beat their previous record. “We’ve almost doubled it!” she said.

As for the sale itself, items varied from used toys and clothes, to housewares, baked goods (the in-house bake sale raised $755 alone) and even some last-minute surprise donations, including a car! According to Gan, the principal of Coe Elementary, Mr. Elliott, drove his car to the rummage sale and began taking bids, eventually selling it for $350.

“I don’t know how old it was,” Gan said. “He was very honest about it – there were some things wrong with it. But it sold!”

(This is Mr. Elliott’s fifth and last year at Coe. He will be moving to the new Old Hay, Queen Anne Elementary for the 2010-2011 school year).

Volunteers said the rummage sale stayed relatively busy from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., when the crowds were taken over by football frenzy.

“We had a steady flow of people most of the day. At the end, we did a Craig’s list blast to get rid of as much as we could. We advertised $5 for what you could take out,” said fellow parent and volunteer Stacy Lawson. As for the results, “We were ecstatic,” she said.

“It was great fun,” Gan said. “It was a great community builder and people were so generous.”

According to Gan the money will be dispersed evenly between three aid organizations, the American Red Cross, Partners in Health and Project Hope.

(Thanks to Eileen Nishi for the pictures!)

Yogalife’s Queen Anne location is offering a class from 1 to 2 p.m. tomorrow, Saturday, February 6 benefiting “Stand With Haiti”, a project of Partners In Health, an organization that has been working to improve health care in Haiti for over 20 years. Tomorrow’s class will be donation-only, and open to individuals and families with members of all ages. Read more about Liv’s family yoga classes here. For more information, call (206) 283-9642.

This is just a reminder that the Help for Haiti Rummage Sale, a joint venture between neighborhood schools Coe Elementary, John Hay and McClure Middle School, is this Sunday, February 7 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Coe gym (located at located at 2424 7th Ave W).

Donations of gently used goods to be sold at the rummage sale can be made from 3:30 to 5 p.m. on Friday, February 5 at Coe and Hay, and on Saturday, February 6 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Coe. All proceeds will benefit the American Red Cross.

There will also be a bake sale at the rummage sale, headed by the folks at John Hay. Baked goods can be dropped off at Coe Elementary on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. Parents and kids interested in volunteering their time at the bake sale should contact Kim Clements at 206-963-9589 or kclements@jasdesignbuild.com, or simply show up between 10 .m. and 3 p.m. on Sunday. More information here.

To get involved, contact the following representatives:

John Hay: Susan Sweeney at susweeney@seattleschools.org and Lynn Baker at lybaker@seattleschools.org:

Coe: Becky Lederman at lederman4@msn.com, Lisa Cole at davidandlisacole@mac.com, and Stacy Lawson at slawson7@gmail.com.

McClure: Margarita Vanegas at mvvanegas@seattleschools.org.

General  Information: Lindsay Foody at honeyfoody@yahoo.com, and Mimi Gan at mimigan@msn.com or (206) 390-2312.

Kids from Coe recently ran a bake sale for Haiti, raising $1,645 in one afternoon!

Martha Downey recently moved to Queen Anne from View Ridge, and for her housewarming she’s decided to host a bake sale in her new neighborhood to raise money for those those in need in Haiti. A student at SCCC, Martha believes it is important to help not only those in your community, but other around the world as well. She wrote,

I chose to do this fundraiser because I finally feel old enough and able enough to do good for people outside of my community, and it has affected people I interact with daily (I have a classmate whose whole family is either in or from Haiti) and I wanted to give back and feel like I made an impact instead of just sitting back and watching it happen.

Martha and a couple friends will be set up outside the closed Peet’s on Queen Anne Ave N and Boston St. (the same spot kids from Coe Elementary held their bake sale last weekend) this Saturday, January 30 from 12 to 4:30 p.m. (or until they run out) selling homemade goodies.

As for the charity the proceeds will be going to, Martha says she’s still deciding between UNICEF and the Red Cross. If you want to help Martha with her bake sale or make a donation, contact her via her Twitter page.

Over the weekend a QueenAnneView reader wrote in, after having been approached and asked to donate money to a seemingly worthy fundraiser, concerned about its legitimacy–benevolent neighborhood donation or fraud? Derek wrote on Sunday, January 24,

This evening a couple middle aged folks were wandering around asking for $10 donations, to go toward a family that lives somewhere in the neighborhood. Allegedly, a 3 year old fell out a window around Christmas time. Now the family is in need of financial support for the “medication” the girl needs to be on. I asked several questions, the woman was pretty quick to answer most of them. The only thing I thought was strange was that I offered to write a check to help and she didn’t know if she could accept a check. She was going to ask somebody and get back to me in fifteen minutes. She never came back. There would be absolutely no reason the couldn’t accept checks, right?

Derek wasn’t sure if he was being paranoid, and wondered if any other Queen Anne residents had had a similar encounter. As it happens, a reader of our sister-site, MagnoliaVoice, was asked to make a donation to the same cause just last night. Katherine wrote to Magnolia Voice,

This evening around 7:30 a man rang my doorbell to solicit funds for a Magnolia family. The man was selling stuffed animals that he said were donated, for $10. He said the fundraiser was for a Magnolia family whose child fell out of a three story window. While I am all for supporting Magnolia families in need I am not convinced that this isn’t a scam.

Neither QueenAnneView or MagnoliaVoice have heard any reports about a 3-year-old that fell out of a window around Christmas – on Christmas Eve, according to what Derek was told. Does anyone know anything about this story? Please comment below with any information you may have.

Kids from Coe Elementary will be hosting a bake sale tomorrow outside the Starbucks on Queen Anne Ave N and Boston St. from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. to raise money for the victims of the Haiti earthquake. Red Square Yoga owner and mom of two at the school, Stacy Lawson, is helping to organize the event. She says Coe has a long track record of charitable work in the community and abroad, powered first and foremost by the students.

“We have a real history of doing social justice work on a level the kids can appreciate,” Lawson said, noting that the school has run a number of succsesful fundraisers in the past, raising over $800 at a bake sale for their sister organization, an all girls school in Afghanistan, and over $10,000 at a rummage sale benefiting tsunami victims.

According to Lawson, the events are about more than just coming together to help those in need – they’re also about teaching students, from an early age, that they can make a difference in the world around them. “The kids play a big part in the organization,” she said. “They host the sale. If they’re old enough, they can help with the baking. They post the fliers. They really understand that they can help impact things that go on around the world. It’s much more about their effort.”

Although Coe is teaming up with John Hay and McClure in just a couple of weeks to host a rummage sale benefiting Haiti, the parents and students from Coe decided that there was more they could do to help the country in wake of such a devastating earthquake, beginning plans for the bake sale on Tuesday.

“We decided that we need to put some focus on Haiti,” Lawson said. Though there will be parents volunteers supervising the event, the kids will be walking up and down Queen Anne Ave promoting the sale and talking about the group the proceeds will benefit, Partners in Health, a non-profit organization founded by Paul Farmer that has been working to support advocacy and health care in Haiti for over 20 years.

“Really this is about the kids. They’ll be on the street and they’ll be walking around and trying to get people to go come to the bake sale,” Lawson said. “We encourage them to talk about the issues and speak to about the organization that we’re contribute to.”

Lawson says they chose Partners in Health because of their longstanding work in helping Haiti from the inside out. “He’s on the ground in Haiti and he’s doing work,” she said. “[Paul Farmer is] not just about bringing in international relief teams, but he’s about helping locals solve their own problems.”

If you can’t make it to the bake sale tomorrow, you can still help by participating in the rummage sale between Coe, John Hay and McClure, which will be held on on Sunday February 7 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Coe gym, located at 2424 7th Ave W. You can donate gently used items for the sale from 3:30 to 5 p.m. on Friday, February 5 at Coe and Hay, and on Saturday, February 6 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Coe.

Lawson hopes that the rummage sale, which has been a successful fundraiser in the past, will again raise a large sum. “We feel that even in this down-turned economy, this is still something people can do, buying second-hand,” she said.

For more details and contact information for the rummage sale, click here. To support the bake sale, swing by Queen Anne Ave and Boston St. between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. tomorrow.

In November Queen Anne Manor, an assisted living community at the top of the hill, collected used clothing for disabled youth and adults. Last month they helped homeless workers get through the winter by donating gloves, mittens, hats and scarves. And true to their charitable commitment, this month they are holding a toy collection drive for the Seattle Children’s Hospital. Starting tomorrow, January 6 through Saturday, February 6 approved toys (see below) can be dropped off at the Manor, located at 100 Crockett St. to be donated.

“These toys (new or gently used) are for the patients who are there under dire, in many cases, life threatening circumstances and for many months at a time,” said Queen Anne Manor Marketing Director Bethany Leigh Juchem.

Approved toys for children with the greatest needs include fuzzy coloring posters, small Lego sets, Brio trains (no track), nail polish, coloring books, arts and crafts kits, playing cards, tactile toys for all ages, Disney/Pixar DVDs, PG-13 DVDs, gift cards and Spanish, Vietnamese and Russian videos, books and music. Approved toys for toddlers include light, sound and pop-up toys, mirrors, links, rattles, teething rings, board books, sound books, sorting/stacking toys, busy boxes, washable squeeze toys, beginning cars and trucks and Fisher-Price Little People play sets. (No infant gyms please).

The Manor will deliver the donated toys to the Children’s Hospital on Sunday, February 7. For more information on the Manor’s philanthropic work and details on approved toys, visit their website.

Santa will be landing at ProRobics at the top of the hill this weekend, located at 1530 Queen Anne Ave N., where he will be taking pictures with with anyone in the holiday spirit, including pets. Photos are $10 each and 100 percent of the proceeds will go to youth activities programs at the Queen Anne Community Center, which provide many healthy, active learning activities for kids of all ages. 100 percent of the pet photo proceeds will go toward community veterinary assistance programs. Any further proceeds to ProRobotics will be put toward “activity scholarships, upgrades to equipment and direct assistance to a local family in need in the form of winter coats, socks and underwear and toys.”

Santa will be at ProRobics the following times this weekend:

Friday, December 18: 4:00 p.m. to 7:00pm
Saturday, December 19: 2:00 p.m. to 6:00pm
Sunday, December 20: 2:00 p.m. to 5:00pm

Thanks to Heather for the tip!

12 Bars of Christmas, an annual charity event for Dynamic Family Services, is having their annual pud crawl fundraiser in Lower Queen Anne this weekend! This Saturday, December 12, participants will celebrate the holidays by quenching their thirst at 12 different Uptown bars.

The pub crawl will start at Bandits at 3 p.m., before proceeding to the other 11 venues, spending between 30 and 60 minutes at each. Other crawl stops include: Tini Bigs Lounge, Hula Hula, Buckleys, The Spectator, Ozzie’s, The Sitting Room, Ascada Bistro, Floyd’s Place, Jabu’s Pub, McMenamins and The Nabob. The bars will be offering food and drink specials to all pub crawlers (see the itinerary and special deals here).

12 Bars of Christmas is asking for a $5 donation, which will all go to Dynamic Family Services, a non-profit organization dedicated to enhancing the development of children with disabilities in King County by providing quality early intervention services and training for parents.

“Last year, we had tons of fun,” organizer Bindi Shah wrote. “Can’t wait to see everyone!”

You can check out pictures of last year’s event here. Donate and register (so you can get an official crawl wristband) here.

Four times a year Whole Foods has a special event called 5% day, when each location donates 5 percent of their net sales to a 501c3 non-profit. Today the five Whole Foods in the Seattle Metropolitan area, including the new Interbay store, will be donating to Operation Frontline, a nutrition education program that teaches families how to create healthy and satisfying meals on a budget.

Operation Frontline is run by Solid Ground, an organization committed to helping provide equal opportunities within the Seattle community. Today, much of their work focuses on combating poverty, homelessness and hunger. Solid Ground is based out of the Wallingford neighborhood, and provides assistance to around 38,000 households in King County every year.